The Indian Parliament and Democratic Transformation [1 ed.] 1138243833, 9781138243835

Table of contents :
Dedication
Contents
List of figures
List of tables
Notes on contributors
Foreword • Karan Singh
Preface
Abbreviations
Introduction • Ajay K. Mehra
Part I: Institutional perspective
1 Parliament: the formative years, 1952–72 • B. G. Verghese
2 Indian Parliament: changing institutional moorings • A. Surya Prakash
3 Why is the Indian Parliament in a state of decline? • Ashutosh Kumar
Part II: Issues in representation
4 The Indian Parliament and its modes of political representation • Asha Sarangi
5 Parliament as a representative institution: an assessment • Ajay K. Mehra
6 The nature of democratization of the Parliament:a study of membership profile of Lok Sabha • M. Manisha
Part III: Making the system accountable
7 Parliamentary accountability in India: contestations and performance • Ajay Kumar Singh
8 Parliament and accountability: enforcing responsibility • Rekha Saxena
9 Opposition and parliamentary accountability: who sets the agenda? • Sandeep Shastri
10 An analysis of disruptions in Parliament • Ronojoy Sen
11 Parliamentary control of delegated legislation: the hazards of erroneous delegation • Jaivir Singh and Raghab P. Dash
12 ‘Responsibility’ and ‘accountability’: Confidence and No Confidence Motions in the Indian Parliament • Vikas Tripathi
Part IV: Parliament and other institutions
13 From Panchayats to Parliament: exploring interfaces • Kripa Ananthpur
14 The first and the fourth estates in India • Uttam Sengupta
Part V: Miscellaneous perspectives
15 Parliamentary staffing: expertise and coordination • Raghab P. Dash
16 Parliament in India’s foreign and security policy: from a conscience keeper to an active arbiter • Rahul Tripathi
17 Parliament as a spectacle: politics by other means • Smita Gupta
Index

Citation preview

The Indian Parliament and Democratic Transformation

This book traces the trajectory of the Indian Parliament from its formation to present day. The chapters presented here explore parliamentary democracy through the formative years and highlight the Parliament’s function as a representative and accountable institution, its procedures and responsibility, its connection with the other arms of the state, its relationship with grassroots democracy and the press, and its critical role in framing foreign policy and national security. The volume frames major debates surrounding the Parliament through historical, conceptual, and contemporary political perspectives. It also looks at how politics in practice is being continuously changed and challenged by new social media and further views the transformation of India’s apex legislative institution in terms of democratizing processes, constitutional values, and changing mores. The book will be of great interest to scholars and researchers of Indian politics, history, comparative politics, political science, and modern India. Ajay K. Mehra is a political scientist affiliated with the University of Delhi and coordinates the activities of the Centre for Public Affairs, a network institution of public intellectuals.

The Indian Parliament and Democratic Transformation

Edited by Ajay K. Mehra

First published 2018 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2018 selection and editorial matter, Ajay K. Mehra; individual chapters, the contributors The right of Ajay K. Mehra to be identified as the author of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. This publication is supported by the Centre for Public Affairs and the India International Centre.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record has been requested for this book ISBN: 978-1-138-24383-5 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-351-25985-9 (ebk) Typeset in Sabon by Apex CoVantage, LLC

To Tanmay and Tanimaa

Contents

List of figures List of tables Notes on contributors Foreword by Karan Singh Preface Abbreviations Introduction

x xi xiii xxi xxiii xxvii 1

A J AY K . M E H R A

PART I

Institutional perspective 1 Parliament: the formative years, 1952–72

35 37

B.G. VERGHESE

2 Indian Parliament: changing institutional moorings

43

A . S U RYA P R A K A SH

3 Why is the Indian Parliament in a state of decline?

61

A S H U TO S H K U M AR

PART II

Issues in representation 4

The Indian Parliament and its modes of political representation ASHA SARANGI

83

85

viii

Contents

5 Parliament as a representative institution: an assessment

99

A J AY K . M E H R A

6 The nature of democratization of the Parliament: a study of membership profile of Lok Sabha

135

M. MANISHA

PART III

Making the system accountable 7 Parliamentary accountability in India: contestations and performance

161

163

A J AY K U M A R S IN GH

8 Parliament and accountability: enforcing responsibility

184

REKHA SAXENA

9 Opposition and parliamentary accountability: who sets the agenda?

203

S A N D E E P S H A S T RI

10 An analysis of disruptions in Parliament

218

RONOJOY SEN

11 Parliamentary control of delegated legislation: the hazards of erroneous delegation

233

J A I V I R S I N G H AN D RAGH AB P. DASH

12 ‘Responsibility’ and ‘accountability’: Confidence and No Confidence Motions in the Indian Parliament V I K A S TR I PATH I

251

Contents

ix

PART IV

Parliament and other institutions

273

13 From Panchayats to Parliament: exploring interfaces

275

K R I PA A N A N TH P UR

14 The first and the fourth estates in India

292

U TTA M S E N G U P TA

PART V

Miscellaneous perspectives

309

15 Parliamentary staffing: expertise and coordination

311

R A G H A B P. D A S H

16 Parliament in India’s foreign and security policy: from a conscience keeper to an active arbiter

330

R A H U L TR I PATH I

17 Parliament as a spectacle: politics by other means

342

S M I TA G U P TA

Index

357

Figures

9.1 Citizen trust in select public institutions 12.1 Frequency of Confidence Motions and No Confidence Motions from First Lok Sabha to Fifteenth Lok Sabha

211

267

Tables

3.1

3.2

3.3 3.4 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5 6.6 7.1 7.2 7.3 7.4

Seats won by national, state, unrecognized (registered) parties and independents in Lok Sabha (1984–2014) Number of national, state, unrecognized (registered) parties that made it to the Lok Sabha (1951–2009) Presidential ordinances (1952–2009) No. of parties in Lok Sabha 1984–2014 Representation of women in Indian Parliament Success rate of women contestants MPs with criminal cases by major parties in 2004, 2009 and 2014 MPs with criminal cases by states 2004, 2009 and 2014 Social and economic profile of MPs, 1952–1967 Social and economic profile of MPs, 1967–1984 Social and economic profile of MPs, 1989–2009 Performance of state and national parties, 1989–2009 Percentage of time spent on different parliamentary activities Time lost in the Lok Sabha Session wise summary of time spent and lost during Tenth–Fifteenth Lok Sabha Number of notices of questions received and admitted Percentage of total time spent on the questions Percentage of total time spent on legislation and bills passed by Lok Sabha

63

63 67 68 110 111 116 118 138 138 143 146 152 153 177 178 179 180

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Tables

11.1 Number of delegated legislations scrutinized by each house during 2008–2012 vis-à-vis the number of delegated legislations laid before Parliament 11.2 Number of delegated legislations framed and laid before Parliament (1952–2012) 11.3 Delay in laying of the delegated legislations: position of the Rajya Sabha during 2010–2012 12.1 Four periods of Parliament-government relations 12.2 Number of CMs and NCMs faced by the successive governments and their strength in the house during the 1950s and 1960s 12.3 NCMs discussed in Lok Sabha during the 1950s and 1960s 12.4 Number of CMs and NCMs faced by the successive governments and their strength in the House during the 1970s and 1980s 12.5 NCMs discussed in Lok Sabha during the 1970s and 1980s 12.6 CMs listed in Lok Sabha during the 1970s and 1980s 12.7 Number of CMs and NCMs faced by the successive governments and their strength in the house during the 1990s 12.8 NCMs discussed in Lok Sabha during the 1990s 12.9 CMs discussed in Lok Sabha during the 1990s 12.10 Number of CMs and NCMs faced by the successive governments and their strength in the house during 1999 and beyond 12.11 CMs discussed in Lok Sabha during 1999 and beyond 12.12 Governments and their tenure from 1989 onwards

237 239 240 253

255 256

259 260 260

261 262 262

265 266 266

Contributors

Kripa Ananthpur works at the Madras Institute of Development Studies, Chennai, Tamil Nadu. She studies the dynamics of local democracy and governance and the interface between governance and civil society institutions. She was part of the DRC for Future State at the Institute of Development Studies, Sussex, UK, focusing on a decade-long study on the interaction between formal and informal local governance institutions in Karnataka, Rajasthan and Pakistan. Among the principal investigators in a World Bank study on ‘Deepening Democracy in Karnataka’, she studied the impact of people’s participation in making local democracy more effective, accountable and transparent in northern Karnataka (2007–11). She has recently evaluated the impact of targeted women’s empowerment and livelihoods in the Pudhu Vazhvu project in Tamil Nadu. Currently, she is coordinating a longitudinal panel survey of 15,000 households across Tamil Nadu in collaboration with the University of Michigan and Tamil Nadu government. She has published in refereed journals such as Development and Change and Journal of Development Studies as well as working papers from Madras Institute of Development Studies, Institute of Development Studies, Sussex, UK, The World Bank, and so on. She was part of UNIFEM’s advisory group for their flagship publication ‘Progress of the World’s Women, 2011–12’ on the theme of ‘In Pursuit of Justice’. Raghab Dash works as Director (Research) in the Rajya Sabha Secretariat, Parliament of India. He pursues his academic interest on the working of Indian Parliament. He has completed his doctoral research on areas of contestation in the Executive and the Legislature relations in the context of law making in Parliament from the Centre for the Study of Law and Governance, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. His recent academic contribution is

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an article titled ‘Understanding Private Members’ Bill in Indian Parliament’ in The Indian Parliament: A Critical Appraisal edited by Sudha Pai and Avinash Kumar (2015). Smita Gupta is an Associate Editor at The Hindu. Her primary focus has been politics, Parliament, and how issues of caste and religion affect society and politics. Through her professional experience, she has covered every general election since 1984. In addition, she has reported on human rights violations and militancy in the Kashmir valley; the Maoist movement and the Salwa Judum in Chhattisgarh; the clashes in Nandigram and Lalgarh in West Bengal; antiChristian violence in Kandhamal; communal riots in Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Maharashtra; and caste conflicts in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, and Madhya Pradesh. She has also written research papers for conferences on the BJP and saffron politics, the impact of the internet revolution on Indian democracy, the Maoist issue and the state of the Indian media. Her articles have occasionally appeared in the Economic and Political Weekly. She has been honored for her work with the Prem Bhatia Award for Political Reporting, the International Committee of the Red Cross/Press Institute of India Award for ‘Humanitarian Reporting in Indian Media’ and The People’s Union for Civil Liberties Award. She was also a Reuter Fellow at Oxford University (1992–93). Ashutosh Kumar is a Professor, Department of Political Science, at Panjab University, Chandigarh, India. Earlier he lectured at the Universities of Jammu and Delhi. He has been associated with the Lokniti network, Centre for Studies in Developing Societies, Delhi as state coordinator for Punjab and has been visiting faculty at the University of Tampere, Finland and at Fondation de Maison des Sciences de l’Homme, Paris. He has been the Chief Editor of the Punjab Journal (Social Sciences) for four years (2012–16) and is a member of Research Promotion cell of Panjab University. His area of interest is in state politics in India with focus on the issues related to elections, identities, and development. He has co-edited a volume titled Globalisation and Politics of Identity in India (2008) and has edited a volume titled Rethinking State Politics in India: Regions within Regions (2011, 2nd edition 2016). Professor Kumar has also published in national and international Journals like JAAS, SAR, JPS, Asian Ethnicity, EPW, Seminar, and SIP among others. He has co-edited a volume on ‘Electoral Politics in Indian States: 2014 Elections and After’ which is under consideration for publication.

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M. Manisha is Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science, Shreemati Nathibai Damodar Thackersey (SNDT) Women’s University, Mumbai, India. She has a doctorate from Jadavpur University, Kolkata with over 17 years of teaching and research experience. She researches and writes on Indian politics, democracy and institutional studies, political parties, legislative institutions, and electoral democracy. She has co-edited Indian Democracy: Problems and Prospects (2009) and contributed several articles in journals and magazines. She has been awarded fellowships by the Indian Council of Social Science Research for her work on ‘Social Bases of State Parties and their Legislative Performance’, and by the Rajya Sabha for her study on ‘Role of Opposition in India: A Comparative Study of Second and Fourteenth Lok Sabha’. She has been the recipient of European Union Visitors Award. Presently, along with her teaching assignments, she is working on two ICSSR Sponsored Research Projects on ‘Determining Quality in Higher Education’. Ajay K. Mehra is a political scientist affiliated with the University of Delhi and coordinates the activities of the Centre for Public Affairs, a network institution of public intellectuals. He was a Foreign Policy Fellow at the University of Maryland, USA; Salzburg Seminar Fellow; Visiting Fellow, International Centre for Ethnic Studies, Kandy, Sri Lanka; Visiting Professor, FMSH, Paris; and Ford Foundation Professor in Dalit Studies, Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi. He has researched, written, and published widely in a career spanning four decades. Among his notable publications are The Politics of Urban Redevelopment (1991), The Indian Cabinet: A Study in Governance (1997), and Political Parties and Party Systems (edited, 2003). Mehra has focused on institutions and governance, political processes, public security, terrorism and the politics of urbanization. He has also been a member of the Task Force on ‘Criminal Justice, National Security and Centre – State Cooperation’ of India’s Second Centre – State Relations Commission and a member of the Expert Group on Diversity Index, both constituted by the Government of India. Asha Sarangi is a Professor at the Centre for Political Studies of Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. She completed her doctorate at the Department of Political Science, University of Chicago, Illinois, USA. She has held various fellowships including the National Fellowship of the Government of India, and the Junior Fellowship of the American Institute of Indian Studies (AIIS). She was also awarded the

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Junior Fellowship by the Department of Culture, Government of India and the Social Scientist Award under the Indo-French cultural exchange program. In 2016, she was invited as a visiting professor to the Centre for South Asian Studies of the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, UK. The main areas of her research are political and cultural economy of development, and culture, identity, politics of language and linguistic nationalism in modern India and South Asia. She has written a new introduction to V. P. Menon’s Integration of Indian States (2014). She has earlier edited Language and Politics in India (2009) and co-edited Interrogating Reorganisation of States: Culture, Identity and Politics in India (2011). She has contributed more than two dozen articles in peerreviewed journals and edited volumes on issues related to the politics of language, nationalism, minority representation, linguistic identity in colonial India, and the states reorganization in independent India. Rekha Saxena is a Professor at the Department of Political Science, University of Delhi, India. She is also the honorary Vice-Chairwoman of the Centre for Multilevel Federalism and honorary Senior Advisor to the Forum of Federations, Canada; a member of the international advisory board for Global Autonomy and Governance Forum 2016, Philippines; and Delhi University’s lead coordinator on intergovernmental relations for the Leverhulme UK international network on Indian federalism. She was a Member of a Task Force of the Second Commission on Centre-State Relations, Government of India. She is a recipient of Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute’s Doctoral (1999–2000), Faculty Research (2003) and Faculty Enrichment (2011) Awards during which she was affiliated with the Department of Political Studies and IIGR at Queens University, University of Toronto and McGill University, Canada. She has published extensively on federalism. Her most recent publication is Federalizing India in the Age of Globalization (co-authored, 2013). Ronojoy Sen is a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of South Asian Studies and the South Asian Studies Programme, National University of Singapore. He has worked for over a decade with leading Indian newspapers. His latest book is Nation at Play: A History of Sport in India (2015). He is also the author of Articles of Faith: Religion, Secularism, and the Indian Supreme Court (2010) and has edited several books, the latest being Media at Work in China and India (2015). He has contributed to edited volumes and has published in several leading journals. He also writes regularly for newspapers. He has a doctorate in political science from the University of Chicago, USA, and read history at Presidency College, Kolkata,

Contributors

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India. He has held visiting fellowships at the National Endowment for Democracy, Washington, DC, the East-West Center, Washington, USA, and the International Olympic Museum, Lausanne, Switzerland. Uttam Sengupta is a senior journalist. He originally started working for The Telegraph. From there he went on to work for India Today and covered Bihar, Bengal, the Northeast, Nepal, Bhutan, and Bangladesh before joining The Times of India as Resident Editor at Patna in 1991. For 12 years, he worked as Resident Editor at Lucknow and Kolkata. He had a brief stint with Dainik Bhaskar and The Tribune at Chandigarh before he finally arrived at New Delhi to work as a Deputy Editor with Outlook. Currently he is Executive Editor with National Herald. Sandeep Shastri is a political scientist by training. He is the Pro Vice Chancellor of Jain University, Bengaluru, India, and the Director of its Centre for Research in Social Sciences and Education. His areas of research specialization include electoral studies, federalism with a focus on federal institutions, survey-based research, and Indian politics. He is the National Coordinator of the Lokniti Network, an academic team involved in survey-based studies that conducts the National Election Studies. He has been an Adjunct Professor at the University of California, Berkeley, USA. He has been a Senior Adviser with the Forum of Federations involved with its consultancy projects on Federal processes in Sudan, Constitution Making in South Sudan and Transition to Democracy in Myanmar. He has authored and edited 11 books and has chapters in more than 45 edited books and over 75 peer-reviewed journal articles besides more than 100 OpEd page articles in leading national and international newspapers. He played a key role on drafting the Karnataka State Youth Policy by serving as the Chairman of the Drafting Committee. Ajay Kumar Singh is a founder faculty of the UGC-Centre for Federal Studies. He is currently serving as Country Coordinator and author of the Leverhulme World Project on Dynamic De/Centralisation – a six-country (India, Canada, Australia, Germany, Switzerland, and USA) study seeking to measure relative indices of centralization and decentralization (Legislative, Administrative, and Fiscal) on 22 policy fields, and to develop a theory of dynamic de/centralization and comparative federalism. He is also the Editor of the Indian Journal of Federal Studies. He has extensively

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contributed for developing a new paradigm of union model of Indian federalism. Jaivir Singh is a Professor at the Centre for the Study of Law and Governance, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. An economist by training, his work takes on multi-disciplinary perspective, he has written on Constitutional Law, Labour Markets and the Law, Competition Law, Property Rights, CSR, and International Investment Law. Having taught at Delhi University before joining JNU, he has been a visiting member at the Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs University of Minnesota (2008) and has held visiting Professorship at the University of Sydney (2016). A. Surya Prakash is Chairman of Prasar Bharati, India’s public broadcaster. He is a leading political commentator and an expert on constitutional and parliamentary studies and governance issues. He has held key positions in several print and electronic media organizations. He was Editor, Zee News; Executive Editor, The Pioneer; India Editor, Asia Times, a business and political daily published from Bangkok and Singapore; Political Editor, Eenadu Group of Newspapers; and Chief of Bureau, Indian Express, New Delhi, India. He has also been a media teacher and has taught media law and ethics. He is the Founder-Director of the Film and Media School at the Institute for Integrated Learning in Management, New Delhi and Founder-Director of the Pioneer Media School, Noida. Among his noted works are What Ails Indian Parliament (1995) and Public Money, Private Agenda: The Use and Misuse of MPLADS (2013). Rahul Tripathi is an Associate Professor and Head, Department of Political Science, Goa University, India where he has been teaching for the last 16 years. He specialized in South Asian studies from School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, and was Visiting Lecturer at the College of International Relations, Nihon University, Mishima, Japan. While he has focused on International Political Economy and South Asia as part of his teaching and research, he has also looked at domestic-foreign policy linkages and new social media and Indian politics in his recent writings and publications. He is the co-editor of Towards Freedom in South Asia: Democratization, Peace and Regional Cooperation (2008) and author of Monetary and Payments Cooperation in South Asia (2010). He is a member of Indian Political Economy Association

Contributors

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(New Delhi), International Political Economy Group (Manchester), and International Political Economy Society (Princeton). Vikas Tripathi teaches Political Science at Gauhati University, Assam, India. He has contributed to academic journals such as the Economic & Political Weekly and Studies in Indian Politics. His area of interest includes public institutions. He is currently engaged in research on the Indian Cabinet and the Parliament in India. B. G. Verghese (1927–2014) was with the Centre for Policy Research since 1986. Beginning his career in journalism with The Times of India, he later edited Hindustan Times (1969–75) and The Indian Express (1982–86). He was Information Adviser to the Prime Minister (1966–69). He was a recipient of the Magsaysay Award in 1975, Assam’s Sankaradeva Award for 2005, and the Upendra Nath Brahma Soldier of Humanity Award in July 2013. Verghese was a member of the Kargil Review Committee and co-author of the Kargil Review Committee Report tabled in Parliament chronicling the sequence of events leading up to the India-Pakistan confrontation and recommendations for the future. He was also a member of the Editors Guild of India Fact Finding Mission to Gujarat in April 2002. Verghese has authored several books including Waters of Hope, Harnessing the Eastern Himalayan Rivers, Winning the Future, India’s Northeast Resurgent, and Reorienting India, Rage, Reconciliation and Security; First Draft: Witness to the Making of Modern India and Post Haste: Quintessential India; and A State in Denial: Pakistan’s Misguided and Dangerous Crusade. (Adapted from http://www.bgverghese.com/about.htm)

Foreword

The Indian democratic system is the largest such experiment anywhere in the world, due to which one-sixth of the human race lives in a parliamentary democracy with free elections, a free press, independent judiciary, and fundamental rights guaranteed by the Constitution. This is itself an astounding achievement. The evolution of the Indian Parliamentary system over more than a century is a fascinating story, which Dr. Mehra has mentioned in his Introduction. The Founding of the Indian National Congress in 1885 began the process of a structured freedom movement. It attracted some of the most distinguished names of the time, such as Ferozshah Mehta, Dadabhai Naoroji, Gopal Krishna Gokhale, who Gandhiji looked upon as his guru, and many others. It was only 20 years later when the imperious Lord Curzon ordered the partition of Bengal – the ‘Bhang Bhang’ – that the movement became radicalized. The Congress Party split between the moderates, whom I have mentioned, and an entirely new generation of fiery revolutionaries such as Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Shri Aurobindo Ghosh, Shri Bipin Chandra Pal, Lala Lajpat Rai, and others came into the forefront. The whole movement from 1905 to 1910 marks a decisive chapter in the Indian freedom struggle. Incidentally I have studied this dramatic period in my PhD thesis on The Political Thought of Sri Aurobindo. Although it was ruthlessly crushed by the British, when Gandhi ji appeared in 1920 he was able to combine the earlier factions into an integrated freedom movement. The story after that, till 1947, is too well known to need repetition. Fascinating and unique though the Freedom Movement was, it ended both in triumph and tragedy; the triumph of Indian freedom and the horrific tragedy of partition. Despite the chaos that followed partition, it is the tribute to our leaders, such as Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru,

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Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Maulana Abdul Kalam Azad, Dr. Rajendra Prasad, and Shri C. Rajagopalachari, that the Constituent Assembly was able, within a short period, to produce our Constitution, indeed a remarkable document. In this process the role of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar stands out. With the Constitution adopted on 26 January 1950, the first in a long series of general elections took place in 1952. We are now in the Sixteenth Lok Sabha having maintained the democratic system of peaceful transition as a result of which, despite divergences of ideology, the transition has always been peaceful. It is important to add that hundreds of elections to State Assemblies have also been held during this period, and that in these decades almost every legitimate political party in India has had the opportunity to participate in the political process. Being an MP myself for 40 years in both Houses, on the treasury benches as well as the opposition, has given me the unique opportunity to watch the manner in which Parliament has functioned, the numerous amendments to the Constitution and the challenges and imperfections in its working. In this book Dr. Mehra has brought together a number of thoughtful and thought-provoking articles by a wide spectrum of scholars in this area. Reading it will throw light on the various facets of Parliamentary functioning and will be of particular interest to students of the Indian democratic system. His Introduction itself is an interesting essay. We must always remember that democracy is still a work in progress with changing political, economic, and technological factors which require it constantly to adjust to the new challenges that arise and avail of the new opportunities that lie ahead. Dr. Ajay Mehra’s book deals with the Indian Parliament and Democratic Transformations. Despite the sharp ideological differences between various parties in Parliament, the nation has to proceed on the path of poverty alleviation, universal health, and educational facilities, a flourishing industry and a vibrant democracy I commend Dr. Mehra for this useful anthology which will be welcomed by all those interested in the functioning of the world’s largest democracy.

