NDA's boycott of parliament

Change of governments after every some years is a sign of mature democracy.Unless people change the governments,the rules tend to take the people for granted and they tend to form an attitude that they would win the elections no matter what they do. This attitude is likely to have adverse impact on the socio-economic progress of any country,more especially the developing country like India.In such a country where a significant part of population does not have access to even basic necessities like water, power,education,emplyment and roads, a sword of Damocles should be kept hanging on the rulers all the time, constantly reminding them to work or else face the wrath of the electorate. One might want to call this 'negative pressure' on the rulers to bring about development but as long as it works, nobody should grudge about it.So change of government after every some years is a sign of a mature democracy.

On the one hand, in India, we have states like Tamil Nadu and Kerala, where electorate votes overwhelmingly in favour of one party in one election and reduces the same party to shambles in the following election.When they get a chance to exercise their franchise five more years down the line, they do not exhibit even a miniscule sense of compuction and bring the very same party to power, which they decisively voted against only five years back. On the other hand, we have West Bengal where the Communist parties have not been defeated once since 1977.Even in Maharashtra, Congress party was firmly in saddle between 1960 and 1995, a span of 35 years. We need to find a golden mean out of these two extremities.We should bring about change of guard after every, say two elections.

From that point of view, defeat of the BJP led NDA in the elections to the 14th Lok Sabha, was a positive development, that should not raise too many eye-brows.

If we analyze the performance of the BJP as an opposition party over last one year, we can say that it has been dismal.

Firstly, the UPA government headed by Manmohan Singh depends on the communist parties for its very survival. When NDA was in power, the BJP had to keep issues like Ram Mandir, Article 370 and Uniform Civil Code in backburner. BJP was subjected to lot of criticism because of that.But let's see what is happening now.For all these years, the communist parties dubbed the congress 'Party of Capitalists'.When Manmohan Singh and P.V.Narsinha Rao first introduced era of liberalization and economic reforms in 1991,these very communists were die-hard opponents not only of the economic reforms but also of Manmohan Singh, who introduced them.

On July 27,1993, Somnath Chaterjee said in the Lok Sabha, during debate on the motion of No-confidence against the Congress government headed by Mr.P.V.Narsinha Rao:

"The history of the Congress rule in this country is the history of the betrayal of the common people. It is a history of exploitation and the history of surrender to forces of divisiveness and fundamentalism. The history of the Congress rule in the country is the history of poverty,, history of illiteracy, history of unemployment and malnutrition. And last but not the least, the direct result of the Congress rule over all these years is the corrosion of our body politic for all pervading "

In the same speech, he went of launching attack on the economic policies of the Congress government by saying:

"We had a lot of peroration from Shri P. chidambaram on economic policy. But the common people of this country are not interested in your semantics. They are not interested in your peroration only. They want results. If the people of this country had accepted your economic policy, our oppositic would be of no avail. But the question is. do they accpet your policy. This is how you delude yourselves. I hoope Dr. manmohan Singh will participate in this debate ad please, aprt from your usual quota, you give us something new on this. "

(Reference: Lok Sabha Debates Archive )

Close to 12 years down the line, same Somnath Chaterjee is holding the post of Speaker of Lok Sabha wherein same Manmohan Singh is the Prime Minister, same P.Chidambaram is the Finance Minister, same Congress party, which 'betrayed the common people for so long' is the largest constituent of the ruling coalition and moreover the same party to which Mr. Chaterjee belongs is supporting that coalition.

If we go through the archives of debates in the Lok Sabha during last 53 years, we would find plethora of evidences of scathing attack lanuched by the commmunists on the Congress party. But when the very same communists are supporting the Congress party, are they not putting their long standing policy in abeyance?Are they not compromising their 'core ideology'?If BJP was subjected to flood of criticism for compromising their 'core ideology', now the communists also deserve the same. I am sure the BJP could focus on this point effectively in and out of the parliament.Have they done it?Answer is not difficult.It is 'NO'.

Secondly the BJP raised the point of 'tainted ministers'.In a parliamentary democracy, any member of Parliament can serve as minister so long as he/she enjoys the confidence of the house and pleasure of the President (read Prime Minsiter).So no ,,matter how much clamour the BJP makes and shouts from the rooftops, their point is not going to carry the day nor the confidence of the people. If they wanted to target Laloo Yadav, they could have raised the sorry state of affairs in Bihar, which Laloo ruled single handedly de-jure or de-facto.If you need a single evidence of the bottomless abyss Bihar was heading for under Laloo's rule, read Patna high court's verdict in a case in 1999.I do not have the exact details of the case or date of verdict or any other detailed information. But from what I read in newspapers, the Patna High Court observed :" There are only two options left for law abiding citizens in Bihar. One is to commit suicide and the second is to leave the state". BJP could have raised this point effectively in and out of parliament to catch attention of the people instead of focussing on Laloo's being 'tained'.

Thirdly, the BJP failed to make an issue of the disregard to democratic norms being shown by the Congress party since coming to power last year.Congress removed governors having RSS background.Actually governor is a constitutional post and any governor cannot be removed from his/her post arbitrarily.The only grounds for removal of a state governor could be failure to safeguard the constitution or failure to discharge the duties.On these two counts, governor of Goa, Mr. S.C.Jamir and governor of Jharkhand, Mr. Syed Sibtey Razi were fit cases of dismissal.But the BJP was too preoccupied with managing its sore relations with the RSS to effectivel make an issue of this important point.

Fourthly,the BJP could make an issue of the presence of the DMK in the government and the UPA.In 1997, Congress party withdrew support to United Front government headed by Mr. Inder Kumar Gujral on the issue of presence of DMK ministers in the government.This thrust mid-term elections on unwilling and unprepared nation.But in 2004, Congress allied with the DMK and contested the elections together in Tamil Nadu. Now the DMK is an important constituent of the UPA. If it was so, why did the Congress party demand removal of DMK ministers from Gujral government?Or why did the DMK show inflexible attitude on the issue?Neither the Congress nor the DMK has furnished any explanation. Somebody might say that the commission of enquiry headed by Justice Milap Chand Jain held DMK responsible for spread of LTTE in Tamil Nadu in its interim report but exonerated it in its final report. If it was so, could the Congress party not wait till the final report of Jain commission was out?Why did they force mid-term elections on the country?Now why did the DMK ally with the Congress?Both the Congress and the DMK owe an explanation to the nation. When they have not provided it, the BJP could have made an effective issue of this.But they did not do so.

The responsibilites of an effective opposition is to bring to light, acts of omission and commission of the government.BJP has miserably failed on that count.For last one year, we have seen that the BJP did not allow the house to function for a long time.Now they have boycotted the proceedings of the parliament.If they had genuine complaints about high handed behavior of the government, they should have raised the issue inside the parliament or launched demonstrations to create awareness among people.Boycotting the house is not at all the solution to this.

Electorate judge both the ruling and opposition parties on their performance.Parformance of opposition party is as important as performance of the ruling party.A party that cannot discharge its responsibilites as a responsible opposition is not fit for occupying the treasury benches.

After analyzing all this, one is forced to draw the conclusion that the BJP's boycott of the parliament has more to do with troubles in its organization after some plain speaking done by RSS chief K.Sudarshan and other leaders known to have proclivity towards RSS. Recently Uma Bharati declared that she would fight against her own people 'much the same way Arjun did in Mahabharata'.Perhaps the BJP feels that lid could be put on these troubles if attention is diverted.

The BJP should introspect its own performance as opposition and try to gain the ground lost in last year's elections.