Define ‘functioning’ Parliament

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has begun the New Year on a positive note. He urged the Congress, and the Opposition as a whole, to let Parliament function for the country’s development and not to disrupt it for “political reasons”. This undoubtedly well-intentioned sentiment needs to be introspected on by all sides of the political spectrum.

To my mind, it seems the Prime Minister would like the Opposition to consciously cultivate a radically new form of political amnesia. It must forget that prior to coming to power the Bharatiya Janata Party had, as a matter of deliberate policy, disrupted almost 40 per cent of the last Parliament. It must forget that the leaders of Opposition of the BJP in both Houses had given ideological reasons to justify such tactics, and had gone so far as to say that disruption of Parliament is a legitimate form of “democratic activism”. It must also forget that when they were in the Opposition, the BJP, in dealing with allegations of corruption against ministers in the United Progressive Alliance government, had reduced politics to an explosive simplicity: Resign first, Discuss later. It must further forget that several ministers in the UPA dispensation were forced to resign even when there were no charges proven against them. And it must also forget that when allegations of manifest corruption are raised against BJP ministers now, the BJP’s answer is that it is ready to “debate” the matter but the question of resignations, or even investigation and action, does not arise.

The scope of the amnesia must extend further. The current Opposition in Parliament must also forget that when in Opposition, it was the BJP that held up the Goods and Services Tax Bill for over three years, not the least because a certain chief minister in Gujarat was then against it. There is almost universal consensus in Parliament on the need to pass the GST today. But, in order to resolve the three remaining points of difference, the treasury benches needed to do much more to find a negotiated solution. Was a genuine and sustained attempt made to reach out to the Opposition well in advance of the Winter Session of Parliament? Was the famous invitation by Mr Modi to Congress president Sonia Gandhi for a cup of tea, well into the Winter Session, not too little too late, and that too without adequate and serious follow-up? But, asking such questions may invite the disapproval of Mr Modi, who has made it clear that only the Opposition is at fault. To fulfil Mr  Modi’s high-minded vision of a “functioning” Parliament, the Opposition must also master the qualities of forgiveness, acceptance and tolerance. It must forgive ministers of the government when they make outrageous statements that question the very foundations of our polity.

There should be no reaction to the atrocious statement made by Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti; there should be passive acceptance of General V.K. Singh’s insensitive comparison of a dalit child who was burnt alive to a dog; there should be silent tolerance of Union minister of state for tourism and culture Mahesh Sharma’s unbelievable comment that former President Abdul Kalam was a good man in spite of being a Muslim; there should be mute forgiveness in response to the statement of Sakshi Maharaj, a sitting BJP MP, that Nathuram Godse was a martyr, whose hanging should be celebrated as “Balidan Divas”; and, there should be unquestioning acceptance of all the statements being made every other day by organisations affiliated to the BJP and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh on making Bharat into an exclusively Hindu nation, even as the illiterate right-wing moral police goes berserk, and anyone opposing its shallow notion of Hinduism or patriotism is murdered.

The Opposition should also just close its eyes and allow Parliament to function according to the government’s agenda even when a BJP-appointed governor in the sensitive border state of Arunachal Pradesh is openly making a mockery of the Constitution. It should not protest when the Indian Railways evicts slum dwellers in Shakur Basti in New Delhi without a thought for their relocation and rehabilitation. It should allow the House to function unperturbed as dalits are brutally maimed and killed in Punjab in farmhouses owned by those allegedly associated with the ruling Akali Dal. It should act like a well-behaved school child even as non-BJP chief ministers are targeted while those of the BJP facing grave charges of corruption are allowed to go about their business as though nothing has happened. It should never open its mouth on issues of price rise, economic distress, the suicide of farmers, and economic mismanagement, nor on unproductive foreign policy handling.

Parliament must, indeed, function. Nobody can support the unseemly spectacle of a dysfunctional Parliament. But there is a seminal question that does need to be answered. What is the definition of a “functioning” Parliament? Is it only a House where nothing else is raised except the bills hurriedly put together by the government? Can the so-called goal of “development”, that the government mistakenly believes is its only concern exclude all other issues, including that of balanced economic development itself?

Mr Modi has made a statesmanlike call for Parliament to function. Even if we ignore the irony of such a demand being made by the person who is the leader of a party that perfected the art of disrupting Parliament and justified the validity of doing so, the Prime Minister should also understand that the onus of making Parliament function rests just as much with the treasury benches as it does with the Opposition. Perhaps, the next time Mr Modi appears as a victim of the Opposition in Parliament, he will be more objective and assess the government’s abilities to reach out to the Opposition, and also evaluate the contribution of his own actions along with those of his government, ministers and MPs in creating fissures within the House.

Author-diplomat Pavan K. Varma is a Rajya Sabha member

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