Karan Singh April 20, 2017

Preface

This book was planned to commemorate the diamond jubilee of the Indian Parliament. Though not a sequel, Centre for Public Affairs (CPA), a network institution of public intellectuals that has focused on public institutions since its inception, having brought out a commemorative volume on Indian Parliament (The Indian Parliament: A Comparative Perspective, 2003) on its golden jubilee, thought it fit to bring India’s apex legislature, the pivot of Indian democracy under academic scrutiny once again on its diamond jubilee. Under the Constitution of India inaugurated on 26 January 1950, the first general election to elect the First Lok Sabha was held between 25 October 1951 and 27 March 1952. The First Lok Sabha was constituted on 17 April 1952. In April 2012, thus, the Indian Parliament completed six decades of its existence. The golden jubilee of an institution such as Parliament is neither just a marker of time nor is it a mere platform for celebration. In the context of an evolving democracy such as India, it represents a multitude of political developments. A parliamentary democracy witnesses political competition for power in each parliamentary election, which results in the constitution of a new government, even if the party and the leader forming the government are the same as before. The elections, the political competition that ensues in their wake, their results, and the proceedings of the Parliament that legislates on a number of contemporary issues during the five-year tenure of the Lok Sabha brings constitutional amendments and triggers democratic transformation in the society and the polity. We need to ask the Parliament, and the parliamentarians we elect, what kind of democratic transformation have they been aiming at. More particularly because the institution has for the past two decades or more grabbed the limelight for wrong reasons – for disruptions caused from both sides of the aisle, and both accusing each other. There has been an unspoken

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consensus that if you are in the opposition, only way you can neutralize the government is by not allowing the institution to perform its constitutionally designated role. In fact, that is the role in which both the individual members and the parties they belong to take pride in. Most parties and their leaders do not have the time and inclination to look back as to how the opposition of the yore, despite being thin in numbers, earned respect of the treasury benches. The treasury benches too forget the respect given to the opposition without looking at their small size in the formative years of India’s parliamentary democracy. The democratization of the Indian society and polity was offered, to begin with, as the rationale for increasing cacophony, in place of discussion, in the country’s Parliament and state legislature. However, is democratization a weakening and debilitating concept, or is it transcendental in nature? In maturing with decades, and the golden jubilee mark is only a reminder to that, should both Indian democracy and the Parliament as its pivot not mature to reach greater heights of sophistication? The expanding socio-economic base of the Indian legislatures, the Parliament too, has been used as one marker of democratization, and rightly so, to explain the increasing cacophony in place of a symphonized debate over the past three decades. While it might be true to an extent, it does not explain a planned party strategy to immobilize the parliamentary proceedings to embarrass the government. We need to look for a more nuanced explanation. Both the Indian democracy and the Indian Parliament are evolving. The growth trajectory must be seen and studied in an evolutionary perspective. It is unfair to look at any publication and/or research on Indian Parliament as the final word. Each one of them adds one more step in its understanding. This volume also seeks to invite and encourage the students of Indian democracy, Parliament/legislature, and public institutions to explore it in greater depth and unravel dimensions that still remain unexplored. With these issues in mind, the CPA explored the possibilities of organizing a volume within its core group as well as with different fora for financial support. One of the first shows of willing support came from the India International Centre (IIC), then directed by Dr. Kavita Sharma, presently President of the South Asia University, New Delhi, India which was at that time celebrating its own golden jubilee. The event became a part of its larger celebrations, supported by B. G. Deshmukh Memorial Fund. The Indian Council of Social Science Research conceded our request for partial grant. Funds also came from the CPA’s core support organization that later decided not to be acknowledged and named.

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The outline of the conference and the volume was discussed in preliminary meetings at the IIC and with different scholars who have formed the core group of CPA’s network faculty. The conference was held during 9–11 April 2013 at the IIC. Dr. Karan Singh kindly consented to be the Chief Guest and Professor Meghnad Desai the keynote speaker. As the Director of the CPA and editor of this volume, I would take this opportunity to thank the entire support base that eventually helped the CPA organize a successful conference and this meaningful volume. Indeed, the India International Centre, the intellectual hub of Delhi and the country, has always been ready with its support to the CPA and me personally. However, the enthusiasm with which the then Director Dr. Kavita Sharma received the idea and helped us in the execution of it, supported with its efficient program department headed by Ms Premola Ghosh, deserves more than our thanks; we express our gratitude to them. We would also like to thank the ICSSR and its reviewers of the conference project that decided to sanction partial grant for the conference. However, but for a generous grant from one of the CPA’s core support institutions, the conference would still not have been conducted with the institutional ease that it did. The institution wishes to remain anonymous and we respect their wish by not naming it. However, we acknowledge its support to the conference and to the CPA’s growth as an institution. When the IIC hosted a meeting to conceptualize the conference, a large number of intellectuals and social scientists responded to our invitation. The interaction and deliberations were useful in shaping the conference with a view to eventually organizing the papers into a useful volume. Interactions were also held with a number of eminent scholars personally, notable among them are Professor Subrata K. Mitra, then at South Asia Institute, University of Heidelberg, Germany (now Director of Institute of South Asian Studies, National University of Singapore), Professor Asha Sarangi, JNU, and Professor Amit Prakash, JNU. I thank them profusely for taking out time and offering useful suggestions in shaping of the project. Each of the contributors, who was given a broad theme as developed by the CPA program team in consultation with a number of eminent scholars to write the paper/chapter, stuck to the task that helped in developing the volume thematically. I as much thank them for their indulgence at this stage, as for putting up with my continuous pestering for submitting the final version of the chapter. The CPA, which works more as a platform than as a traditional institute, has a thin institutional base. Mr V. N. Sharma, Office Secretary,

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forms the backbone of the institutional base. He deserves our special thanks for treating his work more as a commitment than as a job. Indeed, my family, functioning as an emotional cushion against frustrations the ups and downs that the execution of a project of such dimension causes, deserves a special mention. Needless to say, for any remaining shortcoming in the volume, I alone remain responsible.

Abbreviations

ADR AIADMK AITMC BJD BJP BJS BSP CAG CAT CBI CM CPI CPM DIG DMK DPC DRSC ECI FDI IFS INC IPC ISC JD JKPDP JMM LAFEAS LARRDIS

Association for Democratic Reforms All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhgam All India Trinamool Congress Biju Janata Dal Bharatiya Janata Party Bharatiya Jan Sangh Bahujan Samaj Party Comptroller and Auditor General Central Administrative Tribunal Central Bureau of Investigation Confidence Motion Communist Party of India Communist Party of India (Marxist) Detective Intelligence Guild Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam District Planning Committee Department Related Standing Committees Election Commission of India Foreign Direct Investment Indian Foreign Service Indian National Congress Indian Penal Code Inter-State Council Janata Dal Jammu and Kashmir People’s Democratic Party Jharkhand Mukti Morcha Legislative, Financial, Executive and Administrative Service Library, Reference, Research, Documentation and Information Service

xxviii Abbreviations LJSP LTTE MDMK MGNREGA MLA MP MPLADS NAC NCM NCP NCRWC NDA NDC NEW NGO NISMA NITI Aayog NRHM OBC PAC PIL PMK PRI PSP RJD RKD RP Act RTI SAD SC SP SSP SVD TDP TRAI TRS UF UPA UPSC USSR

Lok Jan Shakti Party Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act Member of Legislative Assembly Member of Parliament Member of Parliament Local Development Area Development Scheme National Advisory Council No Confidence Motion Nationalist Congress Party National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution National Democratic Alliance National Development Council National Election Watch Non-Governmental Organization North Indian Small Manufacturers’ Association National Institution for Transforming India National Rural Health Mission Other Backward Classes Public Accounts Committee Public Interest Litigation Pattali Makkal Katchi Panchayati Raj Institutions Praja Socialist Party Rashtriya Janata Dal Rashtriya Kranti Dal Representation of People Act Right to Information Shiromani Akali Dal Scheduled Caste Samajwadi Party Samyukta Socialist Party Samyukta Vidhayak Dal Telugu Desam Party Telecom Regulatory Authority of India Telangana Rashtra Samithi United Front United Progressive Alliance Union Public Service Commission Union of Soviet Socialist Republic

Introduction Ajay K. Mehra

The evolution of parliamentary democracy in India between the Indian Councils Act 1861 and the Government of India Act 1935 provided enough reason for the Constituent Assembly of India to recommend a parliamentary system of government for India.1 However, a preference for ‘daily accountability’ inherent in the parliamentary system over ‘stability’ that was a feature of the American system was also strongly argued about.2 An evaluation of the Indian Parliament after six decades of tumultuous existence, during which it was constituted fifteen times, the Lok Sabha was extended for a year during the emergency (1975–77), elected twenty-one governments headed by thirteen Prime Ministers3 and has amended the Constitution a hundred times,4 entails historical, constitutional, conceptual-theoretical, procedural and political dimensions of evolution, growth and evolution of the institution in a post-colonial traditional society with no tradition of the liberal democratic-representative institution, though republican representative institutions have existed in India historically according to some scholars.5 Indeed, the beginning generated the hope that W.H. Morris-Jones expressed in his first study of the Indian Parliament following constitution of the First Lok Sabha in 1952: ‘The fact that parliament is in origin a western institution is less significant than the fact that Parliament in India has become an Indian institution’.6

Evolution The trajectory of evolution began from the Indian Councils Act (1861) that initiated the process of associating people of India in the legislative process,7 even though by nomination, and of the aristocracy and the landed class. The Indian Councils Act 1892 came seven years after the Indian National Congress was founded and had begun to lobby for greater representation of Indians in decision making. It increased

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the number of additional members in the Central Legislative Council to not less than ten and not more than sixteen, as also the proportion of officials and non-officials to six officials and ten non-officials, generally by nomination, ‘though some of the nominated Indians were allowed to have been elected by a highly restricted electorate’.8 The members were allowed to discuss the budget and criticize the financial policy of the government. It was the Morley-Minto reform package in the Government of India Act 1909 that substantially enlarged the Legislative Council (up to 60 elected members), functions were increased with the right to ask questions and supplementary questions, the members could move resolutions. In this step towards a responsible government, indirect elections were introduced with a separate electorate for the Muslims.9 The Montagu-Chelmsford Reforms that introduced the Government of India Act, 1919, brought in diarchy, which transferred some subjects under self-rule to the elected Provincial governments. The new 145-member Legislative Council was to have 104 elected members (50 general, 30 Muslims, 2 Sikhs, 7 landlords, 9 Europeans and 4 Indian Commercial people). The Imperial Legislative Council became bicameral with a sixty-member (thirty-four elected and twenty-six nominated) Council of States. The provision for a review after ten years under section 84 of the Act led to the constitution of the controversial Simon Commission (November 1927). However, even before it landed on the Indian soil in February 1928, the opposition to this all-white Commission mounted across the country. The reverberations of Poorna Swaraj (complete Independence) in 1927 AICC session fructified in the 1929 Lahore session. In between, the Congress accepted the challenge thrown at them by the British of drafting a constitution when they rejected the Simon Commission. Consequently, an allparty conference constituted Motilal Nehru Committee and its Report (1928) presented a draft constitution for independent India. The eventual Government of India Act 1935 introduced a federal structure and Provincial Autonomy; it was also extensively used in framing the Constitution of India. Eleven Governor’s Provinces and six Chief Commissioner’s Provinces witnessed the extension of franchise to thirty-five million people including one million women; this was a considerable expansion from 2.5 per cent in 1909 to 27 per cent of the adult population. The communal electorate was, however, retained, for the Muslim League wanted it as a matter of faith as the Congress opposed it on ideological and political grounds. The bicameral Federal Legislature consisted of a permanent Council of States (156 British India + 101 Indian states + 13 nominated = 260) and a 375 member

Introduction

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(250 British India + 125 Indian states) directly elected Federal Assembly. A tradition of parliamentary democracy was thus inculcated at both the levels. The expansion of representation, responsible government, federalism and yet a limited democracy were the contributions of the Acts of 1919 and 1935. The Congress, among other things, learned the lessons in parliamentary elections in 1922 with its breakaway group Swaraj Party, though with declared Congress support, and in 1937 the Congress itself contesting the provincial polls. The significance of the two experiences was the use of social coalitions to win elections, which meant seeking the support of the landed class, and in running the elected house.10

The Constituent Assembly The constitutional history of India between the Government of India Act 1935 and the Indian Independence Act 1947 is tumultuous, involving negotiations for independence and a constitution for independent India with the British government and for an undivided India with the Muslim League. The important link for India’s parliamentary democracy however gets deepened with the election of the Constituent Assembly of India, which was first proposed by the Congress in 1934.11 A 389-member Constituent Assembly (292 provinces + 4 Chief Commissioner’s Provinces + 93 princely states) was constituted under the Cabinet Mission Plan.12 The Congress swept the poll, winning 208 seats to 73 of the Muslim League, inviting its boycott of the Assembly. However, the Assembly, which got divided with the Mountbatten Plan between that of India and Pakistan on 3 June 1947, was not a directly elected body. It was indirectly elected by the provincial Legislative Assemblies that were elected in January 1946 in Governor’s provinces by merely 9 to 11 per cent of the adult Indians as voting rights were restrictively defined by property and educational qualifications.13 This body proved significant not only because it framed the Constitution, but also because from 15 August 1947 till the election of the new Lok Sabha and the composition of the first Indian Parliament in 1952, it functioned also as the provisional Parliament.14 Performing multiple functions till it framed the Constitution in 834 days of intense work (15 August 1947–26 November 1949), it also simultaneously kept the executive accountable for its decisions. In its multiple capacity it thus asserted its, and the country’s, sovereignty by overriding the clause of the Indian Independence Act, 1947 that did not allow it either to proclaim India’s constitution or to proclaim it a republic. These were to be done by the British Parliament. But the Gazette of

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India Extra-ordinary of 26 January 1950, proclaimed under the signature and seal of Governor-General C. Rajagopalachari, and in his presence, did exactly that.15 Thus, an assertion of the country’s popular sovereignty with the Parliament as its institutional colonnade on the foundation of republican constitutionalism, the provisional Parliament laid the tradition and foundation of a responsible government in India.16 The new constitution that disappointed CA member K. Hanumanthaiya for its western foundations and orientation,17 carefully crafted India’s bicameral parliamentary system with an indirectly elected (by the elected members of Legislative Assemblies of the Indian states) and permanent ‘upper house’ named Rajya Sabha (Council of States, as it was called in the Act of 1861), a directly elected (from single-member constituencies) Lok Sabha (House of the People) for a five-year term, unless dissolved earlier, from across the country, along with the President with the powers and responsibility to address a joint session of the two Houses at the beginning of each session, send messages and assent to the Bills passed by the two Houses, and with a mild veto of returning the Bill once for reconsideration. The emerging institutional dynamics of the Indian Constitution has been rightly described as ‘intra-institutional system of checks and balances’ that added differential levels of institutional debate to prevent majority tyranny, and any particular interest group from unduly influencing government decisions. For example, the president and state governors could be a counterpoint to directly elected executives. Legislative upper houses could prolong legislative deliberations.18

The framework and functioning Three questions that must be probingly asked and empirically answered while looking at the framework architectured by the CA for India’s parliamentary democracy and the way its pivot, the Indian Parliament, has functioned for six decades, are the following: i) what does the design of India’s parliamentary democracy say; ii) what the reality of its functioning and institutional moorings have turned out to be; and iii) what does it augur for Indian democracy in the coming decades? An Introduction to a collection of essays on Parliament, howsoever well planned, cannot answer each of these questions with any finality; hence it is not even intended.19 We are sure that new empirical researches in the near future by scholars would pick up some of the questions raised here and many more questions that may arise, leading

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to more revelations on how this collectivity elected by the people of India has over the years been changing the conception and role of this institution. Some of the formulations based on the framing and functioning of the Constitution are as follows. 1

2

3

4

India opted for parliamentary democracy with a considered view that the country had years of experience in the functioning of the Westminster system and that daily assessment of responsibility were preferable to stability. Has this been realized in ‘substantial measures’, as Nehru pontificated in his Tryst with Destiny speech highlighting the citizen’s responsibility for the Republic, by its institution and leadership, in over six decades? A reading of the CA debates on Articles 21 and 22 and on the role and the manner of appointment of Governors in the draft constitution brings out an apprehension that parliamentarians in the future may not necessarily be as responsible and devoted as the leaders framing the Constitution, hence there were arguments to build in comprehensive systemic safeguards in each aspect of the institution and its functioning. Have they been realized substantially and worked well? Where does the Indian Parliament stand in terms of its situation within the separation of powers envisaged by the Constitution of India?20 Despite the Constituent Assembly opting for the ‘procedure established by law’ over the overwhelming preference for the ‘due process of law’ amongst the members,21 it certainly is not as supreme as the British Parliament is, bound as it is by the Constitution and the expanded scope of the judicial review, particularly after the ‘basic structure’ doctrine since the Kesavanand Bharati (1973). Whether that is a major constraint in the way of realizing popular sovereignty in India is a question that deserves greater debate even amongst the law makers bogged down with pandemonium. And, as if predictably, its location was quizzed at the very outset. If the Sankari Prasad (1951)22 and the Sajjan Singh (1964)23 established unlimited power of the Parliament to constitutional amendment with an oversight interpretative power for the judiciary, Golaknath (1967)24 overturned this view, arguing that no constitution could allow its own subversion. Kesavanand (1973)25 brought in the ‘basic structure’ doctrine to preclude amendments of undefined provisions characterized as such. In this tussle between constitutionalism and popular sovereignty that the Parliament represents,26 the Parliament’s role since then has not been adequately probed.27

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5

India followed the parliamentary federalism model of Canada even as it opted for strong-centre federalism. Voices have been raised in recent times to abolish the Rajya Sabha, the House meant to bring representation of the states.28 Why is it that it has not fulfilled the expectations of strengthening federalism, and why, instead of taking remedial measures, is the political class contemplating its abolition? What has happened to the intergovernmental panels suggested by the Constitution? While a mirror representation of the Indian society remains a distant dream, why is gender representation tied only to a proposed legislation that has witnessed tremendous opposition? Why have electoral and parliamentary reforms not been put on a fast track? In 2012, the year that marked the sixtieth anniversary of the Indian Parliament, both Houses were scheduled to meet seventyfour times; however, only 61 per cent of available time was used for parliamentary work in the Lok Sabha and 66 per cent in the Rajya Sabha, respectively. The Fifteenth Lok Sabha lost approximately 600 hours of parliamentary proceedings due to frequent disruptions. Why has India’s parliamentary culture become so boisterous? Why does parliamentary democracy in India incite violence, segregate communities and practice exclusion?

