'Functioning anarchy' to democratic functioning.
The former US Ambassador John Kenneth Galbraith had famously described Indian democracy as " functioning anarchy" long ago. This has been repeated recently by our Vice-President Hamid Ansari and the Speaker of the Lok Sabha, Somnath Chatterjee, of course, in different words. The Vice- President lamented " the decreasing credibility of our legislatures as effective institutions capable of delivering public good" and the " damage to the institution of elected legislatures and to the functioning of Indian democracy". The Lok Sabha Speaker was more forthright. He said, " You are working overtime to finish democracy" after he was not able to stop members of the parliament from shouting slogans.
Things have not improved after that event. Now the newspapers are full of another story of Union Minister T.R.Baalu's letters to PMO to help his sons' companies with gas allocation and the opposition's agitation to get a statement from the Prime Minister. This again has disrupted parliament's functioning.
India has been a democracy for the last 60 years. It has adopted one of the finest constitutions based on the experience of some of the established democracies of the world conferring on all its citizens the fundamental rights of liberty, equality and fraternity in 1950. While India had adult franchise in the first election itself in 1952. Women in UK and African-Americans in USA had to fight for their right of franchise. India conducts periodical elections, mostly free and fair, thanks to the vigilant Election Commission. Misuse of money power and muscle power has been reduced, if not eliminated altogether, over these years.
Bribing the electorate and concessions to selected sections with an eye on the election has made its appearance in recent decades. Free electricity to farmers has been one of the sops offered by many political parties. In the recent election in Tamil Nadu DMK promised to give a TV set for all poor families and got elected. However, it is not clear whether it is due to this promise or otherwise. Surprisingly Congress has made a similar promise to the Karnataka electorate which is going to elect a new government. With the increasing education and reducing poverty, it is to be hoped that these sops may not work in the future.
When we come to the functioning of our legislatures, there seems to be a big gap between the ideal and the real. The newspapers are full of statistics on the sittings of the legislatures, time spent on discussions on various bills and the time wasted on slogan shouting or going down to the wells of the legislatures.
The number of Lok Sabha sittings have come down drastically by about one-third from 124 during the years 1952-61 to 81 between 1992 and 2001. The number of annual average bills passed have been reduced from 68 to 50 during the same period. It has been pointed out that the British and Canadian parliaments are in session for about 140 days while the US Congress works for over 150 days.
A report states that only five percent of the grants for various ministries are debated in the House while 95% of the demands for grants are passed passed without any discussion. The total demands for grants are in the region of Rs.18,00,000 crore a year ! All these grants are discussed in the standing committee of each ministry but it is no substitute for a proper discussion in the House itself.
The Lok Sabha Speaker made the above comments during the recent Budget session of the Parliament. According to the newspaper reports the loan waiver for farmers became an open secret before it was announced by the finance minister. The opposition members indulged in what the reports described as ' a game of one-up-manship to voice their demand lest the government walk away with the waiver credit'. One of the opposition member called it the manifesto of the ruling party for the coming general election.
Many times in the past the Lok Sabha and other legislatures have been disrupted by the opposition for not discussing issues which they sought to do with adjournment motions.
Democracy, by definition, is a rule by the majority and it also requires the acquiescence of the minority in the decision of the majority. Democracy respects view of every individual and every party however unpalatable they are to the ruling party. It has been well expressed in these words : " I detest your opinions, but I will fight till death for your right to express them". Tolerance, restraint and compromise are the necessary conditions for the success of democracy. However, our elected representatives have not acquired these qualities in sufficient measure. The shouting and the disturbance that we see in the our legislatures hardly to be seen in UK or US legislatures.
There has been some efforts to make the functioning of the parliament smooth. The members of all the political parties had come together to evolve a code of conduct, sort of a Laxman Rekha which no member of the legislature should cross. This was during the Golden Jubilee Session of the Parliament in 1997 and the Ethics Committee. However, it has not been observed by the members.
There has to be a Laxman Rekha both for the ruling party as well as the opposition. The government has to allow the opposition to have its say and the opposition has to allow the government to have its way. While dissent is essential but the disruption is a a distraction – it changes focus from the issue to the unruly behaviour and devalues the dissent.
Supposing the opposition parties were allowed to speak on the waiver of agricultural loan before the presentation of the budget and were assured by the government that it would be given consideration in the budget, most probably the shouting match would not have taken place. Supposing the government of the day allows all adjournment motions and discusses the issues which the opposition raises, it should be possible for the legislature to take up the legislative business after dealing with the issues raised by the adjournment motions. While the opposition has the right to take up the grievances of the people and put forward its views and suggestions, the oppositions has to allow the government to govern.
The newspaper reports also say that all the bills are discussed at the standing committee meetings of the various departments without any disruption while members disrupt the functioning of the legislature to draw the attention of the voters in their constituencies and supporters in the country.
Media has a great role to play in moderating the behaviour of our representatives in the legislature. However media has to change the definition of news. Media follows an old definition of news – man biting the dog is news. New definition should be : governance, both good and bad, should be news, grievances of the people should be news and new ideas should be news. Developmental activities by the government, NGOs, corporates should be news as well.
If the news channels show the same dog biting repeatedly it gives an impression that many dogs have bitten many people. It magnifies a single episode. Strikes, processions and disruptions of normal life gets instant publicity. And this publicity encourages people to resort to them. If media reports all grievances of people and views of the various sections of people, they would not not disrupt normal life. The media has to listen to the people. Some have already written that they prefer the lack-lustre DD news to the so-called 'breaking news' purveyed by the news channels.
The media – the newspapers and TV channels - should have extensive discussion and discourse on all the points of view. This would also be an exercise in educating our electorate on the current affairs.
The political parties have not yet realised the adverse impact their behaviour in the parliament has on the country at large – on the students, trade unions and local bodies. The disruption that the people see on the TV or read in the newspapers gives some sanction to such behaviour in public life. Indiscipline has become hallmark of our public life. Not a day passes without some disruption of normal life of towns and cities. There are processions – political, religious, even marriage – which prevent normal flow of traffic. Then there are strikes and bundhs though the Supreme Court has banned bundhs. VIP traffic is another disruption. The political parties and the parliamentarians have to introspect whether they are setting a good example to our society which they claim to lead.
Time has come for the leading lights of public life such as former presidents, former justices of the Supreme Court, political leaders, religious heads, top businessmen, legal luminaries, editors and professors to form a forum and to evolve a code of conduct for a civilized way of life and a cultured discourse. Our civilization had a code of conduct called Dharma – that which sustains life and society. Dharma is right conduct which is not imposed but which is evolved with a consensus.
We have to evolve new methods of protest such as black batches, placards, silent marches which do not disrupt normal life of the citizen or the normal functioning of the parliament and other democratic institutions. Since political parties and trade unions resort to disruption of parliament or normal life to get attention, it is the duty of the media to give voice to the grievances raised by them when they use civilised way of protest. Disruption hurts us all. It disrupts our life and our progress. Let us agree to disagree without being disagreeable. Let us be a mature democracy. At least at sixty one has to be mature. Noise and chaos of infant democracy should be replaced by self-restraint of a mature democracy. Let us go from 'functioning anarchy' to functioning democracy.
May 1,2008
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