Valid concern

THE PRESIDENT, MR. K. R. Narayanan, has in his customary Republic Day-eve national broadcast spoken out with characteristic candour against certain structural and prima facie regressive changes mooted - and being emphatically canvassed - in the basically sound system of parliamentary democracy put in place by the founding fathers of the Indian Constitution 50 years ago. In strongly disapproving of suggestions to reverse the salutary principle of universal adult suffrage and to go for a scheme of indirect elections - the obvious reference is to the `consultation papers' released recently by the Constitution review panel - Mr. Narayanan has only reiterated his conviction, widely shared, that the so-called weaknesses and shortcomings of the Constitution, cited by the pro-review camp, have little to do with the system and whatever correctives needed really lie elsewhere - in the way it is worked by those charged with that responsibility and in the functioning of the auxiliary institutional and political subsystems. Telling indeed is the evocative parallel he drew between the suggested changes and the ``guided democracy'' tried in Pakistan by Field Marshal Ayub Khan, and the irony he pinpointed in invoking the name of Mahatma Gandhi to imbibe ``shades of the political ideas'' of that military dictator. In fact, he had struck a note of caution this time last year against any tinkering with the Constitution in the name of a `review'. Now, in the context of the `papers' put up by the review commission for a public debate, he has apparently felt constrained to voice his concerns in specific areas. Indeed, Mr. Narayanan put the `universal adult suffrage' issue in perspective when he said it was ``an article of faith'' with the framers of the Constitution and that their decision to introduce it ``in one go'' was a revolutionary one. The negative aspects such as pervasive illiteracy notwithstanding, India's vast electorate has acknowledgedly shown a remarkable maturity in exercising its franchise, barring perhaps a few exceptions. The real problem is that the voter is increasingly left with a choice of the `devil and the deep blue sea' variety.

No less striking is the President's perceptive observation about the Constitution-framers' deliberate preference for `responsibility', vis-a-vis `stability', as the defining principle of the parliamentary system of democratic governance. Although made in a somewhat different context, his remark juxtaposing the two factors cannot but be seen as a denouncement of the `stability' notion that the ruling establishment at the Centre has been rooting for through fixity of tenure for the Lok Sabha (and State Assemblies) and what is called a `constructive vote of no-confidence'against an incumbent Government. Only the other day, at the golden jubilee function of the Election Commission, the Prime Minister, Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee, had reiterated that point. Whether the President should have gone public with his dissent the way he did, suggesting an open confrontation and rift between him and his Council of Ministers, is certainly debatable but not the concerns that he has addressed. A fixity of term, for instance, will deny an incumbent regime the eminently sound democratic option of seeking a fresh mandate for a specific and legitimate cause, apart from spawning malpractices and pernicious trends that will render it a case of `remedy being worse than the disease'. Known as much for his commitment to sustainable development as for his impatience with injustice to socially weaker sections, the President has not failed to press for due representation for women in legislatures or to drive home the point that the tribal population, likely to be displaced by huge irrigation or other projects, should be taken into ``confidence'' on the beneficial aspects of those schemes and, more importantly, programmes for rehabilitation and resettlement drawn up in consultation with the families concerned and executed in all sincerity.

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