6

7 8

9

Data, research and literature on Indian Parliament While introducing this collection of essays, it is important to present an outline for the young inquisitive minds interested in pursuing studies on Indian Parliament and legislative studies, as well as invite them to this area with very little work and great potential, the sources available and questions that could be asked. Broadly, seven sets of data have been generated on Indian Parliament, of which all the statistical ones are easy to compile. The first set of data is on the socio-economic background of parliamentarians past and present. Earlier they used to be available in printed information booklets issued by the secretariat of the two houses, now the information is easily accessible on their websites. This set of data has been used by various researchers to analyze the changing membership profile of the Parliament. However, the question of socio-economic representation in the Parliament and all other legislative institution from the desirability of mirror representation, the rise and fall of the representation of one community or the other. Similarly, gender representation,

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including a minimum one-third quota for women in all the elective institutions, remains under-researched from the perspective of desirability and operationalization by shifting constituencies. The concerns and fears on gender representation from the perspective of making it representative also of caste, communities and religions are equally important to explore, as are also the attendant question if the gender representation is above such divisions.29 This also brings in the debate on the first-past-the-post system and attendant electoral reforms. Does India need to change the six-decade-old practice to move away either to a proportional representation, a list system or a partial list system? Would any of these changes bring in either mirror representation or greater representation of the communities that lag behind? Such questions are awaiting involved research. Second, since the publication of A. Surya Prakash’s What Ails Indian Parliament, interest in data on the use of the parliamentary time by MPs and parties has increased. These data too are available easily on the parliamentary website, on the website of the PRS legislative and a few more research and voluntary institutions. Going beyond routine interpretations based on how much time was used for presentation of Bills and debates and discussions, this data set would be a good indicator of transformation on India’s parliamentary and democratic cultures. Third, the data on parliamentary committees are available in terms of the composition of various committees, how they function, what they have produced in reports and what has transpired. These also have not been sufficiently analyzed to explore the institutional dimension of the Parliament. The questions such as whether political parties approach the issues at hand in parliamentary committees with a bipartisan approach, the kind of party-based or interest-based tussle that might be arising in the committees, and so on. The fourth set of data have been generated by an analysis of the affidavits of the candidates regarding criminal cases against them. These have rightly added a new dimension on the discussion on criminalization of politics. However, the data thus available have not been probed further. For example, a scrutiny shows two problems – first, many a times a politician (of the opposition particularly) leading a procession and protesting is charged with loot, arson, even of rioting and intention to kill, which prima facie do not appear credible; second, many a times a rival upper caste candidate files false criminal cases against lower caste candidates. Indeed, probing a sample to prove these possibilities would reveal the real picture. Fifth, the data on various other improprieties such as cash for questions, purchasing of votes for the Rajya Sabha elections and so on are

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also available through the media and civil society probing. These have been factored in to indicate mildly institutional weakening and more strongly to conclude the decline of Parliament. Sixth, electoral participation and performance of candidates are also easily available. They have been used by researchers in a variety of ways not only in the context of Parliament, but also to study political processes. These continue to be part of ongoing processes and exercise and could be used in a variety of ways. Seventh, the most valuable data, which are underused and deserve greater attention, are in parliamentary debates. Despite a decline and decay in debates both in quantity and quality, these would provide a spectrum of changing parliamentary culture over time. The transformation of parliamentary culture is a good indicator of democratic transformation that Parliament is engendering. There would indeed be questions on democratic transformation, or the nature of it, for overwhelming analyses have begun to point out, if not conclude, the decline of Parliament in India. That the discourse still hangs between a decline and democratization, gives the researchers to take a panoramic view. For, Lord Bryce had attempted to quiz this question in two chapters – ‘The Decline of Legislatures’ and ‘The Pathology of Legislatures’ – in the treatise Modern Democracies published in 1921. In the two chapters, he asked what were the ills to which legislatures were subject and which caused them to go into decline. And, he could not really find a straight answer to the question. Researching the same question four decades later, K.C. Wheare too could not find a straight answer as he noticed complexity in the question of decline, which also depended on the perspectives of the researcher looking at it. Whether it was a decline in power, or in efficiency, needed to be determined and the two did not necessarily go together. In fact, a legislature could decline in power but grow in efficiency or vice-versa. It is also possible to perceive or see a decline in esteem. His own conclusion was that legislatures in the twentieth century declined in power in relation to the executive.30 While most researches and writings, including in this volume, have stressed decline of legislatures/Parliament, a nuanced view states a mixed result.31 With such theoretical and empirical insights being available, the question is wide open for the Indian scholars to probe further: in case we do reach the conclusion that the Indian Parliament has declined, is the decline of power, efficiency or esteem? If each one of the three is true, are we reaching a democratic crisis if not apocalypse? Obviously, legislative studies in India, of which studies on Parliament would be a part, have to engage with this question more probingly than to mere declare a ‘decline’ in the near future.

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Aside from these sources of data, which indeed are this editor’s listing and not comprehensive by any means, a number of issues have been emerging for legislative studies in India, some from the outset, some as we have traversed six decades and we go beyond. For example, the issue of parliamentary sovereignty in the context of judicial review raised by Rudolph and Rudolph in 1981 can inspire a fresh look at parliamentary sovereignty.32 Though it may appear that with a series of judgements that established the ‘basic structure doctrine’, limiting parliamentary supremacy in amending the Constitution within the boundaries of basic structure laid out by the Constituent Assembly, the issue of parliamentary sovereignty has been settled, but issues beyond the power of judicial review and supremacy of the Constitution, are still there to review parliamentary sovereignty in India. Indeed, the court took its own time since Golaknath to add clarity to the basic structure doctrine, but even if it is settled that the Indian Constitution imposes restrictions on Parliament that do not exist in the unwritten model of the Westminster. Whether the current parliamentary culture is eroding its sovereignty further is another significant question to ask. The role of the Rajya Sabha has been one of the issues of inquiry, but not as comprehensively as the questions India’s second chamber has been throwing up. The Constituent Assembly debated to make it truly a House of Elders à la the House of Lords, a cooling and revising chamber.33 In keeping with that spirit, the minimum age for Rajya Sabha was kept considerably higher than Lok Sabha. The discussion on its composition and election reflect to make it the House representing states, being non-partisan in its approach. This is also in keeping with its federal responsibilities mandated by the Constitution such as the power to transfer a subject from the State List to Union List for a specified period, to create additional All-India Services, and to endorse Emergency under Article 352 for a limited period when the Lok Sabha is dissolved. Recent developments, more particularly since the domicile criteria for the membership of Rajya Sabha as mandated by the Representation of the People Act, 1951 was removed by the five-judge Supreme Court Bench in 2006 in Kuldip Nayar v. Union of India and Others, which was also desired by all the political parties, the nature of the second chamber has changed. Aside from its mandate to vet certain state-centric legislations, its federal nature too has not remained intact. In recent years, the Rajya Sabha has come in for larger scrutiny and political criticism because of the changing majority in the Lok Sabha and consequent regime changes at the national level, while as a continuing body Rajya Sabha remained dominated by the party moving

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to the opposition benches. The consequent roadblocks in the legislative process has been irksome to the ruling party/coalition, which would be adopting the same tactics when on the other side of the aisle. No wonder, during the post-sixteenth general election, a trial balloon to abolish the Rajya Sabha has been floated by the ruling combine. The role and utility of the Rajya Sabha with an emphasis on reforms and parliamentary conventions and culture thus is an area that invites more research. Sarbani Sen’s perspective of checks and balances inherent in the creation of the Rajya Sabha deserves to be researched, both from the perspective of this part of its role and whether this has ever been perceived by the MPs.34 Thus, the role of the presiding officers in the Parliament as well as the state legislatures is an area that the researchers need to draw their attention to. The offices of Speaker of Lok Sabha and Chairman of Rajya Sabha (which is held in ex-officio capacity by the Vice President of India) have not been sufficiently researched in quizzing the Indian Parliament. An essay by Vijay Kumar in The Indian Parliament: A Comparative Perspective35 explores primarily the Lok Sabha Speaker, coming to the conclusion that over decades the office has lost its apolitical sheen. Nehru’s reflection, though about speakers in all the legislatures in the country, that ‘The Speaker (is) a symbol of the nation’s freedom and liberty. Therefore, that should be an honourable position . . . and should be occupied always by persons of outstanding ability and impartiality’36 has been violated since the late 1960s by his own party time and again both in the Lok Sabha and state Legislative Assemblies. The case has been highlighted so succinctly in the recent Arunachal Pradesh case where to stem the rebellion of the Congress MLAs of the Nabam Tuki government (Congress) Speaker Nebam Rezia expelled the party legislators who had withdrawn support to the government. The decision of governor Jyoti Prasad Rajkhowa to dismiss the Tuki government and recommend the imposition of Article 356 was criticised and eventually set aside by a Supreme Court bench of J.S. Khehar, Dipak Misra, Madan B. Lokur, P.C. Ghose and N.V. Ramana on 13 July 2016. However, discerning commentators also questioned the role of the Speaker, for Justice Dipak Misra ruled that ‘complete detachment and perceivable impartiality’ is required from a Speaker.37 Interestingly, some recent researches have used different kinds of data to indicate the underbelly of parliamentary politics and the democratic process in India. Party financing and its impact on election result, and in the long run on parliamentary politics, is one area. A related area is party and political financing, which also includes financing individual politicians and its impact on representative institutions and

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the political process at large.38 Different kinds of legislations, as also their legislative processes, could be a significant area that could be innovatively researched to comprehend how legislative processes have been evolving over the decades as well as the nature of partisanship involved in parliamentary, despite the rules having been laid out for introduction and passing of legislations.39 Such innovative ways of looking at the Indian Parliament would throw fresh results as well as question. Let us for example refer here to three collections of essays on Indian Parliament in recent times – Sudha Pai and Avinash Kumar (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Critical Appraisal, New Delhi: Orient Blackswan, 2014; B.D. Dua, M.P. Singh and Rekha Saxena (eds.) The Indian Parliament: The Changing Landscape, New Delhi: Manohar, 2014 and Ajay K. Mehra and Gert W. Kueck (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Comparative perspective, New Delhi: Konark Publishers, 2003. Pai and Kumar cover thirteen aspects in as many well-researched original essays under three themes of internal dimensions, parliamentary control versus executive autonomy and external dimensions, yet not all emerging dimension of parliamentary functioning and responsibility are fully covered. The essays in the volume range from quizzing the representation question using a variety of fresh data, to the functioning of the institution from the perspective of accountability to external influences of the civil society and media. The approach of some of the authors is refreshing and should ignite the imagination of young researchers to use similar approach to ask question, look at the available data as well as generate a new set of data. Dua, Singh and Saxena bring together twenty essays in seven sections exploring some commonly discussed and several new aspects of the institution, including its interface with the judiciary, parliamentary reforms and effectiveness of the Parliament. Yet a range of issues mentioned in the foregoing paragraphs continues to remain untapped fields for those fascinated by this institution. That the assessment of Indian Parliament attempted in the volume edited by Mehra and Kueck at the completion of its five decades with fifteen essays that critiqued hitherto unexplored areas, including on presiding officers of Indian Parliament and Parliamentary Privileges, opened up further research and assessment visible in latest publications indicates that the area continues to be dynamic. Even a single study, the only one to come out in recent times, by B.L. Shankar and Valerian Roderigues, has served two purposes – (1) disproving the decline of Parliament thesis and, (2) bringing out the representational dimensions of the institution as it sails through in time from the twentieth century to the twenty-first. Clearly, the Parliament

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of the world’s largest and perhaps the most boisterous democracy has several unexplored areas for a discerning researcher. Of course, academic journals have carried a number of well-researched essays on the Indian Parliament; it is not possible to mention and analyze all of them here. Social Watch India too has been carrying analysis of the Indian Parliament in its review of institutions of governance in the country.40 It is equally important to mention some studies and collection of essays that raise questions that could form methodological tools for probing both the Parliament and parliamentary system in India. Pran Chopra edited an interesting volume titled Supreme Court and the Constitution41 that analyzed how the Supreme Court interventions have been altering the nature of Indian federalism. Sarbani Sen’s binary between popular sovereignty and democratic transformations is another significant tool.42 Madhav Khosla’s Introduction to The Indian Constitution43 raises several questions on the role and functioning of the Indian Parliament while discussing separation of powers (Chapter 1).

The study The seventeen chapters in this volume have been arranged in five sections – institutional perspective, issues in representation, making the system accountable, Parliament and other institutions and miscellaneous perspectives. These seventeen chapters probe some ongoing and some new questions. Since each author has picked up a limited number of questions and facts to buttress arguments in the chapter, more facts and questions await researchers on parliamentary and legislative studies. Obviously, a variety of issues that are raised here can be probed further. This volume is thus an invitation to researchers to unravel this field of study further rather than to conclusively present a thesis on the Indian Parliament. The Democratic Transformation orientation brings in the debate on ‘decline’ in most writings, which was not intended in planning the study that sought to look at the dynamics of the institution and assess if that succeeded.

Institutional perspective We requested B.G. Verghese, late scholar journalist, to open an account of the functioning of the Parliament in the initial years based on his experience in covering parliamentary proceedings. The interim Parliament (1947–52) and the first two Parliaments went about their business seriously – both the government and the opposition followed the norms of parliamentary government, both the Houses were chaired

Introduction

13

by senior leaders who set high standards of non-partisanship. The business of the Houses was carried out systematically and with the people’s interest in mind and despite intense criticism of the government, civility and bonhomie prevailed. He makes a significant point regarding party discipline inferring from Feroze Gandhi’s exposé of the LIC-Mundhra deal – the Congress did not take adversely to its own MP exposing wrongdoing in the government. Obviously, the Indian Parliament began its innings with responsibility and élan. This also is a reflection on the way parties and its leaders looked at their own role as well as of the representative institutions they were serving. Verghese’s account is supported and buttressed by studies of Indian Parliament by W.H. Morris-Jones and others. A. Surya Prakash uses the emerging data on dysfunctionality and disorder in conducting the business in Parliament to argue that institutional moorings of India’s national legislature are changing, not entirely positively for the time being. There is a representational deepening and widening of the social base of representation both in terms of the voters and the representatives, which indeed is a positive development; people coming out in large numbers has impacted the Indian democracy and its democratic institutions. As a result, the composition of the Lok Sabha is far more balanced now in terms of occupation, caste and class of members. Rajya Sabha too is impacted due to a change in the leadership profile in the Legislative Assemblies in the states and a more federalized power structure across Indian states. There is a decline in sittings and there are less numbers of legislations too. Question Hour, the first hour before the regular session when any question can be asked, has lost its sharpness. The inquisitorial nature of this hour which one saw in Parliament, when ministers trembled at the thought of being subjected to harsh interrogation by the likes of Bhupesh Gupta, Indrajit Gupta, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, George Fernandes, Madhu Limaye, Piloo Mody, Madhu Dandavate and many such eminent parliamentarians, is over. (Chapter 2, p. 47) This statement of Surya Prakash corroborates Verghese’s conclusion of greater responsibility where both the government and the opposition took their responsibility seriously. In fact, a much smaller opposition making a government with substantive majority and leadership ‘tremble’, speaks of the quality in every sense of the word. A relatively larger opposition with a small majority or coalition government to face is a reflection of the weakening of the party system, which is

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also mirrored in Parliament. Little discussions of important bills are passed in minutes without much debate. Committee system too is a victim of absenteeism and lack of interest among the MPs. Ethics and code of conduct remain a weak point, MPs also do not submit assets and liabilities within ninety days of entering Parliament as mandated by the law. The criminalization debate is among the major issues of India’s representative politics today and leaves out a range of unexplored areas. On one hand, Surya Prakash’s analysis indicates that there is a reluctance amongst parties, political class and individual MPs to parliamentary reforms, on the other hand, they have shed all the inhibitions on increased salary and privileges. The salary, allowances and pension of the MPs have been substantially raised – while the First Lok Sabha was insistent on modesty, increasingly MPs have been asking for more. If that was not enough they also seek visible privileges; a beacon light on their car to make them visibly look like a VIP. Can they connect with the common man, he asks? Intriguingly, under the shadow of criminalization of politics, more and more MPs are now seeking gun licenses and are purchasing sophisticated guns. Ashutosh Kumar looks at the party system to understand the role and functioning of the Parliament. However, his data and analysis also buttress weakening and decline of the Parliament thesis that many scholars lately have been stressing. What would follow in much of the discussion in this volume, Kumar looks at the membership profile, contentious issues such as ‘criminal’ background of a number of MPs and indifference to this phenomenon amongst the parties and leaders, disruption of sessions as a strategy as an accepted norm by all parties when in opposition, and so on. What would perhaps deserve further probing is the reason why the parties doggedly stick to keeping members on the wrong side of the law and why many politicians and political organizations are not respectful of the rule of law. Significant questions raised by him are the following: (1) how do we correlate the broadening of the social representational based of the Parliament and its increasing dysfunctionality due to disruptions; (2) should the rise of the state parties as important and at times powerful stakeholders at the national stage be considered responsible for this state of affairs; (3) should an increase in the number of millionaire MPs be a concern in an aspiring India as it leads to the purchasing of votes? The coalition era has brought a number of state/regional parties on to the national stage; they not only have a presence in the Parliament, they are partners in the government. Even Narendra Modi-led BJP with an absolute majority in the Lok Sabha has retained the NDA with

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all the state parties and satraps in coalition with power sharing. However, since 1996, when the state parties first became the kingmakers, they have used their presence in the Union Government to strengthen their constituencies and benefit their supporters and, of course, their families, both near and distant! With his own decline of Parliament thesis, Kumar raises certain questions that need further examination.

Issues in representation Asha Sarangi situates the idea of representation to the concept of ‘political’, understood as a process that is dialogic, which is defined and elaborated through the constant re-negotiation of a set of political practices and processes in a given society and shapes the institutionalization of forms in representational politics. Exploring the idea of representation theoretically, she attempts to situate the Indian case within it. She argues that political representation in a democratic government can take various forms mediated and authorized by people themselves. Parliament’s role in a polity functions on two layers of accountability. Kapur and Mehta rightly emphasize that ‘parliament is an agency that holds government accountable, and parliamentarians are held accountable through elections’.44 Parliamentary system and its politics inheres the danger that ‘normative question of representation is reduced to number crunching exercise over the years’. Sarangi also enters the debate on representation of women as conceived in the Indian context and points out how technicalities and ‘verbosities’ have quelled the discourse on gendered representation and thwarted its realization. She points to stark contrasts in assumption of leadership styles of the earlier era of India’s parliamentary politics marked by debate and democratic discourse, even principled resignation, to contemporary perception of representational role marked by pandemonium politics on similar issues. However, the dynamics of democracy leading to its deepening at the roots that have brought in leadership from the marginalized and excluded sections of society in the forefront and sizeable sections of them are now in the representative institutions. As Asha Sarangi points out, ‘The wall of separation between politics of the elite and the politics of the masses ideally should begin to crumble giving way to various domains differently organized and mobilized on grounds of community rights, entitlements, and historical injustice’ (Chapter 4, p. 96). Does that mean that criteria, benchmarks and paradigms to judge the behaviour in legislatures should be refashioned? Indeed, the democratization argument has been used in the Indian political science for over a decade is now used along with the ‘decline

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of legislature’ thesis that uses input-output and cost-benefit analyses.45 While unanimity amongst the Indian political science experts appears unlikely, the debate needs to be grounded on a more realistic-objective plane rather than on a purely normative surface. Ajay K. Mehra makes a comprehensive, though nuanced, critique of the Indian Parliament as a representative institution. His points of departure are the historical concerns on the questions of representation and representative institutions and how the Indian Parliament has fulfilled its representational responsibilities in large measures by facilitating climbing of political ladder of those on the margins and consequent ‘plebienization’ of the representative institutions. Yet, boisterousness visible in India’s representative institutions across the board, including the Parliament at the national level, is a reality that cannot be wished away. The arrival of state parties and satraps in Parliament with their political and electoral stakes back home where the constituency needs to be convinced of their role and their sentiments pandered creates a complex mix. Are they wrong in approaching their representativeness from their domestic/constituency perspective? Should they be prisoners of an alien parliamentary democratic culture? Yet, the institution must function and perform its designated role. The approach and answer to this question, he points out, is far from clear at this stage amongst the political actors. Juxtaposing the classic statement of Lord Bryce that, as we look back, all previous institutions look better than the contemporary ones, he takes a comprehensive look at the issues and data relating to the functioning, time loss, criminalization, women’s representation and so on, Mehra points out both change and ambivalence, even duplicity, amongst the parties and leaders in looking at an issue. Significantly, differences on approach and reactions to these developments and their impact on the Parliament are stark when a party/leader is in power and when she/he is in the opposition. Further, he goes into several cases of both corruption and criminality pointing out that there are serious issues of representation from the perspective of citizenship that the Indian society and polity must discuss. He evokes Bryce to be cautious on pronouncing a decline of the Indian Parliament and Mill to suggest that institutions are made by ‘men’ and it is an incessant process. The emerging anomalies, thus, deserve to be studied and attended in a nonpartisan fashion not only by parliamentarians, legislators, politicians and political parties but also by the society at large that must begin to question parliamentary behaviour and recalcitrance of the actors to unravel their short-term objectives. He concludes by admitting both dynamism and weaknesses that must be attended with political reform.

