Opinion - News Analysis   

Stay home, Mr. Prime Minister

By Harish Khare

New Delhi March 10. After India's comprehensive victory over Sri Lanka in the World Cup cricket match at Johannesburg today, pressure will sought to be increased on the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, to travel to South Africa to watch India play in the semi-final (and, hopefully, the final, as well) match. The argument is that his presence would spur the Indian team on to give its very best.

Mr. Vajpayee would be well advised to reject any such suggestion. Apart from earning for him easy brownie points insofar as he would be seen to be in sync with the national mood of good cheer and achievement, such a trip would send more than one wrong signal.

First, should the Prime Minister travel to South Africa the bill would be picked up by the tax-payer. As it is, Prime Ministerial travels do cost a bundle; it is only the traditional respect for the Prime Minister's institutional office that prevents any questioning of the expenses incurred. But this respect would be stretched to the limit should Mr. Vajpayee allow himself to be persuaded by a small group of pseudo-cricket "administrators" to cheer the Indian team first-hand. No public cause or reasons of state justifies such wastefulness.

Second, the Prime Minister would lose all moral authority to veto the numerous foreign junkets that his Ministers and their bureaucrats keep devising all the time. It is not just that Central Ministers who want to "study" problems abroad, legislators — national and State — as well as the State Government Ministers and their officials keep travelling abroad. All that at the expense of the public exchequer; all totally unproductive and all entirely avoidable. All this when the end of the "free lunch" age has been announced.

If the Prime Minister takes a planeload of MPs, Ministers and other hangers-on, who would be able to say no to other constitutional functionaries who may be similarly keen on travelling to South Africa to cheer our cricket boys? The Lok Sabha Speaker, Manohar Joshi, has already indicated his desire to be on hand to buck up Saurav Ganguly and his boys. The Deputy Prime Minister, L.K. Advani, may travel with his own set of cheer-leaders. And, third, prime ministerial dignity and respect should be invoked and associated with a cause that is intrinsically ennobling and enlightening. Not with something that is essentially being driven by market forces and hyped by television. Nothing wrong with cheering with the millions at home. As effective and as potent.

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