Back Budget session — Full play of acrimony, divisive issues
R. C. Rajamani
| The issues that deeply divided Parliament persist, threatening to spill over to the next session in July. And it will not help matters if the NDA resorts to boycott again. |
On the penultimate day of the Budget session, the BSP leader, Ms Mayawati, a Rajya Sabha member, criticised the role of the CBI in targeting her in a few cases, questioning if it was not because she was a Dalit. She said if the CBI was working at the Government's behest, her party would be compelled to withdraw support to the UPA.
Meanwhile, the Railway Minister, Mr Lalu Prasad, claimed to be in possession of a letter that the Chapra poll observer reportedly sent to the Law Minister, Mr H. R. Bhardwaj, alleging that the EC was pressured into countermanding the Lok Sabha poll. Himself a candidate in Chapra, Mr Lalu Prasad demanded the sacking of the two Election Commissioners, Mr B. B. Tandon and Mr N. Gopalaswamy.
The RJD party even affected proceedings briefly in both Houses of Parliament over the issue. According to the said letter, the EC observer, Mr L. V. Saptarishi, had also alleged that the Election Commissioners had made some "casteist" remarks about the community Mr Lalu Prasad belongs to. However, the presiding officers of both Houses firmly refused to allow any discussion on the role of the highly-respected constitutional body.
A week earlier, Mr Lalu Yadav, making a statement on the train accident near Vadodara, had dwelt at length on the alleged attack on him by "the RSS, the VHP and Bajrang Dal activists". He described it as "a murderous attack and an attempt on my life". His statement was short on the human tragedy of loss of lives and long on personal pain. He also touched raw sentiments when he said he came from a community that was long suppressed socially and politically and there were "people who do not like to see us being empowered."
In the final two weeks of the session, Parliament was faced with another unseemly verbal duelThe issue in question was the NDA's charge that the UPA Government had tried to prevent the Pakistan President, Gen Pervez Musharraf's meeting with the BJP patriarch and former Prime Minister, Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee, during the former's recent visit to India.
Of course, this charge was made outside Parliament. But it upset the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, so much that he brought it to the notice of Parliament. He took serious exception to the "type of language" used against him in the NDA memorandum submitted to the President. He told the Rajya Sabha: "For example, in that memorandum, our government has been accused of prevailing upon President Musharraf not to see Mr Vajpayee... This is the length to which the Opposition goes. I think the country should know that between the two — what they say and what they do — there is a world of difference."
But, a day later, in a clear exercise in quibbling, senior BJP member and Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, Mr Jaswant Singh, said the Prime Minister was "off the mark" in his statement on the NDA's view on Gen Musharraf's meeting with Mr Vajpayee. He explained that the NDA memorandum to the President, Dr A. P. J. Abdul Kalam, had only said: "It is reported" that there had been an attempt to prevent Gen Musharraf's meeting with Mr Vajpayee. Therefore, this was not attributable to the Opposition alliance, the former External Affairs Minister said!
Capping the current controversy over the Kargil-related Defence purchases, the Government finally rejected the Phukan Commission Report, which, however, gives the former Defence Minister, Mr George Fernandes, a clean chit in the deals that figured in the Tehelka expose.
The Government has asked the CBI to probe the matter. This may give the NDA Opposition enough ground to adopt a confrontationist posture during the next monsoon session, unless the issue is resolved in the interim.
On the last day of the session, in a significant push for financial sector reform, the Government introduced two major pieces of banking legislation in the Lok Sabha, including one to lift the 10 per cent cap on voting rights to foreign banks acquiring equity in Indian banks.
The long-awaited Banking Regulation (Amendment) Bill, introduced by the Finance Minister, Mr P. Chidambaram, however, has a rider that any person acquiring more than 5 per cent equity in an Indian bank will have to obtain approval of the Reserve Bank of India. The Bill also seeks to empower the RBI to specify the Statutory Liquidity Ratio without any floor or ceiling, to give it more operational flexibility.
The second legislation is to amend the Reserve Bank of India Act to remove the floor and upper ceilings of the Cash Reserve Ratio. The Reserve Bank of India (Amendment) Bill also empowers the central bank to deal in derivatives. Both pieces of legislation were referred to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance after being introduced in the House.
Unfortunately, the main Opposition was absent when such important Bills as the Right to Information Bill, the Patents Amendment Bill and the Prevention of Money Laundering Bill were passed. It, however, participated, though perfunctorily, when the Finance Bill giving effect to all the Budget proposals was passed in the Lok Sabha, though it was absent when the Rajya Sabha later returned the Bill.
This provoked a comment whether the entire business transacted during the session did not suffer from want of credibility. The development does not augur well for democracy — a point stressed both by the Speaker and the Prime Minister during their concluding day remarks.
The NDA must reflect whether its 12-day boycott and their earlier action to stall proceedings on the "tainted ministers issue" were not a bit overdone.
The BJP's argument that the cases against Mr L. K. Advani and others (in connection with the demolition of Babri Masjid) were political in nature is specious. The NDA, particularly the BJP, must show magnanimity and return to Parliament in July when the monsoon session starts.
(The author, a former Deputy Editor with PTI, is a New Delhi-based freelance writer. Feedback can be sent to rajamani_rc@yahoo.co.uk)
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