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M. Manisha studies the membership of the Lok Sabha to understand the nature of democratic transformation. Indeed, it is only natural that the nature of parliamentary membership has undergone significant transformations since independence; a young republic in the middle of the twentieth century setting out on the path of electoral and parliamentary democracy reposed its faith in the party and leadership at the vanguard of the independence movement. It paused to review them only two decades and four general elections later and began looking for alternatives since then, with generations, expectations, aspirations and values changing. Six decades and sixteen general elections later, not only is the profile of the Indian Parliament transformed, the party system and political culture kept changing in each decade. The class, caste and age profile of the Indian Parliament began changing in 1967, and it is much different now from the 1950s, and naturally! Significantly, the process also redefined the way the MPs, and the parties they belonged to, began reimagining their role actively, which in many of the contributions in the volume treat as ‘decline’. As she rightly says, it is a story of evolution of parliamentary democracy over decades, but is the redefinition of individual and institutional goals determined by the rapid politicization of the society leading to democratic transformation strengthened institutions and their processes? She argues that it equally reflects the constraints that emerge out of the limits to the process of democratization. The new parliamentary leadership that has emerged has reconceptualized the goals of Parliament from being largely a deliberative, national institution to a multifunctional institution that reflects the political dynamics at local, state and national level. It has also redefined roles of individual members of Parliament with a heightened focus on ‘acting as representative’. This has had an impact both on the form and substance of parliamentary functioning that has increasingly become more disruptive and chaotic on the one hand, and more reflective of dynamics of Indian democracy, on the other hand. The political elite of India have been actively using the forum for a vociferous expression of opinion as well as to support and oppose the policy options, yet they have been constricted and constrained by a narrow partisan definition of roles demanded by an intensely competitive politics. Beginning as a national forum in the elite sense of the word, broadening of the electorate and plebienization of the legislatures, Parliament included, it promoted the regional and local to the level of national. The explosive mix has metamorphosed the Indian Parliament into an open political arena bringing within its precincts political contestation and protest politics of the street.

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Aside from the arguments presented in the chapter, her study underlines the need for studies of political leadership and its role in making the Parliament an institution of democratic transformation, which could be undertaken either from the party perspective or from the regional/state perspective.

Making the system accountable Enforcing of the executive in order to ensure a responsible government is among the main functions of Parliament. How has the Indian Parliament been faring in this crucial task? Ajay Kumar Singh examines the question of accountability, in the context of India, at two levels. First, he looks at the theoretical literature from J.S. Mill to Bentham, and a range of studies from the behavioural tradition from the US and elsewhere to situate the question of accountability in representative democracy and functioning of a democratically elected legislature. Second, he looks at the data and literature to conclude weakening of accountability in the Indian context. Singh’s analysis does not show Indian Parliament in a positive light in performing its accountability function, whether it’s role of ensuring the executive accountability, or its own responsibility to be accountable to its electorate. Theoretically, from where the perspective of philosophies of Mill, Bentham and Kant are concerned, Parliament as the central institution of representative democracy creates deliberative as well as empowered spaces that generate both consensus and dissensus. This space with the dynamics of reaching consensus through dissensus and debates ensures representation, deliberation, information, decisiveness and checks. It also is the source of law and a dignified institution of governance. Yet, in the power dynamics, legislatures are the countervailing power that maintain the democratic balance. That legislative capacity does not necessarily result in legislative performance is an accepted mode of analysis. The Indian Parliament does have the capacity, but is it performing? Or is this political organization becoming a victim of its own politics? He rightly points out that the core of accountability debate is the question of authorization, sanction and punishment. Also, in ensuring the two broad levels of accountability – (1) systemic accountability of the government to Parliament and through it to the people, and (2) representative responsibility of Parliament to the electors, the Indian Parliament’s performance indices show that it is weakening in its functions. Rekha Saxena examines the system of parliamentary accountability in India and points out that it has not remained the same as originally conceived in the Constitution. With the judiciary stepping in with the

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basic structure doctrine, pronouncements on PILs and other sundry cases, while the executive has to be on its guard in sticking to the Constitution and even anticipating the mood of the judiciary. However, it deserves further examination whether this development has added to the parliamentary power and the responsibility thereof has curtailed it. Further, since the paradigm shift in Indian policy framework from state socialism to business liberalism in 1991 under Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao and Finance Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh, a series of autonomous regulatory authorities have been established under various Acts of Parliament in different sectors of the national economy, e.g., electricity, telecom, insurance, company affairs and so on. These regulatory agencies replaced the direct ministerial or bureaucratic control of these sectors. Now, parliamentary control is more immediate and direct in the case of ministries and departments than in the public sector undertakings and in regulating the corporate business sector. The working of the Parliament in India can be generally delineated into at least three phases: (1) one-party majority governments, (2) a Congress minority government led by P.V. Narasimha Rao and (3) coalition/minority governments. The role of the Parliament has of course varied in these phases. Under the one-party dominant system, parliamentary control of the executive was conditioned by a greater degree of party discipline, giving the executive a greater degree of control over the Parliament’s functioning. During the era of federal coalition coinciding with the onset of multi-party systems since the 1989 Lok Sabha elections, the autonomy of the Parliament has increased a great deal. The contemporary challenge is to ensure the Parliament’s accountability to the people, a parallel dimension of accountability, besides governmental accountability to the Parliament. Sandeep Shastri examines an important dimension generally left out of the discussion of parliamentary studies – the role of the opposition. His chapter focuses on an assessment of the role of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha in recent times. In the last quarter century, with the clear emergence of a competitive party system, the Opposition has come to be a key player in the deliberations of the Lok Sabha. Shastri examines the manner in which the Opposition has discharged its responsibilities within the framework of the system of parliamentary democracy. He argues that the political context that defines and decides the role of the Opposition in any elected chamber in a parliamentary democracy is the manner in which it develops a working relationship with the government, the strategies for consensus building, carving out spaces for constructive cooperation and legitimate criticism based on tactics of effective negotiation.

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Shastri draws attention to the fact that the role of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha is verily defined by the fact that parties and leaders who occupy the Opposition benches are seeking to re-define their role. When for many the House is not necessarily a forum for debate, dialogue and discussion, adjournments and disruptions appear to be the principal ‘theatre’ of action. He does not view this as a dilution of the role of the Opposition but a redefining of its strategy which needs to be viewed in the wider context of the role of the elected House as perceived by its members undergoing a visible change. Thus, very cogently, and rightly, Shastri moves the focus from the dominant narrative of parliamentary decline emerging lately. Shastri’s analysis raises some interesting questions for further research. For example, in the Westminster tradition, both the government and the opposition represent and convey a political continuity by declaring themselves as Her/His Majesty’s government/opposition. The continuity, not necessarily in ideology, politics and policies, is a continuity of the polity, i.e., if a government fails, whether or not the House of Commons is dissolved for a fresh election, an alternative is ready to convey the stability of the polity. This convention has not developed in India. It did not happen to begin with because there was no officially designated opposition and, hence a leader of the opposition. The Opposition was so small that the concept and tradition of shadow cabinet too did not develop. Hence, a/the leader of the opposition has never been looked at as the alternate Prime Minister. Second, a skewed parliamentary politics that has been witnessed due to the Lok Sabha-Rajya Sabha disequilibrium since 2014 gives a different twist to the politics of the opposition. Third, the Speaker’s ruling in the Sixteenth Lok Sabha that did not recognize the pre-poll alliance of the UPA as the opposition group creates an interesting discourse in the context of parliamentary politics. Fourth, the sharp difference in approach that the parties at different sides of the aisle have taken on an issue is an area that could be a good research theme. Obviously, as the succinct analysis of Shastri indicates, this is a significant area for future research. Ronojoy Sen analyzes disruptions in Indian Parliament, a phenomenon that has simultaneously given rise to contrasting claims of decline and democratization of the Indian Parliament. Sen does not enter into the debate on accountability. He uses a subtle historical-political analysis of how the Parliament has been conducting itself since its inception and how the culture began changing as the Congress dominance declined since 1977 and more decisively since 1996. He sums up the early mood of one of the prominent members of the opposition since the 1950s and former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee: ‘You have the numbers,

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we have the arguments’, an argument that his own party forgot during its occupation of the opposition benches, particularly during 2004–14. Without getting into either of the claims, Sen uses Myron Weiner’s thesis of India’s idea of the two ‘political cultures’ that conceptually distinguished between the mass culture in local and state politics and the elite culture of ‘national leadership, senior administrative cadre and the English-speaking intelligentsia’ in the metropolises and the national capital in the early 1960s.46 ‘An elite or a Brahmanical political culture the 1950s and 60s’, seeped in British parliamentary norms and rituals began melting with a democratic upsurge from the 1970s onward, intensified from the late 1980s and the language and idiom of mass political culture gradually permeated the Parliament. Later theorizations, used in the study by most contributors of the deepening of Indian democracy, the entry of state parties, televisation, and so on have been used by Sen as tools to outline a decisive change. Thus, norms of parliamentary discourse and behaviour are replaced with the politics of protest and demonstrations inside Parliament. The question Sen leaves the readers to decipher, if the opposition was able to enforce accountability with lesser numbers, does it have today a sense of achievement in terms of making the executive accountable? Or, is content with just not allowing a few initiatives of the executive, or the ‘ruling party’ as they would like to assert, to materialize and a few legislations not being passed? Jaivir Singh and Raghab P. Dash examine parliamentary control of delegated legislation. Also referred to as secondary, subordinate or subsidiary legislation, delegated legislation is a law made by an executive authority under powers delegated to it by a primary legislative body, the Parliament in the Indian case, in order to implement and administer the requirements of the primary legislation. The process of delegation is through a statute passed by a legislature setting out broad outlines and principles for the authority that exercises the power and responsibility of delegated legislation, which also fleshes out the details (substantive regulations) and provide procedures for implementing the substantive provisions of the statute and substantive (procedural) regulations. Delegated legislation can also be changed faster than primary legislation so legislatures can delegate issues that may need to be fine-tuned through experience. Singh and Dash point out at the very outset that ‘that the nature of governance associated with the delegation of legislation in India is erroneous’ and they advise reform both in procedure and the judicial processes related to it. A more important fact that emerges through the analysis is that the parliamentary control over the delegated legislation is weak and suggests executive domination in this domain.

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Thus the steps to lay down and follow principles in relation to delegated legislation, which empowers the executive to function in a domain outside its constitutionally designated role, need to be worked out by the legislature and cautiously overseen by the judiciary. In fact, barely had India’s constitutional edifice been put in place that this matter came up before the Supreme Court’s constitutional bench, which was divided on the American perspective that the executive cannot make or repeal laws, the British tradition of a sovereign Parliament empowered to delegated laws and a middle-of-the-road Indian position opined that the legislature did not have an unconstrained right to delegate. The ambiguity was, however, removed later in a 1954 majority judgement on Delhi’s Laws Act that felt that the legislature cannot delegate its function of laying down legislative policy in respect of a measure and its formulation as a rule of conduct. Thus, ‘[t]he Legislature must declare the policy of the law and the legal principles, which are to control any given cases and must provide a standard to guide the officials or the body in power to execute the law’ (quoted in Chapter 11, p. 235). Yet, there is still no unambiguously defined principle of what and how much could be delegated and the Supreme Court has never restricted it, making the juridical check on it weak. Parliament has multiple layers of control over delegated legislation, from the laying procedures to scrutiny by committees constituted for the purpose in both of the Houses, yet the authors point out a weak control and oversight structures. Obviously, we need to look at the issue of relative stronger position of the executive even in the legislative domain. The authors thus suggest more clarity in the parent law so that the Parliament could exercise its oversight functions effectively. Vikas Tripathi draws upon the conceptual distinction between the idea of ‘responsibility’ and ‘accountability’ to establish the centrality of Confidence and No Confidence Motions as instruments to ensure a responsible government. He attempts to understand the efficacy and effectiveness of the Motions of ‘Confidence’ and the ‘No Confidence Motions’ listed, discussed and voted from the First to the Fifteenth Lok Sabha to present an assessment of the Parliament-government relationship during different moments in parliamentary democracy. Tripathi points out that recent writings on the Parliament in India, not only give due consideration to the rules, procedures, conventions and constitutional principles but also endeavour to establish links between internal characteristics and the external environment of the Parliament to account for what ails the Indian Parliament. These analyses, he says, explore the nature, character and functioning of the Parliament as an institution of accountability and attempt to unfold the present relationship between

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the legislature and executive in India. However, it may be argued that it falls short on analyzing the government-Parliament relationship in a systemic and general manner, in part because it remains woven around specific themes like representation, accountability, separation of power and legitimacy and is self-limiting in presenting a perspective on the change as well as continuity marking the government-Parliament relationship during distinct moments in the history of parliamentary democracy. He contends that a serious attempt to explore the notion of ‘responsibility’ and ‘responsible government’, linking it with an overall character and nature of the government-Parliament relationship is yet to emerge. There is an inseparability that marks the concept of ‘responsibility’ and ‘accountability’ in these writings. Since, the idea of Parliament as an institution of accountability subsumes the question of responsibility, and a detailed statistical evidence is presented to assess the functioning of Parliament as an institution of accountability, he finds the CMs and the NCMs used over the past six decades as useful tools and indices to argue that it has been possible to successfully use these instruments whether or not the government has been defeated. First, the emergence of strong opposition leadership made Jawaharlal Nehru cautious despite the Congress enjoying absolute majority. Even Indira Gandhi, who would attend Parliament only when necessary, was cautious in the face of effective opposition leadership. Charan Singh in 1979 resigned before facing the confidence vote in Lok Sabha. V.P. Singh eventually ran against the wall with his push for implementing the Mandal Commission Report in order to checkmate the saffron surge and had to quit. In 1996, Atal Bihari Vajpayee could not attract sufficient allies for the proposed NDA and resigned in thirteen days before facing the confidence vote. While H.D. Deve Gowda and I.K. Gujral had to quit in a year as their governments could not go past the CM, Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s NDA government lost by a vote the NCM proposed against it. Two facts and points emerge clearly – that the governments, even with a majority, have to tread carefully in the face of CMs/NCMs, and their excessive use would dissipate their utility. One issue that was debated following the Vajpayee government’s defeat by a singular vote that unless the party that proposes the NCM is in a position to form an alternative government, the proposal should not be accepted. However, the argument did not go far for two reasons: first, no party was prepared to part with the instrument whether or not it can form an alternative government and second, a mechanism to ensure compliance of alternative government could not be agreed upon.

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Parliament and other institutions This section has two chapters, one examines the interface and interrelationship of the Indian Parliament with the institution of local democracy, i.e., the Panchayat Raj Institutions. Kripa Ananthpur looks at the relationship with the PRI imaginatively. The second one by Uttam Sengupta examines the interface and inter-relationship of Parliament with the fourth estate. Parliament is considered to be the cornerstone of democracy. Local governments energize the process through which democracy is deepened and institutionalized at the grassroots. Described in India as Panchayat Raj Institutions (the term has traditionally subsumed urban local bodies as well) that were created first in 1960s, but were constitutionalized to mandate the sub-state level devolution through the SeventyThird and Seventy-Fourth Amendments effected in the Constitution in 1993. India since then has one of the most elaborate provisions for local governments in any constitution in the world. However, the interface between the local government institutions and the Parliament remains largely unexplored. In general, it is assumed that in a federal system, in any system for that matter, the interface between the highest legislature in the country and the grassroots self-governing units should be minimal once devolution power has been statutorily settled; but the reality is more complex. Kripa Ananthpur explores to unravel and understand the complexities of such interface in India both from a theoretical perspective as well as from a practical stand point. Local governments (LGs), comprising panchayats, municipalities, autonomous districts, regional councils and other similar structures of governance today truly build up an entire edifice of Indian democracy in order to bring the state and the citizen closer through greater accountability in the delivery of public services by bringing the structures of governance close to the people. Yet, the Constituent Assembly of India, which also functioned as the provisional Parliament during 1947–52, nearly missed the bus as Chairman of the Drafting Committee Dr. B.R. Ambedkar’s apprehension that the exploitative and oppressive structure of Indian villages would appropriate the constitutional power to its own ends. However, the initiative of the President of the Assembly Dr. Rupendra Prasad and an amendment proposed by the well-known Gandhian, K. Santhanam, led to the insertion of Article 40 in the Directive Principles of State Policy in Part IV of the Constitution, the part that contained positive rights from the ever-growing list of rights that the members wanted to give to their citizens and was made non-justiciable given the limited capacity of the Indian state.

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However, the resolution for local democracy did not fructify till in 1957 the Policy Planning Division of the Planning Commission set up a committee under Balwantrai Mehta to review the ongoing Community Development Programme (1952) and National Extension Service (1953) and to recommend institutional mechanism to improve the two recommended a three-tier Panchayat Raj system as the last link in the chain of the delivery network. The states, all of them ruled by Congress then, tweaked the recommendations to suit their needs and by early 1960s the PRIs were elected on ‘non-party’ basis as recommended and functioning in their limited role, only to stagnate and decline within a decade. The Asoka Mehta Committee appointed in 1978 by the Janata Government to look at deficiencies and the ways of revival, categorized their path into three phases: of ascendancy (1959–64), stagnation (1965–69) and decline (1969–71). Parliament displayed its apprehension of the move to constitutionalize the local government by Rajiv Gandhi in 1989, but eventually amended the Constitution in 1992 to incorporate the new provisions (Seventy-Third and SeventyFourth Amendments). While the state governments continue to remain indifferent to the local government, even undermine them, Ananthpur points out three factors that weaken local democracy – i) the statutory provisions for the ex-officio role of the local MPs and MLAs, in a paternalistic manner, at different levels in the PRI institutional structure; ii) MPLADS, MNREGA and other centrally sponsored schemes that cut into the funds that should have gone to the local bodies; and iii) the creation of several parallel bodies at the local level to administer new central or state schemes. Moreover, both the national and state level politicos interfere to control the local politics and institutions at informal levels too. A significant point that the author brings out through her survey is the way Parliament is perceived by people – as a policy-making body by her urban respondents, or as a distant body that is not much understood or visible from their perspective by the rural respondents. This leads us to a significant question. Does the electronic media-centric chaos created by the MPs within the precincts of the Parliament and their converting this representative forum elected as the central legislature, as also to hold the executive responsible and accountable, help the MPs reach their audience and constituencies? We would need further research into this question. Uttam Sengupta’s analysis of Parliament and media highlights that gradually declining quality and quantity of parliamentary debate has not been sufficiently captured by the media. In fact, the Parliament’s engagement with such issues has come down over the years. He points

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out that both print media and electronic media are remiss in highlighting issues of representation and legislation that are significant for people at large, they instead focus on the trivial. He points out questions such as MPs dozing, the quality of food in the Parliament’s subsidized canteen, leaving out an in-depth analysis of debates on important issues, a review of the functioning of the parliamentary committees in terms their efficacy, as well as the reports they put out. If there is a thesis of decline of Parliament, Sengupta points out the decline of media’s role in putting the Parliament to a serious scrutiny.

