| AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA |
V SUNDARAM
Poor Mother India is in the vicious grip of Mother Sonia Gandhi's de facto dictatorship today, ably abetted and aided by our puppet puppy de jure Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh. By no means India is in a state of emergency today. India is definitely not in a helpless state of armed invasion by Pakistan, or Bangla Desh, or China or any other country. And yet both Houses of Parliament have been adjourned sine die yesterday in order to protect the posts of the following disgusting disgraceful MPs of India from the known and inevitable operation of Congress imposed Law of Jaya Bachchan-type disqualification:
a) 'Poor and innocent' Somnath Chatterjee, the greatest Speaker in world Parliamentary history, finds himself holding an office of profit in West Bengal ie. Chairman, West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation. He tactfully stayed away from Parliament yesterday in order to pave the way for the issue of an Ordinance under Artcle123 of the Indian Constitution by the effete UPA Government latest by coming Friday.
b) Madame Sonia Gandhi (political heir of Rajiv Gandhi and spiritual killer of Mahatma Gandhi!!) finds herself holding the posts of Chairman of the Advisory Council, in the rank of an Union Cabinet Minister on paper and de-facto Prime Minister in practice and that of Chairman, Rajiv Gandhi Foundation.
c) Maharaj Karan Singh who has been beached by the tide of history finds himself in the post of Secretary General of The Indian Council for Cultural Relations.
The 'traditional recess' of the Parliamentary session in both the Houses has been done away and the decks are now clear for the UPA Government, already in an alert state of combat readiness, to bring in an ORDINANCE in order to change the existing law on offices of profit and to ensure that prominent MPs, including Congress president Sonia Gandhi and Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee, escape a Jaya Bachchan-type disqualification.
Protesting against the sine die adjournment of both Houses of Parliament, the leaders of the NDA, led by former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, marched to Rashtrapati Bhavan yesterday and urged President A P J Abdul Kalam not to prorogue Parliament. Leader of Opposition L K Advani has described the mischievously mendacious move as 'a singularly unfortunate event in the history of Parliament'. The sine die adjournment of Parliament is procedurally necessary to bring in the ordinance since Article 123 of the Constitution empowers the President to promulgate an ordinance on the advice of the Council of Ministers only when Parliament is not in session. By such an unconstitutional and unscrupulous move, the UPA Government, already enmeshed and entangled in the labyrinthine layers of a petty puerile Petticoat Government, has politically decided to treat both the Parliament and the Indian Constitution, if not the silent and helpless millions of India, as disposable condoms!! It is very clear we are heading for a Pakistan type dictatorship.
The illiterate masses of India when they threw out Indira Gandhi and Sanjay Gandhi after the Emergency in 1977 gave the following message to the nation: 'Don't be cowed down by terror and tyranny. Don't forget that these types of dictatorship usually present a tough and formidable exterior. They seem on the outside, to be hard, glittering, impenetrable and irresistible. But within it all, they are full of rottenness. We have to resist it with all our might and hold aloft the flag of human freedom'. This message seems to have been forgotten by Sonia Gandhi and her henchmen today. It will not be before long when the people of India will rise up as one man and teach a lesson to all these self-proclaimed dictators at the earliest available opportunity!
Article 123 clause 1 of the Indian Constitution enables the President to legislate when Parliament (either House or both Houses) is not in session and the President 'is satisfied that circumstances exist which render it necessary for him to take immediate action'. Every citizen in India is convinced that no such situation exists in India today. There is only a private and personal emergency for Sonia Gandhi, Somnath Chatterjee and Dr. Karan Singh and no national emergency at all!
