He should know best

Sir, - It is unfortunate that the President, Mr. K. R. Narayanan, has expressed his views on Constitution review in a manner which gives scope for misinterpretation. How will a mere review by a commission or committee amount to changing the basic structure of the Constitution? Further, the Prime Minister emphatically stated that its basic structure and core ideals would ``remain inviolate''. Mr. Narayanan would agree that the Council of Ministers is the President's Council of Ministers. In the light of this, one fails to see logic in his unwarranted advice - ``we should not throw away the baby with the bath-water''.

However, the President has raised a valid question: ``whether it is the Constitution that has failed us or whether it is we who have failed the Constitution''? Who but Mr. Narayanan knows better that it is we who have failed the Constitution? Did it stipulate destruction of democracy by a proclamation of Emergency in 1975? Did it lay down that the President sign the proclamation of Emergency without a murmur? One has lost count of the number of times Article 356 was abused to dismiss democratically-elected governments in the States. Where does the Constitution envisage a Chief Minister appointing his illiterate wife his successor? In what letter and in what spirit of the Constitution did a person hold the office of Prime Minister for six months without facing Parliament even once? And which Article entitled a retired President of this poor country to get Rs. 40 lakhs sanctioned by the Cabinet for renovation of his allotted house before vacating the Rashtrapati Bhavan? These questions agitate the mind of the common man.

Dr. B. R. Ambedkar was absolutely right when he said in the Constituent Assembly: ``Democracy in India is only top-dressing on an Indian soil, which is essentially undemocratic''. No wonder, in our country today ``Some rise by sin/And some by virtue fall'', as Shakespeare put it.

The need for reviewing the Constitution is imperative because those who ruled for most of the 50 years after independence failed to meet the three conditions laid down by Dr. Ambedkar for its working: ``... Abjure extra-constitutional activity, strive for economic justice along with political equality and banish hero-worship.''

Gp. Capt. Vijay Vir (retd.),

New Delhi

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