Miscellaneous perspectives Raghab Dash discusses the parliamentary support system, its secretariat, an aspect of running of the Parliament that has not been explored. Three aspects come out clearly and succinctly. First, is its historical legacy, beginning with the Montagu–Chelmsford Reforms in 1920 when Central Legislature came into being and Secretary of the Legislative Department was tasked with providing secretarial assistance to it. Despite demands for a separate secretariat since 1921, the arrangement continued. It was left to Vithalbhai Patel after he was elected President of the Legislative Assembly in August 1925 to carry on campaign and mounting pressure on the government to create the secretariat and his efforts succeeded on 10 January 1929. Second, while it helped developing the secretariat after independence, the period between 15 August 1947 and 15 May 1952, when the First Lok Sabha was constituted, G.V. Mavalankar shaped the secretariat as the Speaker of the Constituent Assembly, the interim Parliament and the First Lok Sabha. Third, the leaders displayed great wisdom in keeping the secretariat, which was bifurcated to serve each of the houses, independent of the bureaucracy and all its paraphernalia – service conditions, appointment, grievance redressal and so on. Dash goes into every detail and provides an insight into the functioning of the two houses of Parliament. Rahul Tripathi’s analysis of the role of Indian Parliament in foreign policy takes a broad sweep at the foreign policy making in the country – from Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru playing his own external affairs minister to the present. Foreign and Security Policies in India have traditionally been perceived to be the domain of the Executive. The Prime Minister, his Office, and the Ministries of External Affairs and Defence led by their respective ministers have long presided and acted over the matters that have a bearing on the nation’s defence and external relations. The Parliament has had more of a deliberative role

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often discussing and endorsing the actions taken by the government of the day on these matters. Such an arrangement sustained as there was a single-party dominated government at the centre for nearly four decades after independence and the opposition did not deem it fit to disturb the national consensus on ‘core’ issues of national interest. However, with the era of coalition politics at the national level since 1989 that matured considerably by 1998, the Parliament began to reflect a far greater diversity of interests and stances than is often seen in the earlier instances with the unstated consensus on foreigneconomic and security policy often breaking down. In a departure of sorts, the UPA I, on the issue of Indo-US Nuclear deal by the CPI(M), and the UPA II, on multi-brand retail issue by the AITMC, witnessed coalition partners withdrawing support on foreign-security policy issues. The Union government increasingly has walked a tightrope as it can no longer presume that all are on board on issues of foreign policy. Smita Gupta looks at the changes in parliamentary deliberations, strategies, politics and behaviour for the past three decades as political grandstanding in the country’s premium political theatre has transformed the apex representative and legislative body into a spectacle. What has contributed to this and what impact has it had on politics in the country? Gupta points to televised proceedings as one reason. Political parties and leaders in the era of social media use this visual medium along with other electronic tools to reach their constituents. She succinctly puts it, As political parties joust with each other to push forward concerns most important to their constituents, passions rise and ebb. Walkouts, storming the well of the House, shouting slogans, holding up placards, demanding adjournments are all par for the course. (Chapter 17, p. 342) She also aptly cites the use of pepper spray in the Lok Sabha, an unprecedented event, which did not add to dignity of the house. Her analysis, as many others in this volume, juxtaposes the two arguments used for the contemporary developments of democratization and decline. Both are perhaps true and in a causal relationship in this context, but it is the outcome that needs to be reviewed. Gupta does not point to a positive outcome. The caution and warning by veteran Communist Party of India leader Gurudas Dasgupta that she cites is apt: ‘A day may come when Parliament may be reduced to signing registers and going home, without a word of discussion, drawing a daily allowance and monthly salary for being present in the House’ (quoted in Chapter 17, p. 343).

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Conclusion This study establishes the Indian Parliament as a dynamic arena of political and constitutional India. With social, economic and gender representation continually discussed and the Parliament being the forum and instrument for social engineering, if not change, it is no less a social arena of chafing that eventually smooths frictious edges of contentious issues. It is India’s apex representative and legislative body, it also is simultaneously the source of the government and a watchdog exercising the leash of enforcing accountability and responsibility on it. It is the institution that also articulates the needs and aspirations of the people which are voiced by the 543 directly elected and 250 indirectly elected representatives despite the pulls and pressures of partisanship displayed day in and day out. Obviously, as the institution completes six decades traversing from the middle of the twentieth century to the second decade of the twentyfirst, half of which is already over, the overwhelming concern emerging from the analyses, mostly quantitative, is a decline of the institution that is representative as procedurally prescribed but far from mirroring the social diversity: still legislating, even if the legislations have many a time looked more partisan than they should be; still holding the government on edges though both the methods and the results are suspects; for the past twenty-five years its representative character has been marred and mired with the charges of criminalization, a euphemism for the criminal cases against the elected representatives as well as criminally tainted persons entering the representative instructions. If that was not enough, a highly fractured party system, which is leading to a fragmented mandate time and again, is increasingly appealing to the social cleavages (caste, religion, etc.), sharpening them further and keep them on a boil between elections, creating charged emotions that keep erupting from time to time. However, the decline must also be weighed against the positives of the Parliament never failing to give a government and letting it function smoothly; one minority government and three coalition governments have completed full five-year terms since 1991 – no mean achievement. On the positives, a number of studies have pointed out that the Parliament and the Legislative Studies have been a great enabler, as they have provided opportunities for those on the margins to move to the centre stage of politics and power and these institutions have become more representative since the 1990s. The power at the federal level has changed hands sixteen times since independence and twelve times it has been from one party or the coalition to the other. If there have been tussles for the prime

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ministerial chair, they have been politically sorted out as well, though in some cases, they have also led to the fall of the government. Obviously, it would depend on what is defined as decline and what would be characterized as success. Nonetheless, there is no denying the fact that fault lines of India’s representative and procedural democracy have been all too apparent in the past three decades. Since certain positives have also been the hallmark of the Indian Parliament and parliamentary democracy in their six-decade journey, there is a need to make its success in sustaining democracy the point of departure for research. The institutional strength given by the Constitution and procedural and political weaknesses that have crept in must be examined to look for remedial measures.

Notes 1 Both the Union Powers Committee (Chair: Jawaharlal Nehru) and the Provincial Powers Committee (Chair: Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel) recommended ‘parliamentary executive’ for the country. The latter said, ‘it would suit the conditions of this country better to adopt the parliamentary system of constitution, the British type of Constitution with which we are familiar’. CAD, vol. IV, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat, p. 578. 2 Dr. Ambedkar thus justified opting for this system: The Parliamentary system differs from a non Parliamentary system in as much as the former is more responsible than the latter but they also differ as to the time and agency for assessment of their responsibility. . . . The daily assessment of responsibility which is not available under the American system is, it is felt, far more effective than the periodic assessment and far more necessary in a country like India. The Draft Constitution, in recommending the parliamentary system of executive, has preferred more responsibility to more stability. CAD, vol. VII, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat, pp. 32–33. 3 The count in this case begins with each Prime Minister sworn-in after each general election or in between. Leaving aside 1947–52 interim government, Jawaharlal Nehru was sworn-in thrice. Leaving out the two interim terms of Gulzarilal Nanda (1964 and 1966), second Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri’s was the fourth government. His successor Indira Gandhi was sworn-in in 1966, 1967, 1971 and 1980. Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the tenth Prime Minister, was sworn-in after the eleventh general election (1996), the twelfth and the thirteenth general elections (1998, 1999). H.D. Deve Gowda and I.K. Gujral both served for a year each, as the eleventh and the twelfth Prime Ministers after Atal Bihari Vajpayee resigned in thirteen days in the Eleventh Lok Sabha. Dr. Manmohan Singh, the thirteenth Prime Minister, was sworn-in after the fourteenth and fifteenth general elections (2004, 2009). Narendra Modi is fourteenth Prime Minister elected following sixteenth general election in 2014. 4 See for details: https://india.gov.in/my-government/constitution-india/ amendments?page=9 (Accessed on 10 July 2016).

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5 Subhash Kashyap (History of the Parliament of India, vol. 1, Delhi: Shipra Publications, 1994, Chapter 1) has referred to popular assemblies in the Vedic period, the emergence of several republics in post-Vedic and Buddhist periods and the system of panchayats, a council of five in villages with quasi-judicial and other related roles. He presents evidence and arguments from the classics to suggest that the kingship was elective and the King functioned with the help of a council. He points out the presence of Gana, the Sanskrit for republic, in the Rigveda, which refers to the Gana forty-six times, which perhaps were tribal system of government with both an elective head and a council. Similarly, he points out that the Jatakas, the 600 BC Jain classics, also refer to Sabha or assembly. 6 W.H. Morris-Jones, The Indian Parliament, London: Allen and Unwin, 1957, p. 42. 7 Gurumukh Nihal Singh considers the Indian Council Act, 1861, important in India’s constitutional history, ‘because it enabled the GovernorGeneral to associate the people of the land with work of legislation’, and ‘by vesting legislative powers in the Governments of Bombay and Madras and by making provisions for the institution of similar legislative councils in other provinces, it laid the foundations of the policy of legislative devolution which resulted in the grant of almost complete internal autonomy to the provinces in 1937’. Quoted in Manik Lal Gupta, Constitutional Development in India, New Delhi: Atlantic Publishers and Distributors, 1989, p. 22. 8 Shibani Kinkar Chaube makes a pertinent point that Lord Ripon, who visualized elective local government as a training ground for Indians in representative government with his 1883 devolution package, deserves being factored into the discussion of the evolution of representative politics in India. Despite his opposition, separate electorate also entered then due to bureaucratic pressure. Shibani Kinkar Chaube, The Making and Working of the Indian Constitution, New Delhi: National Book Trust, India, 2009, pp. 9–10. 9 The British were not enamoured by the philosophical foundation of liberalism in their own country in granting representation to Indians in governance: ‘The language of representative politics thus entered India through a utilitarian filter, at a time when British liberalism was at its most rampantly collectivist and paternalist. . . . The interests of Indians, the British had decided, could not be individual. It followed that when elections to provincial legislatures were first introduced – as a result of constitutional reforms devised in 1909 by the Secretary for India, John Morley, and the Viceroy, Lord Minto – the units of representation were not defined (as they were in Britain) as territorial constituencies containing individuals with rights and changeable interests. The Legislatures of British India’s administrative provinces, arbitrarily demarcated territories, represented societies of communities, not individuals’. Sunil Khilnani, The Idea of India, Gurgaon: Penguin Books India, 2016 (A reprint of 2012 edition), p. 24. 10 Khilnani, 2016, op cit., pp. 24–27 and Ajay K. Mehra, ‘Historical Development of Party System in India’, in Ajay K. Mehra, D.D. Khanna and Gert W. Kueck (eds.), Political Parties and the Party Systems, New Delhi: Sage, 2003, pp. 49–82. 11 Chaube, 2009, op. cit., p. 5.

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12 The Cabinet Mission under Sir Pethick Lawrence visited India in March 1946 to draw a plan for the transfer of power to India in consultation with all the major political stakeholders. Its inclination towards accepting a pro-Muslim League two nation theory, if not partition, has been discussed and analyzed (see, for example, Chaube, 2009, op. cit., pp. 11–12). 13 The Constituent Assembly – and the Provisional Parliament that it adjunctly functioned as – performs a representative function and hence some critiques have raised genuine concern over the representativeness of the body. However, the fact that the Assembly brought in Universal Adult Suffrage reflected the concerns of the members for creating representative democracy in India. Further, it has been rightly argued that the constitutions of the most stable democracies in the world, whose experiences the Assembly tapped, ‘with the Philadelphia Constitutional Convention in 1787, followed by the French National Assembly of 1789’ did not have constituent bodies elected on the basis of universal adult franchise. ‘On the other hand, the Frankfurt Parliament of Germany (1848), elected on the basis of universal male franchise, failed to enact a constitution’. Chaube, 2009, op cit., pp. 16–17. 14 Granville Austin puts it aptly: ‘The Constituent Assembly wore two hats: one as the nation’s provisional parliament, the other while drafting the constitution. Vital in themselves, these goals were understood to be essential to each other’. This also meant, he rightly points out, ‘These they knew (what the country needed and what they intended it should have) in practice as well as in theory, for they were the Government of India while they were drafting the new constitution’. Granville Austin, ‘The Expected and Unintended in Working of Democratic Constitution’, in Zoya Hassan, E. Sridharan and R. Sudarshan (eds.), India’s Living Constitution: Ideas, Practices, Controversies, Delhi: Permanent Black, 2002, p. 319. 15 Chaube, 2009, op. cit., pp. 19–20. 16 Sarbani Sen (The Constitution of India: Popular Sovereignty and Democratic Transformations, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2007, pp. 1–40) defines Parliament, or representative institutions as the expression of popular sovereignty and constitutionalism a product of people exercising their sovereign authority for collective self-determination. 17 K. Hanumanthaiya’s disappointment, expressed in his long comment, was that many learned members, well-versed in the laws of various countries, were not from the Congress, hence they did not understand what kind of constitution India needed. As a result (in his words), ‘we wanted the music of Veena or Sitar, but here we have the music of an English band. That was because our constitution makers were educated that way’. Constituent Assembly Debates, vol. IX, Thursday, the 17 November 1949, http://parliamentofindia.nic.in/ls/debates/vol11p4.htm (Accessed on 31 May 2016). 18 Sen, 2007, op. cit., fn. 8, p. 4. 19 The studies on Indian Parliament have been mapped in a subsequent section, which bring out that it is a dynamic area that should keep inviting researchers. PRS Legislative at the Centre for Policy Research, Vidhi Centre for Legal Research, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies and the secretariats of both the houses of Parliament keep generating data that could be used with empirical research to explore various aspects of Parliament and parliamentarianism in India.

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20 A fresh insight into separation of powers is presented by Madhav Khosla, The Indian Constitution, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2011, Chapter 1. 21 For a discussion on the Constituent Assembly debate on this issue see Ajay K. Mehra, ‘“Due Process” or “Procedure Established by Law”’, in Pran Chopra (ed.), The Supreme Court Versus the Constitution: A Challenge to Federalism, New Delhi: Sage, 2006, pp. 115–130. 22 This case challenging the Parliament’s power to amend the Part III of the Constitution (citing Article 13b) in the wake of the First Amendment (1951) that intended to restrict the scope of Article 31 (1) and (2) as the Right to Property and quantum of compensation (repealed since by the Constitution Forty-Fourth Amendment Act, 1978) became issues in implementing the government’s policies on land reforms. The Supreme Court ruled that a constitutional amendment will be valid even if it abridges or takes away any of the fundamental rights. 23 The case challenging the validity of the Seventeenth Amendment of the Constitution (1964) that sought to apply the use of Article 31 (A) with retrospect and also amend Schedule Nine accordingly also validated the Parliament’s power to amend Part III of the Constitution. 24 An eleven-judge bench of the Supreme Court (the apex court constituted such a large bench for the first time) ruled on 28 February 1967 declaring that the Fundamental Rights were transcendental and inviolable and the Parliament of India had no power to take away or abridge any of the Fundamental Rights in Part III of the Constitution by way of an amendment. The bench felt that the liberty of the individual in the Constitution is subject to various ‘reasonable restrictions’ which are expressly mentioned in the Constitution and no further limitations should be imposed on it at any time. 25 In adjudicating in this case that challenged the validity of the twentyfourth (asserting that the Parliament had the power to amend any part of the Constitution), twenty-fifth (curtailed the right to property and empowered the government to fix compensation for the land acquired), twentysixth (abolition of privy purses) and twenty-ninth (amended the Schedule Nine) amendments of the Constitution, the apex court ruled, though did not define, that the ‘basic structure’ of the Indian Constitution could not be altered by the Parliament. Since the cases related to the Fundamental Rights, the judgement obviously meant that Party III of the Constitution was part of the basic structure as given by the Constituent Assembly. 26 See Sen, 2007, op. cit.; see particularly ‘Introduction’. 27 Granville Austin’s analysis of the developments in the working of the Constitution from the very outset, bring out interesting tussle between the government and the judiciary. The tensions that arose out of unexpected impact of the constitutional provisions that the ‘founding fathers and mothers’ had drafted themselves intended to have ‘national unity, and integrity, democracy, and a social revolution to better the lot of the mass of citizens’. Now in the Government of India the country’s socio-economic diversity as well as the entrenched order was reacting at having been put at a disadvantage. The Government turns to Parliament for constitutional amendments as ‘rectification’, and the web begins, which has intensified since the 1970s. The analysis that juxtaposes the ideals, the social stresses and demands, governmental reactions, parliamentary laws and

Introduction

28 29

30 31

32

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constitutional amendments, brings out an interesting dynamic of the role of Parliament. Austin, op. cit., 2002, pp. 319–343. Such a demands and arguments need to be put to the test of intra-institutional system of checks and balances pointed out by Sen, 2007, op cit., p. 4. In a detailed review of the issue of gender representation, Zoya Hasan traces its history from a discussion beginning with the constitutional reforms in the 1930s. The opposition of the Indian National Congress to special electoral rights led to all its linked women organizations oppose gender representation. However, the British government brought in gender representation on religious lines in the Government of India Act 1935 by reserving forty-one seats for women. After independence, women’s representation in elective institution remained low. The report of the Committee on the Status of Women in 1971 observed that ‘The review of disabilities and constraints on women, which stem from the socio-cultural institutions, indicates that the majority of women are still very far from enjoying the rights and opportunities granted to them by the constitution’. However, this did not find favour with the government; it did not receive backing of even Indira Gandhi. The National Perspective Plan for Women prepared during Rajiv Gandhi’s government in 1988 favoured a 33 per cent reservation for women in legislative bodies. The discourse picked up in the 1990s and support for the idea of women’s representation in legislative bodies started gaining support, more particularly after the Seventy-Third and Seventy-Fourth Amendments ensured 33 per cent representation to women in local bodies. Despite initial apprehensions and teething problems, the women representatives in the local bodies did make a mark. However, that was not enough for the Parliament to legislate on women’s reservation. The closest the Parliament came to passing such a legislation was when One Hundred and Eighth Constitutional Amendment bill was passed in the Rajya Sabha on 9 March 2010. Zoya Hasan, ‘The “Politics of Presence” and Legislative Reservation for Women’, in Hassan, Sridharan and Sudarshan (eds.), op. cit., 2002, pp. 405–427. K.C. Wheare, Legislatures, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1963, pp. 219–223, 227–230. See, for example, M.R. Mahajan and Harsimarat Kaur, ‘Measuring the Effectiveness of the Indian Parliament’, in Sudha Pai and Avinash Kumar (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Critical Appraisal, New Delhi: Orient Blackswan, 2014, pp. 33–45. First published in the Journal of Commonwealth and Comparative Politics {XIX(3), November 1981} Lloyd I. Rudolph and Susanne Hoeber Rudolph reproduced the article ‘Judicial Review Versus Parliamentary Sovereignty: The Struggle Over Stateness in India’, in Lloyd I. Rudolph and Susanne Hoeber Rudolph (eds.), Explaining Indian Democracy – A Fifty Year Perspective 1956–2006: The Realm of Institutions – State Formation and Institutional Change, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, pp. 183–210. See Ajay K. Mehra, ‘The Role of the Rajya Sabha’, in Ajay K. Mehra and Gert W. Kueck (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Comparative Perspective, New Delhi: Konark, pp. 405–422 and Rekha Saxena, ‘The Rajya Sabha: A Federal or a Secondary Chamber’, in B.D. Dua, M.P. Singh and Rekha

34

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41 42 43 44 45

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Ajay K. Mehra Saxena (eds.), The Indian Parliament: The Changing Landscape, New Delhi: Manohar, 2014, pp. 381–402. Sen, 2007, op. cit. The volume was result of a conference golden jubilee of the Indian Parliament (2002). See, Vijay Kumar, ‘Presiding Officers of the Indian Parliament’, in Mehra and Kueck (eds.), op. cit., 2003, pp. 174–205. Quoted by Dhananjay Mahapatra, ‘Are Our Speakers as Impartial and Apolitical as They Should Be?’, The Times of India, 18 July 2016, p. 9. Utkarsh Anand, ‘Why Speaker’s Power to Disqualify Is Not Unrestrained’, The Indian Express, 20 July 2016, p. 13. M.V. Rajeev Gowda and E. Sridharan, ‘Reforming India’s Party Financing and Election Expenditure Laws’, Election Law Journal, 11(2), 2012, pp. 226–240; Devesh Kapur and Milan Vaishnav, Quid Pro Quo: Builders, Politicians, and Election Finance in India, Philadelphia: Centre for Global Development, University of Pennsylvania, Working Paper No. 276, December 2011, http://ssrn.com/abstract = 1972987 (Accessed on 31 March 2013); Milan Vaishnav, The Market for Criminality: Money, Muscle and Elections in India, 2011, http://casi.ssc.upenn.edu/system/files/ Market%2Bfor%2BCriminality%2B-%2BAug%2B2011.pdf (Accessed on 31 March 2013). For example, Raghab P. Dash, Law Making in a Democracy: The Contested Domain of Executive-Legislative Relations in India, Unpublished PhD thesis submitted to the Centre for the Study of Law and Governance, JNU, 2014 is a comprehensive study of Delegated Legislation. A. Surya Prakash and Ajay K. Mehra, two of the contributors in this volume, have contributed to more than one issue of Social Watch India’s assessment with their review of the Parliament. Since these are part of continuing evaluation with fresh issues and data each time, these are recommended as useful resources to researchers. Pran Chopra (ed.), The Supreme Court Versus the Constitution: A Challenge to Federalism, New Delhi: Sage, 2006. Sen, 2007, op. cit. Madhav Khosla, The Indian Constitution, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2012. Devesh Kapur and Pratap Bhanu Mehta, The India Parliament as an Institution of Accountability, Paper No. 23, January 2006, United Nations Research Institute for Social Development, p. 8. See, for example, Balveer Arora, ‘The Indian Parliament and Democracy’, in Ajay K. Mehra and Gert W. Kueck (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Comparative Perspective, New Delhi: Konark, 2003, pp. 14–41; A. Surya Prakash, What Ails Indian Parliament, New Delhi: Indus, an imprint of Harper Collins, 1995; and Ajay K. Mehra ‘Parliament Under Social Watch: Representation, Accountability and Governance’, Citizens Report on Governance and Development 2006, National Social Watch Coalition, Delhi: Pearson; ‘Indian Parliament and the “Grammar of Anarchy”’, Citizens Report on Governance and Development 2007, National Social Watch Coalition, Delhi: Sage Publications, 2007 and ‘Indian Parliament and Cost to the Country’, Citizens’ Report on Governance and Development 2013, National Social Watch, Delhi: Danish Books, 2013. Myron Weiner, ‘India Two Political Cultures’, in Myron Weiner (ed.), Political Change in South Asia, Calcutta: Firma KLM, 1963, p. 114.