More than one billion people in India are eagerly awaiting our great and gentlemanly President to react in the following manner to the wickedly unconstitutional move of Sonia Gandhi and her henchmen:
a) When he receives the reference from the Government of India, he should refer the matter to a Supreme Court for clarification keeping in view the fact that he has already referred the petition presented by Telugu Desam and Samajwadi Party to the Election Commission for enquiry and report;
b) He should seek a clarification from the Government on the following aspects:
i) What is the grave national emergency which made the Speaker of the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha adjourn both the Houses sine die?
ii) Rajya Sabha Chairman has been requested by the Government to adjourn the House sine die. What is the external or internal threat to the territorial integrity and security of India which prompted the Government of India to make such an extraordinary request?
iii) In what way can the anticipated application pari passu of Jaya Bachan's disqualification in respect of Somnath Chatterjee, Sonia Gandhi and Dr. Karan Singh in the interest of equity and natural justice lead to the creation of a state of national emergency warranting the issue of an ordinance by adjourning both Houses of Parliament sine die in so abrupt a manner?
iv) Should the protection of the offices of profit held by Somnath Chatterjee, Sonia Gandhi and Dr. Karan Singh have a higher priority over the sanctity of the Indian Constitution?
v) Is the UPA Government waging a political war against the Indian Constitution and the people of India in order to save the posts allotted to themselves by selfless (!) people like Somnath Chatterjee, Sonia Gandhi and Dr. Karan Singh?
When the Bihar Assembly was dissolved on the advice of that now temporarily forgotten Sonia's slave Buta Singh, and when the matter came up before the Supreme Court, the Supreme Court held the Ordinance issued as unconstitutional. At that time the President of India was misled into signing the ordinance when he was in fact on a tour outside the country. The people of India are happy that the unscrupulous UPA Government is giving a glorious opportunity to the President of India to act wisely and firmly and thus veto the proposal for an unconstitutional ordinance in the larger interest of healthy functioning of our democracy. That will give the right signal for all the petty politicians of India.
All the political parties have complained against Navin Chawla, one of the Election Commissioners planted by the Congress Party to function as their representative in the Constitutional Body. In view of this, the Election Commission cannot also be expected to deal fairly with the reference made by the President of India in regard to the petitions given by Telugu Desam and Samajwadi Party against the continuance of Somanath Chatterjee, Sonia Gandhi and Dr. Karan Singh as Members of Parliament. Instead, taking note of the past deeds of misdemeanour of Navin Chawla and the fact that on his own admission large sums of money have been paid by congress M.Ps. and Ministers to the Trust run by his wife, the people of India expect the President to act quickly and to request Navin Chawla to step down immediately in the larger public interest. Anybody else in his unenviable position would have gracefully resigned. As one who has willingly embraced the political culture of congress party for over 30 years, no one can expect him to behave differently from Buta Singhs or Natwar Singhs and the like. In the congress party, any act of shamelessness is viewed as courageous and honourable and any deed of honour and discretion as shameful and cowardly.
The old English saying is that those who live in glass houses should not throw stones at others. In India, the wisdom contained in this saying is not applicable to those VIPs like Sonia Gandhi, Dr. Karan Singh and others living in the glass house of the Indian National Congress. In this Congress glass house, all can dance with naked bodies with gusto and enthusiasm. If anyone outside dares to throw a stone at those inside this glass house, the Congressmen will always deal with such retaliation by using the Constitution and the National Flag of India as guided missiles! All the people of India have come to this sombre and inescapable conclusion.
What are things constitutional? I would only say let the ends be legitimate, and let them be within the scope of the Constitution, and all means which are appropriate, which are plainly adapted to those ends, which are not prohibited, but consist with the LETTER AND SPIRIT of the Constitution, are constitutional. Viewed in this light, the move for an 'Ordinance' in a comic situation, totally unnecessary and unwarranted, is indeed unconstitutional.
To conclude in the words of Charles A. Beard: 'The theory that the Constitution is a written document is a legal fiction. The idea that it can be understood by a study of its language and the history of its past development is equally mythical. It is what the Government and the people who count in public affairs recognize and respect as such, what they think it is. More than this. It is not merely what it has been, or what it is today. It is always becoming something else and those who criticise it and the acts done under it, as well as those who praise, help to make it what it will be tomorrow. A nation may make a Constitution, but a Constitution cannot make a nation'.
JAI HIND!
(The writer is a retired IAS officer)
e-mail the writer at vsundaram@newstodaynet.com