Opinion Yesterday’s PM

UPA II’s crisis is entirely of its own making. In the course of the prolonged national debate on the Lokpal Bill,Dr Singh could have persuasively explained to the people of India that bringing the Prime Minister and,more importantly,the higher judiciary within the purview of the Lokpal was neither desirable nor crucially necessary to combat corruption. He could have taken the Opposition into confidence by saying that the authority of the Prime Minister and the independence of the higher judiciary must be safeguarded. He could have easily won this argument against Anna and his team by telling them,and also the nation at large, that the proposed anti-corruption ombudsman can be made strong and effective without disturbing the sanctity of the Constitutional architecture. Sincerely acknowledging the several good points in the Jan Lokpal Bill (such as operational independence of the CBI),Dr Singh could have assured Team Anna that these points would be incorporated in the government’s own bill. On a parallel track,he could have reached out to both political and civil society establishments to solicit their suggestions on a more comprehensive set of anti-corruption reforms,including the funding of elections,which is the main source of political corruption in India. If,after all these exertions by the Prime Minister,Anna had still chosen to press for the adoption of his own Jan Lokpal Bill,and resorted to an indefinite fast,his unreasonableness would have isolated him from the common people. Today,the PM stands isolated,also weak,wounded and defeated.

Why didn’t Dr Singh follow this most non-controversial and self-evidently beneficial path? The answer is simple. He is a Prime Minister without the authority of a Prime Minister. And those who wield effective power in the UPA government,have neither the maturity nor genuine commitment to the principles and ethos of democracy to engage the nation in a sincere dialogue leading to consensual action.

The Prime Minister finds himself shackled by yet another internal constraint. He is simply in no position either to prevent corruption in his own government and party,or to take timely action against those whose scandals have hit the headlines with hurtful regularity. At least one major reason for the handicap he suffers from is that he himself was a direct beneficiary of the shameful ‘cash-for-votes’ scandal in July 2008,in which Opposition MPs were paid huge bribes in order to ensure the survival of UPA I. Because of his inaction and also the enlarging taint of scam on his own hands,Dr Singh’s sanctimonious Independence Day peroration about the government’s resolve to fight corruption convinced nobody. By sending a widely respected anti-corruption crusader like Anna Hazare to Tihar Jail the very next day,his morally disabled government only managed to convert cynicism into outrage.

It is difficult to see how Dr Singh can heal his self-inflicted wounds. He already looks yesterday’s Prime Minister. He will have to pay the price for his government’s collusive protection of corruption,made worse by its blunder of first arresting,without any provocation,the leader of a peaceful agitation and then sending him to the same jail where several high-profile scamsters have been lodged. The fact that neither he,nor any of his colleagues,showed any remorse for their bungle in the debate in Parliament—rather they justified it—has only compounded their collective guilt. If they have any capacity for introspection left,they should ask themselves why lakhs of common Indians,all united under only one flag,the tricolour,have jumped into what is turning out to be the biggest nonviolent mass movement India has seen in a long time.

The ongoing developments also show that even Opposition parties,BJP in particular,do not have their finger on the pulse of the people. What prevented the BJP from removing its corrupt chief minister in Karnataka before Santosh Hegde’s report forced its hands? This,clearly,is time for the entire political establishment to do some real soul-searching.