Part I

Institutional perspective

1

Parliament The formative years, 1952–72 B. G. Verghese

India’s sovereign Parliament came into being with the first general election in 1952 based on universal adult franchise. This followed the adoption of the Constitution in November 1949 by the Constituent Assembly (that had also doubled as a provisional parliament). The intervening period was taken in enactment of the Representation of the People’s Act, 1951, preparation of electoral rolls, formulating the electoral process and training personnel. It was a mammoth task. Not only was this the largest democratic election anytime, anywhere in the world – and remains so – but many at home and abroad were sceptical how an illiterate mass would read the ballots and cast votes in secrecy. The previous election under the Raj had been held on a restricted franchise of about 11 per cent of the adult population based on educational, income and property qualifications. The idea of voting on the basis of familiar symbols and marking the left forefinger of each voter with indelible ink, to prevent double voting, was a stroke of genius. It worked, and has since been copied around the developing world. More remarkable was the fact that India stood history on its head. Whereas adult franchise was the end product of 100–50 years of social and economic revolution in the West, here India consciously determined to adopt adult franchise as an instrument of social and economic transformation. The sceptics were many. They were confounded. The task ahead was to translate the lofty promises of the Constitution into ground reality or, as Gandhi graphically put it, to wipe the tear from every eye. Ambedkar, the Father of the Constitution, emphasised the social dimension, and projected equal citizenship as the cornerstone of a cohesive, democratic India. This then was the agenda given to the new Parliament. Many members were old stalwarts, lawyers, professionals and mature politicians of the freedom struggle, but a sprinkling of the new India also found

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representation – dalits, scheduled tribes, farmers and local small town leaders. It was a motley gathering of dress, tongues, occupations and cultures, but truly representative of the vast diversity of India. Though predominantly populated by white khadi-clad, Gandhitopied1 Congressmen, reflecting a single-party dominance that was to last until 1967, red, blue and saffron caps began to intrude before too long. The rise of the Bharatiya Jan Sangh saw the decline and demise of the Hindu Mahasabha and Ram Rajya Parishad while the Left was represented by the Communist Party of India and the Praja Socialist Party. All these parties gradually splintered and gave birth to new political formations during the late 1950s and the 1960s. The Congress voted as one, but the views it reflected were many, which made for the lively cut and thrust of debate. There were powerful and learned speakers to advocate a multitude of causes and though there was a clash of arguments, decorum and courtesy were seldom missing. Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru encouraged this diversity and many distinguished personalities drawn from outside the Congress were inducted in his first cabinet to bring in representation and make it a national government in principle – Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, Baldev Singh, Jagjivan Ram, Shanmugham Chetty, K.C Neogy, John Matthai, C.H. Bhabha and C.D Deshmukh among them.2 The Attorney-General was not unoften summoned to the House to explain legal niceties and assist the House. M.C. Setalvad and C.K. Daphtary, the first two Attorney-Generals, were familiar figures in the Lok Sabha and were always heard with attention and respect. Obviously, the leaders who were laying the foundation of constitutional practices and parliamentary government did not want to make any mistake that could prove fatal for India’s democracy that was still taking roots. Unfortunately, that healthy practice has disappeared over the years. Listening to the debates, as I did as a reporter, was an education. The discussions were erudite and went to the fundamentals. Dr. Ambedkar, in particular, would come with a large bag full of references. He would trace the origins of particular laws and their legal and social implications, cite foreign examples, spell out alternative pathways and then commend the course he laid before the House. These were masterly performances and heard with rapt attention. Then there was the eloquence of Nehru himself, Syama Prasad Mukherjee, Acharya Kripalani, Parushottam Das Tandon, Minoo Masani, Jaipal Singh, Pandit Kunzru, Seth Govind Das, H.V. Kamath and others including Maulana Abul Kalam Azad in his chaste Urdu. The Speaker, the gentle G.V. Mavlankar was greatly respected. Needless to say, he commanded

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respect with his non-partisan and adroit handling of the proceedings of the Lok Sabha, more particularly his dexterous guidance during contentious but informed, erudite and involved debates that was respected by the government and the treasury benches despite a weak opposition. In the Rajya Sabha, Vice President and Chairman Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan’s stewardship was akin to that of a loveable guru presiding over a gaggle of boisterous children. Indeed, despite Congress dominance, the Rajya Sabha debates were also lively and animated and the Chairman and the House functioned on the principles of mutual respect. The tone of both Houses reflected dignity and decorum. There was banter and repartee, but nothing could be said about those not present in the House and no charge could be levied without prior notice. Question Hour was eagerly looked forward to and as many as 20–30 questions would be answered in an exercise of daily accountability, which is among the main functions of a legislature. There was no zero hour, but short notice-questions were not uncommon. Private business on Fridays was taken seriously and a private member’s Bill moved by Feroze Gandhi to permit reportage of parliamentary proceedings was actually adopted. Obviously, partisanship and party discipline did not come in the way of a good private member’s Bill being accepted by the House. Parliament made news and its proceedings were widely reported in considerable detail. Parliament met for perhaps 120–50 days in the year and all subjects – foreign affairs, planning, social policy – were regularly debated. Disruption of proceedings was completely unknown. Despite its meagre number, the opposition functioned with substantive intervention and yet succeeded in opposing the government. Sessions of the parliament used to be productive. The initial years after the framing of the Constitution were devoted to giving its provisions legislative flesh and institutional backing. This was a time of nation-building and structural reform. Though the Congress had always favoured a decentralised, panchayat-oriented polity, the circumstances of Partition, the massive refugee influx, the tricky business of integration of princely states, the Kashmir war and incipient insurgency in the Northeast compelled a degree of centralisation not previously contemplated. Yet federalism was not abandoned. Many chief ministers, yeomen leaders of the freedom struggle in their own right, were no push-overs and held their ground, demanding more. States reorganisation, language policy, the abolition of zamindari and the reordering of other property rights, the establishment of institutions and policy frameworks for land and forests, cooperatives,

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credit, industrial and scientific policy, the fashioning of the public sector and foreign policy centred on non-alignment and so forth were prime pre-occupations of governance and legislation. The civil and security services were refashioned. Social issues such as education and family planning, reservations, the three-language formula, cow protection, the Hindu Code Bill – but, alas, not a uniform civil code – were taken up. In short, two synergised simultaneous processes of constitutional processes and institution building were undertaken by the Parliament in all earnest. One-party dominance, a weak opposition or any such partisan matters did not come in the way. Parliamentary efficacy was ensured by the vision and attitude of the parliamentarians. The community development programme and national extension service marked fundamental structural change. ‘Reasonable restrictions’ on the freedom of speech and expression were introduced with the very first Constitutional amendment. And furious debates raged on translating the Directive Principles of State Policy, the nation’s social charter, into policy and programmes. The Parliament was responsive to the needs of the infant democracy and its people, party affiliation and ideology of the parliamentarians guided them in debating the issues, but they displayed responsibility in attending to the matter at hand. Socialist leanings to eliminate poverty and foster equality led to the formulation of a ‘socialistic pattern of society’ with the commanding heights of the economy firmly in the hands of the State. This was later to lead to ‘garibi hatao’ and a spate of nationalisation. Nibbling away at the constitutional edifice was to lead to a series of court cases and the formulation by the Supreme Court of the concept of an inviolate ‘basic structure of the Constitution’. All this stirred huge controversy in Parliament and in the country. Issues of corruption came up occasionally, such as the so-called jeep scandal. This entailed the purchase of a few jeeps by V.K. Krishna Menon from the UK for military use.3 Then followed the ‘housing scandal’. This concerned the establishment of the Hindustan Housing Factory to manufacture pre-fabricated structures to facilitate the rapid assembly of accommodation. Both were small-time issues but loomed large. A more serious crisis that shook the Government arose over the Mundhra-LIC deal that caused the resignation of the then Finance Minister, T.T. Krishnamachari and the Finance Secretary, H.M. Patel following an Inquiry headed by the jurist, M.C. Chagla.4 The deal was exposed in Parliament by Feroze Gandhi, Indira Gandhi’s husband and Prime Minister Nehru’s son-in-law. More importantly, by a Congressman. He faced no disciplinary action or castigation from the party or the Prime Minister for exposing his own party’s government.

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Obviously, morality was looked upon above party discipline. This made the Parliament a vibrant institution. The real slide began in the late 1950s and 1960s with a ban on electoral funding by corporate houses. The quip was that every MP and MLA was compelled to commence his or her legislative career with a lie with regard to election expenses. Issues of electoral reform gained salience – and remain. Matters have since grown worse. The Congress split saw the principal sources of corruption moving from the local and state level to the national, with the tapping of more lucrative central sources such as import and export licensing and defence and other contracts. The reports of the Estimates Committee, the Public Accounts Committee and the Public Undertakings Committee were given considerable importance and keenly debated. One feature that stood out was a section in these reports titled ‘procedural lapses’. Implicit in this was an unwarranted hint of corruption with the process being regarded as sacrosanct regardless of performance, a wretched by-product of the permit-licence raj. Thus firms that reported production in excess of licensed capacity, through efficiency measures, better technology or conservation measures, were considered offenders. The absurd process versus performance syndrome persists. Nehru reigned supreme and was meticulous in attendance. His speeches on the nation’s secular fabric, the need for planning, the development of a scientific temper and, above all, foreign policy were seminars intended to exhort and educate. His clashes with Syama Prasad Mookherjee and Purushottam Das Tandon electrified the House as he made no bones about his scorn for revivalism and conservatism. But he was a tired man by the late fifties and faced humiliation in the period 1958–62 when his somewhat woolly-eyed policy of Hindi Chini Bhai Bhai and dependence on V.K. Krishna Menon came a cropper.5 Parliament was stinging about what was a monumental failure of policy. Consultative committees had been set up for each Ministry, but the more useful parliamentary standing committees that could examine any matter and take expert evidence only came later. The question arose as to whether these committees should be open to the media, as the press favoured. Fortunately this was not accepted, as members who discussed issues candidly irrespective of party affiliations or ideologies, would then start playing to the gallery as now increasingly happens in the House with the advent of TV coverage. The Press Gallery played an important role in Parliament as it was the means of communicating proceedings to the Members’ constituencies and to the public at large. So Members would often look at the Gallery to see who was present and would thereafter come up to the Press Rooms

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on the first floor to brief absent newsmen. Parliament reporting has gradually lost ground and moved from straight reporting to opinion pieces and commentaries to the detriment of both Parliament and the Press. The nadir of Parliament was the Emergency when opposition members were jailed or muzzled by censorship. Thereafter, standards have steadily deteriorated as proceedings have sometimes deteriorated into brawls, grandstanding or disruption, rules are flaunted and decorum has been thrown to the winds. This, however, is a passing phase as India is in transition and Parliament’s changing membership and proceedings represent some of that enormous churning from below. Parliament represents the country’s supreme institution and the first four Parliaments set the frame for building a democratic India. This remains a work in progress.

Notes 1 Gandhi topi or cap is a typical boat-shaped white cap made of handspun white khadi fabric, popularised by Mahatma Gandhi during the first NonCooperation Movement in 1918–21. It later became an essential political uniform of Congress leaders across the country. 2 For a detailed discussion on India’s cabinet formation in the initial years see, V.A. Pai Panandiker and Ajay K. Mehra, The Indian Cabinet: A Study in Governance, New Delhi: Konark, 1997. 3 The jeep scandal came up in 1948 when Menon was India’s High Commissioner in London. The Indian Army urgently required 4,000 jeeps due to outbreak of hostilities with Pakistan in 1948. The Indian High Commission in London negotiated and placed orders for 2,000 reconditioned jeeps along with spares for three years with an unknown firm. The firm defaulted on all terms of the contract. The delivery was scheduled to commence in August 1948 and to be completed in December 1948. Only 155 jeeps were delivered in March 1949, which were declared unfit for use. See G.S. Bhargava and S.N. Dwivedi, Political Corruption in India, New Delhi: Popular Book Service, 1967, particularly Ch. V and A.G. Noorani, Ministers’ Misconduct, New Delhi: Vikas Publishing House Pvt. Ltd, 1973. 4 The shares of the company owned by businessman Haridas Mundhra, who was in financial crisis, were purchased by the public sector Life Insurance Corporation of India for ₹12.6 million on the instructions of Finance Minister T.T. Krishnamachari and his principal finance secretary H.M. Patel in 1957 to bail him out of the crisis. Krishnamachari had to resign after he was indicted by the M.C. Chagla Commission, but no legal action was taken against any of the concerned persons. Significantly, the Board of Inquiry headed by Supreme Court Judge Vivian Bose set up by the Government of India to look into the role of Patel found that ‘the transaction was not entered into to save the Calcutta market but to assist Mundhra as a quid pro quo for donations given by Mundhra to the Congress fund’. Noorani, 1973, op cit. 5 For a detailed discussion on this see Pai Panandiker and Mehra, 1997, op. cit.

2

Indian Parliament Changing institutional moorings A. Surya Prakash

Like many of the sessions in the past, the two Houses of India’s Parliament transacted little work in the first phase of Budget Session, 2013, because of repeated disruptions and acrimony over a variety of national and international issues. Unfortunately, this has become the standard leitmotif of democratic engagement in the country over the past two decades and such is the extent of the breakdown of the democratic system that public expectation from representative bodies has also declined substantially. However, despite many negative features that have undermined its prestige and authority, the people of India continue to repose faith in the country’s Parliament because of their innate faith in democracy, but the country’s apex legislative body would be committing a grave error if it were to take the people for granted and do nothing about its declining standards. Some course correction and reform is needed if Parliament is to redeem itself in the public eye. India has witnessed much political, social and economic change since the first general election in 1952. All these developments have had both a positive and a negative impact on the working of Parliament. The focus of this chapter is on how these changes have impacted institutional moorings and on how Parliament has responded to the changing scenario. For example, from 1952 to 1967, we had general elections once every five years and at these elections the people elected a new Lok Sabha and new assemblies in the states. The elections to Parliament and state assemblies were held simultaneously. All this changed when Prime Minister Indira Gandhi decided to de-link the two when she opted for a snap Lok Sabha election in 1971. Ever since this cycle was broken, no one has been able to put it back and now we are saddled with elections in some part of the country or the other almost every year, thus causing political instability both at the Centre and in the states. This has also led to a crisis of governance in many

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states and at times at the federal level also because of what Atul Kohli describes as dissipation of mandate. In his view, political leaders in India generally find that their mandates evaporate within eighteen to twenty-four months after an election. From that point onwards, voters are just waiting for elections to dislodge the incumbent. Politicians respond to such situations in the most cynical fashion by actively seeking to weaken institutions, including political parties. The net result is that governance takes a major hit. Kohli detected this tendency with much prescience and clarity over two decades ago and said that powerful leaders in India often have proved to be enemies of institutions such as political parties. Because institutions tend to constrain personal power, those who attain positions of power because of personalistic traits usually show little interest in institutional development or, worse, actively seek to weaken existing institutions.1 Since elections to the state assemblies and the lower House of Parliament are no longer held simultaneously, a great deal of uncertainty pervades both regional and national politics because political parties have to go back to the people for a fresh mandate every few years either to govern the state or to govern the country. Another thing that has happened with the de-linking of these elections is that MPs have lost their anonymity. Earlier, candidates put up by major political parties for the Lok Sabha seats were riding piggy-back on the state assembly candidates of their respective parties. They did not have sufficient exposure to their constituencies, which are huge both in geographic and demographic terms and the constituents hardly knew who their MP was. This is no longer the case. People now know whom they are sending to Parliament and have begun making demands on the MP’s time, clout and resources. This has meant a huge increase in constituency pressure, resulting in a sharp decline in MP’s parliamentary output. Another matter of concern is the mushroom growth of political parties based on region, religion and caste. While there were just twelve political parties in the Second Lok Sabha, there are thirty-nine political parties in the Fifteenth Lok Sabha and we have not seen the end of this phenomenon. The splintering of the polity and the birth of more and more political parties has begun to affect political stability and governance.

Composition of the Lok Sabha While a lot still needs to be done, there are a couple of positive developments over the years. The first and most important development is that there is a lot more balance in the social composition of the Lok

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Sabha. Unlike the first few Lok Sabhas, the Fifteenth Lok Sabha is a far more representative body. We now see the occupational democratization of the House and the political empowerment of large sections of the Indian population which were not empowered some decades ago. For example, almost half the members of the First Lok Sabha comprised of Lawyers (36 per cent), Journalists and Writers (10 per cent) and most of them came from dominant Hindu castes.2 The composition of the Lok Sabha is far more balanced now in terms of occupation, caste and class of members. There is similar improvement in terms of the educational qualifications of Lok Sabha Members. The First Lok Sabha had 112 nonmatriculates. This came down to nineteen in the Fourteenth Lok Sabha. Again, the First Lok Sabha had 277 graduates, postgraduates and doctorates. In the Fourteenth Lok Sabha as many as 428 members could boast of such qualifications.3 The political empowerment of the less privileged has also changed the composition of the Legislative Assemblies in states and this in turn has changed the composition of the Rajya Sabha because MLAs constitute the Electoral College for the Rajya Sabha election. This is bound to impact the indirectly elected House of Parliament, which has also begun to mirror the social, political and economic diversity of Indian society. A couple of other developments that are of a positive nature are the introduction of the committee system and the televising of parliamentary proceedings by Speaker Shivraj Patil in 1993. The constitution of department-related committees has improved parliament’s oversight functions and has nudged MPs towards specialization. The televising of Parliament has lifted the purdah on Parliament and enabled people to see it in its true colours. It has also improved the sartorial sense of MPs, if nothing else!

Growing irrelevance of Parliament But the negative list is huge and worrisome. There is now definite evidence of the growing irrelevance of Parliament. For example, until the late 1970s, Parliament has devoted 23 per cent of its time to discussing the Union Budget and this gave MPs enough time to focus on budgetary allocations and governmental performance in every sector. In recent years, parliament devotes just 10 per cent of its time to scrutinize the budget. MPs argue that some of the load has since shifted to the standing committees but even if this be so, there is no doubt that there is a sharp decline in the time spent by the two Houses on budget-related debates.

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Yet another troubling statistic is the decline in the number of sittings of Parliament per year. In the 1950s, Parliament had an average of 127 sittings, in the 1960s it rose to 138 sittings. This had declined drastically to just 78 sittings in the year 2003. In 2011, the two Houses met for just 73 days. The irony is that while the work of government is expanding, the work of Parliament, which has oversight responsibilities, is declining. Even if one were to take into account the fifteen working days set aside for scrutiny of the demands for grants of various ministries in the standing committees, parliament’s sittings per year is down by over 30 per cent. In fact, since 1988, Parliament has never met for 100 days or more. The last time it came close to this mark was in 1992, when the Lok Sabha met for 98 days. Several MPs have exercised their concern over the decline in sittings/per year. On May 13, 2012, when both the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha met for a special sitting to mark the sixtieth anniversary of the first sitting of the two Houses on May 13, 1952, MPs sought immediate remedial measures. Sitaram Yechury (CPM) told the Rajya Sabha that day that Parliament had not met for 100 days in a year for over two decades. The Fourteenth Lok Sabha, Yechury observed, was marked by the least number of sittings in the history of Parliament with 332 sittings averaging just 66 a year. He said unless Parliament had more sittings, it cannot perform its oversight duties effectively. He suggested that 100 sittings per year should be made mandatory for the two Houses of Parliament.4 While sittings per year and time allocated for budgetary matters is down, there is a sharp rise in the time lost in disruptions and in the cost of parliament. The Eleventh Lok Sabha lost 5 per cent of its time to disruptions. This rose to over 10 per cent in the Twelfth Lok Sabha and 22.40 per cent in the Thirteenth Lok Sabha. In the Fourteenth Lok Sabha, Parliament met for just 66 days per year on an average and even these sittings were not effectively utilized to keep a watch on the Executive because as much as 26 per cent of Parliament’s time was lost in disruptions.5

The Question Hour Another major item on the negative list is the Question Hour. Let us face it, the Question Hour has lost its zing. Right till the 1980s, the Question Hour was an extremely productive hour in the two houses. MPs came armed with razor-sharp questions and ministers called upon to respond to questions faced this hour with much trepidation. The MPs not only drafted their own questions but also had a string of supplementaries in hand to corner ministers and to cause much

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embarrassment to inefficient or dishonest members of the government. The Speakers of the Lok Sabha, though originally from the ruling parties, had a non-partisan approach and joined the opposition in grilling ministers or pulling them up when they failed to come up with credible replies to the queries from MPs. Those were also the days when members of the ruling party pilloried ministers with as much gusto as opposition MPs, so much so that ministers at times would plead with their party MPs to stay away from the House, allow the ‘inconvenient’ question to lapse, and thus save the government from embarrassment! The inquisitorial nature of this hour which one saw in Parliament, when ministers trembled at the thought of being subjected to harsh interrogation by the likes of Bhupesh Gupta, Indrajit Gupta, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, George Fernandes, Madhu Limaye, Piloo Mody, Madhu Dandavate and many such eminent parliamentarians, is over. Today, MPs who are ill-prepared or lack the moral courage to pin down ministers appear far more nervous than the ministers and we often see ministers, wanting in democratic etiquette, talk down to them! Now, many MPs have question-making factories as it were. They hire secretaries and office staff who prepare questions on their behalf. The focus is on volumes so that the MP can tell his constituents that he has asked a huge number of questions in Parliament. Since this activity is outsourced, questions no longer have the vigour of the 1950s. The bigger problem is that since the MPs have not framed the questions, they are as much surprised to see their questions on the agenda as the ministers. As a result, because of their unpreparedness, MPs stay away from the House and ministers get away lightly. Many other parliamentary instruments like Adjournment Motions, Call Attention Motions and Short Duration Questions have become rusted. The government is no longer afraid of the opposition because the latter is not clothed in moral authority anymore. Compare this to the situation in 1957 when a question put by Feroze Gandhi, an MP belonging to the ruling party, led to the unearthing of the LICMundhra deal and the eventual resignation of the then Finance Minister, T.T. Krishnamachari!

Law making: Indian style! Legislative business ranks low in an Indian MP’s list of priorities. It would seem as if an MP would sit in either House during the course of law making when he has nothing else to do. That is why the two Houses or Parliament are practically empty when they are discussing bills. Low attendance when legislative business is transacted is a

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recurring phenomenon since the early days, but the lack of interest of MPs has hit a new low. Some examples from the 2012 Monsoon session makes disturbing reading. On August 30, 2012, the Lok Sabha passed the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (Amendment) Bill and the Chemical Weapons Regulation (Amendment) Bill in a record three minutes. The AIIMS (Amendment) Bill concerned the establishment of six more such premier hospitals at a cost of ₹49.2 billion and the Chemical Weapons Bill sought to bring Indian law in tune with international agreements. The House took one and a half minutes each to dispose of the two Bills.6 On September 3, 2012, the Lok Sabha passed two amending Bills and one original legislation in twenty-two minutes. The original legislation was The Protection of Women against Sexual Harassment at Workplace Bill, 2012 – a law that millions of working women have been waiting for. One amending bill was The National Highways Authority of India (Amendment) Bill. The other was The NorthEastern Areas (Reorganisation) and other related laws (amendment) bill 2012. This was no trivial matter. It sought to amend the NorthEastern Areas (Reorganisation) Act, 1971 with the object of setting up separate high courts in the states of Manipur, Meghalaya and Tripura, instead of the Guwahati High Court being the common High Court, in their respective state capitals at Imphal, Shillong and Agartala respectively, to address and to provide easy access, speedy and cost-effective justice for the people of those states and also to make the consequential amendments to other related laws. This law was moved for consideration at 12:03 hours and passed at 12:05 hours. Thus, for our MPs, a law providing for the establishment of separate high courts in three states did not warrant a debate. In fact, it deserved no more than two minutes of their time. Incidentally, all the bills mentioned here were passed without debate! On the following day, the House passed the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro-Sciences, Bangalore Bill in two minutes. At 12:07 hours, the Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare moved that the bill be taken up for consideration and passage. The House adopted the motion. Thereafter, the House took up clause-by-clause consideration of the bill. The minister then moved that bill be passed and the House gave its consent at 12:09 hours. If you think you can only cook up Maggie Noodles in two minutes, think again! While these examples are extreme cases, they mirror the general apathy of MPs to their primary task of law making.7

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The committee system The introduction of the committee system in 1993 was a great idea because it was meant to encourage specialization among MPs, but here again we have shown that we have the capacity to wreck the best of ideas. As a result, the standing committees came into being with several congenital problems. First of all, the committees were too large (fortyfive members) and carried a lot of dead weight by way of disinterested members. Average attendance levels were around or below 50 per cent and even among those who turned up for meetings, only 10 per cent of the members were serious about committee work. Over time, the number of Standing Committees has risen from seventeen to twenty-four and, consequently, the number of MPs per committee has also declined. But, problems like absenteeism, committee-hopping etc. persist. Therefore, there is need for urgent reform to make these committees work more efficiently. Presiding officers and leaders of political parties must become choosier while nominating members to committees. The committees need to become more compact and once an MP is attached to a committee, she/he should remain in that committee for the entire term of five or six years as the case may be. By recasting Standing Committees every year, the basic idea of promoting specialization is negated. The Speaker must prohibit committee-hopping and end the current merry-go-round of committees which makes a mockery of the committee system. Further, Standing Committees must have wider powers and must get in specialist advisors from outside government and government-owned companies. These advisors should be entitled to attend meetings and to advise the committees on areas of inquiry. Attendance at committee meetings must be monitored and MPs who play truant must face the prospect of losing membership of their committees.

Ethics Another issue that needs attention is the issue of ethics. MPs in India have been obsessed with their privileges for too long. We now need to get them to turn their attention to ethics. This issue has been pending since 1951, ever since the provisional Parliament decided to debar a member – H.G. Mudgal – who had misused his office. The parliamentary committee that probed this case suggested a code of conduct for MPs, but even after sixty years we are yet to see an enforceable code of conduct. This issue was as good as lost until the then Speaker Shivraj Patil revived the idea when he circulated a draft Code of Conduct for

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MPs at a meeting of presiding officers in 1993. As expected, the idea took some time to germinate. Thereafter, in 1996 the Privileges Committee of the Lok Sabha endorsed the code and recommended its adoption. It also suggested that the Committee of Privileges be renamed the Committee of Privileges and Ethics.8 Thereafter, the Lok Sabha established an Ethics Committee. This committee included the Code of Conduct in its report and suggested measures to make MPs accountable to the people. It first said that citizens should be empowered to write to the Speaker about unethical conduct of members and such complaints should be referred to the Ethics Committee. Second, as in the UK and the US, a Register of Members’ Interests must be opened and all MPs must be directed to disclose their assets, liabilities and interests. The committee also said that the Code of Conduct must be incorporated in the Lok Sabha’s Rules of Procedure. The rules must also be amended to empower the Ethics Committee to receive complaints against MPs and examine the same.9 We must see that all this happens if we are to have a Parliament that commands the respect of all citizens. As regards the declaration of assets and liabilities, this got an impetus after the Representation of the People (Third Amendment) Act came into force on August 24, 2002. Despite public clamour for such a declaration by every MP, Parliament was dragging its feet on the issue. The judiciary, however, forced the hand of the government and the election law was amended to say that such declarations must be made by all MPs. This law has made it mandatory for all MPs to submit a declaration of assets and liabilities within ninety days of entering Parliament. The declaration has to be submitted to the presiding officer. This applies to all those elected to Parliament after the law came into force. However not all members have complied with the requirement of this law. Until recently, some members of the Rajya Sabha had declared their assets and liabilities while some others had not. The declarations furnished by members is to be maintained in the Rajya Sabha’s Register of Declaration of Assets and Liabilities. Equally welcome is the positive impact that sustained public pressure has had on Parliament in regard to jumbo Cabinets. After years of dithering, Parliament passed the Constitution (Ninety-First Amendment) Act, 2003, that prohibits governments at the Centre and in the states from having ministers in excess of 15 per cent of the total strength of the lower House of Parliament or of the Legislative Assemblies in states. The demand to limit the size of the council of ministers was first made after the sub-committee of the first Administrative Reforms Commission headed by K. Hanumanthaiya suggested in the 1960s that there be a cap

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on the size of the ministries. The Amendment has also put a welcome bar on the grant of ministerships to defectors and has also completely prohibited splits in political parties. These are positive developments.

Criminalization of politics Apart from the two Houses of Parliament, there is evidence of the growing dysfunctionality of a majority of the Legislative Assemblies in the country. Commentators attribute many reasons for this unfortunate trend. Some of them are the following: the growing intolerance of the other point of view and rivalry between political parties in states bordering on hatred and often triggering violence; declining interest in debating issues within legislative chambers; poor use of parliamentary instruments for fulfilling oversight responsibilities; the growing importance of money power and muscle power in electoral politics and, finally, the criminalization of politics. Turning to the last-named cause, it is indeed a sad commentary on the political class as a whole that it is just not willing to take even preliminary steps to keep criminals out of legislative chambers. The Supreme Court has struck down a legal provision that enabled convicted MPs and MLAs to retain membership of the Houses they are elected to if they appeal against the conviction in a higher court. The political class has reacted in unison against this judgement. The readiness with which it has sprung to the defence of convicted legislators does not augur well for the country’s democratic process. The issue at hand is whether an MP or an MLA who is convicted by a court of law to imprisonment for two years or more for a criminal offence should continue to sit in these august chambers if she/he has filed an appeal against this judgement in a higher court. Section 8 (4) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, allowed him/her to do so and over the years; many respected institutions and eminent jurists have strongly opposed this provision and urged parliament to delete the same. No political party or coalition which has run the federal government has had the gumption to delete this provision, lest it offend MPs facing criminal charges in courts. The NCRWC, headed by former Chief Justice of India Justice M.N. Venkatachalaiah, recommended that the election law be amended to bar any person charged with an offence punishable with imprisonment up to five years from contesting elections to Parliament and state Legislative Assemblies. Further, it said any person convicted for heinous offences like murder, rape, dacoity and smuggling must be permanently barred from contesting elections.10

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The Second Administrative Reforms Commission (2006) headed by Veerappa Moily, a member of the Union Cabinet, said that persons facing grave criminal charges must be kept out of the electoral arena, but one must guard against political vendetta while doing so. It said there are candidates in the election fray who face grave criminal charges like murder, abduction, rape and dacoity. As a rule, it would be rash and undemocratic to disqualify candidates on some pretext or other. Election by indiscriminate disqualification is a stratagem sometimes resorted to by dictatorships to pervert the democratic process. However, in the present situation, on balance, in cases of persons facing grave criminal charges framed by a trial court after a preliminary enquiry, disallowing them to represent the people in legislatures until they are cleared of charges seems to be a fair and prudent course. But care must be exercised to ensure that no political vendetta is involved in such charges and people facing charges related to political agitations are not victimized.11 It recommended that Section 8 of the RP Act, 1951 be amended ‘to disqualify all persons facing charges related to grave and heinous offences and corruption’, with the modification suggested by the Election Commission.12 The Law Commission suggested fourteen years ago that mere framing of charges by a court in regard to election-related offences should by itself be a ground for disqualifying a person from contesting an election. The Commission said Section 8 of the RP Act, 1951 should be amended as well as several other sections in the same Act. It also suggested that punishments prescribed by several sections in Chapter IXA of the IPC should be enhanced. The Commission said all these sections in the election law and the IPC pertained to serious election offences. The main purpose behind the suggested amendments was to provide (a) the framing of charges by the court should by itself be a ground for disqualifying a person from being a candidate for election and (b) to enhance the punishments provided for election offences contained in the Representation of the People Act, 1951 and Chapter IXA of the Indian Penal Code.13 The commission further said that in view of its recommendation that a candidate against whom charges have been framed by a court in respect of certain offences be debarred, it was necessary for a candidate to furnish details regarding criminal cases pending against him

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including copy of the FIR/complaint and any order made by the concerned court.14 In other words, all the three august commissions named earlier held the view that mere framing of charges was enough to bar individuals from contesting elections to Parliament and state assemblies. The ECI decided in 1997 that candidates in Parliament and state assembly elections should file affidavits about their convictions in cases covered by Section 8 of the RP Act, 1951. The commission was of the view that conviction by a trial court was sufficient to attract disqualification ‘and even those released on bail during the pendency of their appeals against their convictions are disqualified from contesting elections’.15 Thereafter, in September 1997, the Chief Election Commissioner wrote to the Prime Minister in this regard and pressed for immediate amendment of the law to deal effectively with the malaise. He said there were ‘grave incongruities’ in the existing provisions in Section 8 and wanted the same amended. For example, he said a rapist who is convicted and sentenced to ten years imprisonment is under election law debarred from contesting elections only for six years from the date of conviction, which means that in the seventh year of his imprisonment, a rapist is free to contest an election during the remaining four years of his imprisonment. The commission said persons convicted of such offences should be barred from contesting elections for six years after completion of their term of imprisonment. In 1997, the ECI had said that under jurisprudence, a person is presumed to be innocent unless proved otherwise and convicted by a court of law. Thus in a strict legal parlance, a criminal is one who has been convicted of a crime by a court of law. But the common man perceives otherwise. In his eyes, a person who has been charged with certain types of offences and is under trial is also a criminal. The common man considers it criminalization of politics if he sees a history-sheeter or a notorious bad character, involved . . . in various crimes of a heinous nature like murder, dacoity or rape, contesting elections and getting elected.16 The commission finally opined that a person facing trial in a serious offence, if kept out of the electoral fray till he is exonerated of the charge, should not have a legitimate grievance, as such restriction on his right to contest elections would be a reasonable restriction in the greater public interest and

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A. Surya Prakash for bringing sanctity to the august Houses which are the supreme law making bodies of the country.17

While some of the concerns of the Election Commission were addressed via amendments to the election law some years hence, the political executive did not act on the commission’s advice that criminals be kept out of electoral politics. The commission was therefore compelled to reiterate its key recommendations vis-à-vis the criminalization of politics in 2004 and yet again thereafter. In July 2004, the Chief Election Commissioner K.S. Krishna Murthy wrote to the Prime Minister and once again urged speedy action on pending electoral reforms. In that letter, Krishna Murthy said the issue of criminalization of politics had been raised by the Commission from 1998 onwards. Disqualification for criminal offences is provided for in Section 8 of the RP Act, 1951. As per that provision, ‘a person is disqualified from contesting election only on conviction by the court of law’. There have been several instances of persons charged with serious and heinous crimes like murder, rape, dacoity, etc. contesting elections, pending their trial, and even getting elected in a large number of cases. ‘This leads to a very undesirable and embarrassing situation of law breakers becoming law makers and moving around under police protection’.18 Therefore, the commission had proposed that the law be amended to provide that any person who is accused of an offence punishable by imprisonment for five years or more be disqualified from contesting election even when the trial is pending, provided charges have been framed against him by the competent court. ‘The Commission reiterates that such a step would go a long way in cleansing the political establishment from the influence of criminal elements and protecting the sanctity of the Legislative Houses’.19 The commission said it was aware of the counter view that was based on the doctrine that a person is presumed to be innocent until he is proved guilty. But, it asserted that keeping a person who is accused of serious criminal charges and where the court is prima facie satisfied about his/her involvement in the crime and consequently framed charges out of electoral arena ‘would be a reasonable restriction in greater public interests’. There cannot be any grievance on this. However, as a precaution against motivated cases by the ruling party, it may be provided that only those cases which were filed prior to six months before an election alone would lead to disqualification as proposed. It is also suggested that persons found guilty by a Commission of Enquiry should also stand disqualified from contesting elections.20

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It is in this context that the Supreme Court on 10 July 2013 decided to strike down Section 8 (4) of the RP Act, 1951 which enabled criminals to continue their tenures in Parliament and state assemblies if they filed appeals against their conviction in a higher court. Any judge in any democracy who sees steady deterioration in democratic values is bound to correct the aberration. And that is exactly what the Supreme Court did last July. Though the court did not bar politicians who are charge-sheeted from contesting polls, it declared that a person convicted and sentenced to two years imprisonment should be kept out of the electoral fray, even if his/her appeal is pending in a higher court. The court also barred persons in jail from contesting elections because such persons lose the right to vote. Rejecting the opinions of some of the best legal minds in the country, the political class has almost unanimously decided to challenge the Supreme Court’s verdict and to take legislative measures to undo parts of the apex court’s order. Sailing along with this view, which was expressed forcefully by politicians from across the political spectrum at an all-party meeting convened prior to the Monsoon Session of Parliament, the government announced its resolve to seek a review of the apex court’s judgement and simultaneously introduced a bill to amend the Representation of the People Act, 1951. The purpose of this amendment is to protect the so-called rights of criminal-politicians rather than that of the people. They are also meant to overturn the verdict of the Supreme Court relating to the prohibition imposed by the court on persons in jail losing their right to file nominations in elections. The Law Minister Mr. Kapil Sibal, who piloted this bill in the Rajya Sabha, utilized the opportunity to lecture the judiciary and all and sundry. He advised the judiciary to be ‘extremely careful’ in giving rulings which have an impact on the polity. He claimed that there was a negative perception in the country that all politicians were criminals and that the courts were enthusiastic to prove this to be right.21 Let us test the Law Minister’s defence of the politician on the basis of available facts and the analysis of the background of our representatives done by two voluntary organizations: ADR and NEW. These organizations found that 1,460 of the 4,807 sitting MPs and MLAs in the country (constituting 30 per cent) have declared criminal cases against themselves in their self-sworn affidavits submitted to the ECI prior to contesting elections: 688 (14 per cent) out of the total number of sitting MPs and MLAs have declared serious criminal cases against themselves. Further, they have found that 162 of the 543 Lok Sabha MPs (30 per cent) have declared criminal cases against themselves, of which 14 per cent of the MPs have declared serious criminal cases

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against themselves. Of the 4,032 MLAs in the country, as many as 1,258 (31 per cent) from all state assemblies have declared criminal cases against themselves. Here too, 15 per cent of the MLAs from all state assemblies have declared serious criminal cases against themselves, according to this analysis.22 Mr. Sibal also made the extraordinary claim that the political class was the most accountable class in the country and that the politicians were accountable to Parliament, to the election commission, to the country and to the people. It was strange to hear this from the Law Minister of a government that wants the Supreme Court to review its decision to bar convicted persons from continuing in Parliament and state assemblies and which has introduced amendments to the RP Act to undo another aspect of that verdict. It is equally strange to hear this from a Law Minister whose actions betray utter contempt for the opinions of the Law Commission, the Commission headed by Justice Venkatachalaiah, the Second Administrative Reforms Commission, the Election Commission and the Supreme Court.

MPs’ salaries In the Constituent Assembly of India, many members subscribed to the view that it was anathema for an MP to ask for or to be given a salary. This feeling persisted in the First Lok Sabha as well. However, since Parliament had the mandate to make law in regard to the salary and allowances of MPs, it seemed to reluctantly perform this chore. That is why the first Salaries and Allowances of Members of Parliament Bill introduced in May 1954 gave MPs the option to either accept a salary or to opt for a higher allowance in lieu of salary. That Bill fixed a MP’s salary at ₹300 plus a daily allowance of ₹20 during sittings of the House. By 1994, the salary and allowances of an MP rose to ₹5,500 a month plus a daily allowance of ₹200. In later years, an MP was entitled to a salary of ₹16,000 plus a Constituency Allowance of ₹20,000 and an Office Expenses Allowance of ₹20,000. While it is true that our MPs were on meagre salaries and allowances for several decades, this is no longer the case. In 2010, MPs gave themselves a huge hike. The salary trebled to ₹50,000 a month and the other two allowances doubled to ₹40,000 each, taking an MP’s monthly package to ₹130,000. In addition, the daily allowance also doubled to ₹2,000. The minimum pension of ex-MPs was raised that year from ₹8,000 to ₹20,000 a month. Indian MPs have shed their inhibitions about taking a hefty pay cheque and, hopefully, much of the hypocrisy surrounding salaries and allowances will also go out of the window. Suffice it to

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say that, as of now, they get more than a decent wage and a whole list of perks which are not available to MPs in most other countries. They can have no further complaint on this score.

The Lal Batti syndrome23 When we consider the conduct of MPs and the kind of demands they make on the government and the tax payer, one can say that this is inversely proportional to their commitment to serious parliamentary work. Therefore, when it comes to individual MPs, the report card is disappointing and one of the reasons is the growing distance between MPs and the electors. The motto in the 1950s was simple living, high thinking. Now it is high living, no thinking. MPs want to flaunt their power and wealth and stay away from the aam aadmi (common man). They want red beacons atop their cars so that their cars are not flagged down by policemen for traffic violations; they are obsessed with their privileges and have a disdain for ethics; they neglect parliamentary duties; attendance is abysmal during the passage of bills and there is high absenteeism in committees (50 per cent). The list is endless and all this has taken its toll on the working Parliament.

Have gun, will function Over time, MPs became so accustomed to special treatment that they began demanding guns and ammunition on priority by the 1980s. In February 1988, a Lok Sabha MP asked the Defence Minister why MPs who had .30 carbine rifles were not entitled to a regular supply of ammunition. The following year, members of the House wanted to know whether firearms confiscated by the Customs Department could be bought by MPs. The Revenue Minister informed them that weapons of non-prohibited bore were being sold to parliamentarians and that MPs were entitled to a 5 per cent discount. Parliament was also informed that thirty-eight MPs had bought firearms from the Customs Department in this manner between October 1987 and January 31, 1989. MPs were also entitled to three army disposal vehicles like Jeeps and Jongas and cars. However, their demand that they be entitled to buy tax-free goods from the Army Canteen has been turned down.24 Mr. Ambrish Pandey, a social activist who had filed an RTI application on the sale of weapons to parliamentarians, has enabled us to get an update on the situation vis-à-vis MPs and guns. The ADR and NEW analyzed the data obtained by him and came up with the

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following analysis: As many as 756 guns were sold to MPs and VIPs between 1987 and 2012. Between 2001 and 2012, eighty-two MPs purchased guns from the government. Eighteen of these eighty-two MPs who were sold guns had pending criminal cases against them, including charges of murder, attempt to murder, kidnapping etc., at the time of sale. Amongst the eighty-two MPs who have been allotted guns from the government, an MP from Uttar Pradesh had forty-four criminal cases including charges of murder, attempt to murder etc. Recently the price was hiked to include tariff. ADR says that after 2002, a policy decision was taken that only MPs can be sold such guns. It says: some of the guns are classified as prohibited guns, but it was not clear from the data provided by Customs about which guns were prohibited and which were non prohibited. Prohibited guns need special permission from the Finance Minister to be given to anyone including MPs.25

Cost of Parliament Finally, a word about what it costs to keep the two Houses of Parliament going. Over the last six decades, there has been a phenomenal rise in the cost of parliament. It rose from ₹36,000 a day in the 1950s to over ₹12.3 million per day in 2004. In 2012, it was close to ₹2 crore per day. If the people do not get value for money, the efficacy of the parliamentary system is certain to be called into question. Cutting across party lines, India’s political leadership must understand the gravity of the situation and take measures to restore public confidence in parliamentary democracy.26

Parliament is crying out for reform A beginning can be made with a review of the practice and procedure of Parliament. This has never been more pressing. Though the two Houses have been in existence for over sixty years, we have not had an honest audit of the working of Parliament and this has contributed in no small measure to the growing hiatus between this elected body and the people. A look at the quality of debates and the efficacy of parliamentary instruments will give us an idea of how far removed we are from that ideal Parliament that we all thought we would have after independence.

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Where do we go from here? While there have been some positive developments in regard to the representational character of parliament over the last six decades, some recent developments including the outbreak of scandals has put a question mark on the quality of individuals chosen by political parties to contest parliamentary elections. Obsessed as they are with the ‘winnability’ of the candidate, political parties tend to overlook almost everything, including the grave criminal conduct of the ticket seeker. This has substantially weakened the moral authority of parliament. Side by side, there is a visible reluctance on the part of Parliament to improve the institution’s functional efficiency and to take a fresh look at its practices and procedures in order to meet the aspirations of the people. Equally disappointing is the fact that the decline has been apparent for a long time but there has not been a single initiative by the country’s political parties to stem the rot. If anything, every political party has done its bit to undermine the importance of Parliament. Only public vigilance and sustained pressure on Parliament can bring about the necessary changes and improve the efficacy and prestige of Parliament.

Notes 1 Atul Kohli, Democracy and Discontent: India’s Growing Crisis of Governability, Cambridge, New York, Port Chester, Melbourne and Sydney: Cambridge University Press, 1991, p. 402. 2 LARRDIS, Occupational Background of Members of the First to Tenth Lok Sabha: A Socio-Economic Study, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat, Journal of Parliamentary Information, XXXVII(3), September 1991, p. 468. 3 A. Surya Prakash, Parliament@60: Time for Some Stock Taking, www. rediff.com/news/column/parliament-60-time-for-some-stock-taking/ 20120529.htm (Accessed on 10 January 2014). 4 www.thehindu.com/news/national/make-100-sittings-a-year-mandatoryyechury/article3415451.ece (Accessed on 10 January 2014). 5 Rajinder Sachar, ‘Cut Their Salaries’, The Times of India, 28 August 2007. 6 Lok Sabha Debates, 30 August 2012, pp. 970–972. 7 Lok Sabha Debates, 3 September 2012, pp. 514–529. 8 A. Surya Prakash, ‘Need Last Mile Connectivity’, The Pioneer, 20 July 2004. 9 Ibid. 10 Report of the National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution, vol. I, paras 4.12.2–4.12.8, http://lawmin.nic.in/ncrwc/ncrwcreport. htm (Accessed on 15 January 2014). 11 Second Administrative Reforms Commission Report on Ethics in Governance, New Delhi, 2006, p. 14, http://arc.gov.in/rtifinalreport.pdf (Accessed on 15 January 2014). 12 Ibid., p. 173.

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13 170th Report of the Law Commission of India on Reform of Electoral Laws, 1999, para 1.3.5. 14 Ibid., para 6.3.2. 15 http://eci.nic.in/archive/handbook/CANDIDATES/cap6/cap6_4.htm (Accessed on 24 June 2016). 16 A. Surya Prakash, ‘The Case Against the Ordinance to Protect Criminal Legislators’, Vivekananda International Foundation, 30 September, 2013. www.vifindia.org/article/2013/september/30/the-case-against-the-ordinance-to-protect-criminal-legislators (Accessed on 15 September 2017). 17 Electoral Reforms (Views and Proposals), Election Commission of India, New Delhi, 1998, p. 23. 18 Proposed Electoral Reforms By the Election Commission of India, New Delhi, 2004, p. 10, http://eci.nic.in/eci_main/PROPOSED_ELECTORAL_ REFORMS.pdf (Accessed on 15 September 2017). 19 Ibid. 20 Ibid., p. 25. 21 Proposed Electoral Reforms by the Election Commission of India, New Delhi, 2004, p. 4, http://eci.nic.in/eci_main/PROPOSED_ELECTORAL_ REFORMS.pdf (Accessed on 15 January 2014). 22 The Indian Express, New Delhi Edition, 28 August 2013, p. 4. 23 Refers to the red beacon light on the cars. 24 Press Release issued by the Association of Democratic Rights and National Election Watch on ‘Analysis of Sitting MPs and MLAs With Self-declared Criminal Cases – Election-Wise’, 10 July 2013. 25 http://adrindia.org/content/analysis-guns-sold-mps (Accessed on 15 January 2014). 26 A. Surya Prakash, What Ails Indian Parliament, New Delhi: Indus, an imprint of Harper Collins, 1995, pp. 238–239.

3

Why is the Indian Parliament in a state of decline?* Ashutosh Kumar

I One of the widely shared arguments presented in favour of the success of democracy in India has been that it has been ‘widening and deepening’ because of the ‘democratic upsurge/assertion from below’ taking place in the recent decades under a changed mode of electoral politics.1 The upsurge is being manifest in the increased level of participation and contestation involving the wider masses.2 This has been reflected in the way democratic institutions in India in the recent decades have become far more representative in nature. Positive references have also been made regarding ‘progressive democratization’ of the Indian Parliament.3 Inevitably, to support this contention, the shifting nature of representation in the Parliament in terms of the social profiles of its members has been referred. Also, it has been mentioned that an increasing number of parties are getting their candidates elected to both the Houses.4 In comparison to the past, the social profile of the parliamentarians has become diverse, as in recent years MPs have been coming from varied social backgrounds. Politicisation and mobilisation of the newer identity groups has been reflected in the articulation of their collective claims and demands through the language and processes of democratic politics. The transformation of newly assertive identity groups into voting communities/active citizens has meant that the number of MPs belonging to these groups, many belonging to hitherto politically dormant and under-represented middle/lower castes and communities, has been growing. This augmentation of their representation in recent decades without reservation of seats/constituencies indicates deepening of representative democracy in India. Many of such communities belong to farming and other associated activities in rural India.5 Representation of the members from the scheduled castes and the scheduled tribes has also increased, most recently since the fourth

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delimitation commission recommendations regarding the enhancement of the reserved seats due to the increased percentage of these communities as per the 2001 census the number of MPs from these communities since the Fifteenth Lok Sabha has increased.6 However, more notable is the steady increase in the representation from the backward/intermediate castes, which do not have the advantage of reservation. On an average, their representation has increased by 2.95 percent, or sixteen seats, in the Lok Sabha. There has been a corresponding decline of the members belonging to the upper castes if we review the period between the Tenth to the Fourteenth Lok Sabha. While the OBC members in the First Lok Sabha were just 5 percent, they constitute 25 percent of the Fifteenth Lok Sabha. The representation of minorities, however, has remained almost the same in the last four Lok Sabhas, and the Muslim representation has remained abysmally low at 5 percent. Considering their proportion in the overall population, the minority community candidates continue to remain under-nominated by almost every political party. It holds true for the women also who also remain under-nominated and under-represented in the successive Parliaments. In addition, the SC/ST candidates have been successful only in the reserved seats and not on a general seat.7 In the recent decades, the representativeness of the Parliament has received a further boost with a constant infusion of the new entrants, mostly from the relatively new smaller state/sub-state level parties that have cropped up in the last three decades since the decline of the Congress as an umbrella party, along with the broadening social base of the MPs in social and spatial sense.8 The electoral volatility has also been on the rise since the momentous nineties.9 Since 1952, the ruling party has changed eight times at the federal level in the sixteen Lok Sabha elections held so far in India.10 Along with the change of governments, there has also been a healthy circulation of political elites, as first-time young members reflecting the contemporary India constitute between 25 to 30 percent of the total strength of the Parliaments constituted since the advent of the coalition era in 1989.11 Parliaments in recent years have witnessed an increasing ‘presence’ of the state level parties that has widened the base of representation (see Tables 3.1 and 3.2). A close look at the party-wise composition of the recent Parliaments shows that whereas the number of national parties has been wavering from six to seven over the past three decades, there has been a significant increase in the number of state level/registered parties.12 The number of national parties has remained constant at seven from Tenth to Fifteenth Lok Sabha whereas, in the Sixteenth Lok Sabha, the number came down to six.13 The national parties like BSP and CPI failed to secure even one seat in the Sixteenth Lok Sabha adding to other 1,650 parties that contested.14 On the other

Table 3.1 Seats won by national, state, unrecognized (registered) parties and independents in Lok Sabha (1984–2014) Year

Total seats Seats won Seats won for which by national by state elections parties parties were held

Seats won by Seats won by unrecognised Independents registered parties

1984–85 1989 1991–92 1996 1998 1999 2004 2009 2014

541 529 537 543 543 543 543 543 543

0 19 4 2 49 10 15 12 22

462 471 478 403 387 369 364 376 342

66 27 51 129 101 158 159 146 176

13 12 1 9 6 6 5 9 3

Source: CSDS Data Unit

Table 3.2 Number of national, state, unrecognized (registered) parties that made it to the Lok Sabha (1951–2009) Year

No. of National parties in the Lok Sabha

No. of State parties in the Lok Sabha

No of unrecognised parties in the Lok Sabha

1951 1957 1962 1967 1971 1977 1980 1984–85 1989 1991–92 1996 1998 1999 2004 2009 2014

11 4 6 7 8 5 6 7 6 7 7 7 7 6 7 5

11* 8* 10** 10 12 11 10 12 8 13 19 20 23 24 22 22

NA NA 4 2 4 2 1 0 10 4 2 12 8 8 8 2

*Then known as ‘Other state parties’; **Then known as ‘Other recognised parties’. Source: CSDS Data Unit

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hand, the number of state/registered parties has increased from eight in the Ninth Lok Sabha to thirteen in the Tenth, nineteen in the Eleventh, twenty in the Twelfth, twenty-three in the Thirteenth and twenty-two in the Fourteenth to the Sixteenth.15 With the number of the ‘relevant’ state parties increasing in post1991 India, their presence in the two chambers of the Parliament has also increased steadily.16 There has particularly been a significant rise in the numbers of the state party MPs in the Rajya Sabha. This is due to the fact that several Legislative Assemblies, such as Tamil Nadu, have state party majority.17 The growing presence of the state level parties/registered parties is being considered a positive development as it is supposed to enhance the representative character of the Parliament as an institution.18 This is because compared to the ‘polity-wide’ parties,19 the state parties are more inclined to accommodate the collective claims of the newly politicised sub-state identities, including the numerically smaller ones, and give representation to them.20 The specific interests of the smaller peripheral states are believed to be taken up much more zealously by the state parties, as their political presence/ fortune remain confined to a singular state. Even in terms of mobilising the hitherto dormant smaller identity groups, state parties have scored over the national parties, as many of these ‘sandwich’ communities consisting mainly of numerically as well as economically weaker artisan/landless farming backward castes (referred as most backward castes) have of late been rising steadily.21 The state parties also score over the national/polity-wide parties like the Congress and the BJP, whose leadership has remained largely with the upper/dominant castes due to lack of adequate institutional mechanism to facilitate intraparty mobility within party organisations22 that could facilitate entry of the lower/middle castes into leadership role.

II Notwithstanding the laudatory references regarding the Parliaments constituted since the 1990s for becoming more representative, mirroring India’s multi-ethnic/diverse society, and thereby contributing to the ongoing process of democratic transition/consolidation, there have been prominent contra-voices as well speaking of the institutional decline in recent decades. The overwhelming view that comes across while sifting through the relevant literature on the Parliament as an institution at work is that despite its becoming more representative in quantitative sense, the institution is well past its glorious days. The ‘golden period’ of the

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Indian Parliament is traced to the ‘Nehruvian India’. It is, however, viewed to have slid downhill during the seventies and the eighties reaching its nadir in the last two decades with the advent of the ‘coalition era’.23 Also, lately, print and electronic media are increasingly critical of the performance of Parliament and point out ‘a decline in the effectiveness of Parliament as an institution of accountability and oversight’.24 What follows is an overview of the arguments supporting the ‘decline of parliament thesis’. First, the decline in institutional terms is with reference to the interrelationships between the three organs of the parliamentary government in India. The three organs have their own jurisdictions as defined by the Constitution and established in the constitutional practices over the last seven decades. This doctrine of separation of powers is complemented by the doctrine of checks and balances to ensure accountability and to ensure that no single organ becomes too powerful. Of late, however, the doctrine of checks and balances has come under visible constraint casting a shadow over the powers and effectiveness of the Parliament. Let us first focus on the higher judiciary. In institutional terms, the higher echelon of the judiciary through some of its decisions seems to be going beyond the established constitutional scheme of separation of powers and the doctrine of ‘procedure established by law’ to the detriment of the legislature. Encroachment in the sovereign domain of the Parliament has been happening in the garb of judicial review/judicial activism.25 Let us substantiate the argument by referring to the Supreme Court decisions in the Kesavanada Bharati and the Minerva Mills cases, establishing the basic structure doctrine, which gives the last word to the judiciary about the constitutionality of any constitution amendment Act. In 1981, the Supreme Court, while delivering the decision in Waman Rao v. Union of India, held that amendments to the Constitution made on or after 24 April 1973, by which time the Ninth schedule was amended from time to time by the inclusion of various statutes, were subject to judicial review on the ground that they violate the basic structure or essential features of the Constitution.26 Agreed that the 1950 Constitution had provided for a higher requirement for amending the Constitution by the Parliament as compared with enacting the ordinary laws, however, the basic structure doctrine introduced by the Supreme Court may arguably be viewed as ‘an attempt to infuse India’s constitutional scheme with judicial supremacy’.27 Such an argument receives credence if one considers that ‘no court in the world . . . has the authority to review constitutional amendment’ carried out by ‘validly elected democratic governments’.28

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As for the judiciary at times even taking over so to say the role of the Parliament in the form of judicial activism, one can refer to the ‘doctrine of unremunerated rights’. The doctrine has enabled the judiciary to establish a host of what can be termed as ‘judicially crafted rights’. In this respect references have been made of the unfettered expansion of Article 21, now including a broad range of rights like right to a clean environment, shelter, medical care, education, food and other rights.29 In a series of cases, often in the form of public interest litigation and its ‘associated innovations’, Directive Principles of State Policy (especially Articles 37 and 47) have been invoked by the Supreme Court for interpretive guidance for the adjudication of social rights making them justifiable/enforceable.30 In some recent instances, what can be construed as trespassing into the domain of the speakers’ authority, the Supreme Court has even directly monitored the working of the Parliament or the state legislatures passing on the instructions to the speakers.31 In the case of giving ruling over the constitutional validity of defections by the members in the Parliament, the ruling of the speaker/chairman has been made subject to judicial scrutiny notwithstanding the provision of the tenth schedule added by the Fifty-Second Constitutional Amendment Act, vide Supreme Court ruling in the Kihoto Holohan v. Zachillhu case (1992). Then, there are several Supreme Court decisions that have set aside legislations of the Parliament on the ground of jurisdiction. Of late even the actions within the legislative bodies have been subjected to judicial review.32 Yet another example cited about the judicial ‘over-reach’, though it concerned the Union executive, is the decisions of the Supreme Court in the second and third judges’ cases. The Supreme Court constitution bench, while interpreting article 124, held that the opinion of the Chief Justice of India (CJI) (heading a judicial collegium of four senior-most judges) was to be ‘binding/determinative’ rather than being merely ‘consultative’ as in the past.33 In order to restore ‘plurality of functionaries in appointment of the judges’ as well as ‘to bring more transparency in the judicial appointments’, the Parliament passed nearly unanimously the Ninety-Ninth Constitutional (Amendment) Act, 2014, and the National Judicial Appointment Commission Act (NJAC), 2014,34 which was subsequently declared as unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of India, invoking the basic structure doctrine.35 Let us now refer to the inter-relationship between the executive and the legislature at the union level to give further credence to the ‘decline thesis’. A weakened executive, lacking a clear and stable majority in the Lok Sabha and therefore under a coalitional arrangement, has been

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showing a proclivity to resort to institutional ‘shortcuts’ to achieve policy change without waiting to let it undergo the process of due legislative deliberations. The frequent usage of ordinances tends to undermine the authority of the Parliament as the sole law-making institution for the Union as mandated by the Indian Constitution. While the successive political regimes have justified the usage in the name of the delays inherent in the legislative process, another reason has been the reluctance on the part of the government to face the Parliament and engage the opposition in a constructive manner. This becomes evident when we consider that in the last one and half decades, more than half of the ordinances were re-issued rather than getting them passed in the form of legislative bills.36 What else would justify the re-issuance of the same ordinances without going for the parliamentary ratification as envisaged by the Constitution?37 The trend to opt for ordinances even when the parliamentary route was available was set by the then minority Congress government led by P.V. Narasimha Rao, which took recourse to the repromulgation of the ordinance in 1992.38 In the 1990s alone, out of ninety-six ordinances, fifty-three ordinances were repromulgated (Table 3.3). The weak coalition governments during the hung Parliaments (1989, 1996–98, 1998–99 and from 1999 to 2014) used the President’s ordinance making powers for overcoming difficulties in legislation. Ironically, even when the BJP got an absolute majority in the Sixteenth Lok Sabha, the NDA government has disregarded the parliamentary norms and the Supreme Court of India’s observation of 1986 and advised the President to repromulgate the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (Amendment) Ordinance related to land acquisition in February 2015 after the Parliament went into

Table 3.3 Presidential ordinances (1952–2009) Decade

Ordinances

Repromulgated

1952–59 1960–69 1970–79 1980–89 1900–99 2000–09

52 67 135 93 196 72

– – – – 53 06

Source: Shubhankar Dam, ‘Presidential Legislation in India: The Law and Practice of Ordinances’ p. 87.

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Table 3.4 No. of parties in Lok Sabha 1984–2014 Year

National parties

State parties

Registered parties

Total parties

1984–1985 1989 1996 1998 1999 2004 2009 2014

07 08 08 07 07 06 07 06

18 20 30 30 40 36 34 39

09 85 171 139 122 173 322 419

33 113 209 176 169 215 363 464

Source: CSDS Data Unit

recess. It obviously feared that if this was introduced as a Bill in the Parliament, the Rajya Sabha, where the ruling NDA does not have a majority, would have rejected it. In complete disregard to the constitutional norms, the NDA government repromulgated the ordinance for a third time in May 2015. Legislative oversight of the executive has also been on the decline.39 The principle behind legislative oversight is that the legislature is not merely a law-making body but has the responsibility to ensure that the public policies are ‘administered in accordance with the legislative intent’.40 Notwithstanding the doctrine of checks and balances, there has been a lack of adequate institutional mechanisms within the Parliament to hold the government accountable. That the required mechanisms have failed to evolve adequately may partly be because of the long period of one-party dominance within the Parliament, as was also the case with the Constituent Assembly.41 What contributed to the institutional deficit was a lack of democratic culture within the Congress, that came up after the ascendance of Indira Gandhi to the position of unbridled power contributed to the weakening of the Parliament in the seventies as there was a concerted effort to tame the legislature (as well as the judiciary), as evident in the form of the FortySecond Constitutional Amendment. The post-Indira Gandhi period has not improved the situation as almost all the parties following on the footstep of the Congress have become ‘family parties’. The parliamentary instruments for ensuring accountability of the Union executive, e.g., the Question Hour,42 motions on the floor, oversight powers, the committee system,43 all appear to be in a state of

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steady decay. Ironically, even as the recent decades have witnessed supposedly weak coalition governments, it has also been a period marked by weak Parliaments.44 Instead of engaging in constructive debate, the members of the opposition parties frequently resort to unparliamentarily/extra-constitutional practices that appear to suit the party or the coalition in power. Parliamentary oversight has particularly suffered in the economic domain as ‘much of the economic decision making is increasingly governed by international treaties’ in globalising India and the ‘Indian Parliament . . . does not have a system of effective treaty oversight in place’.45 The Parliament also seems to be abdicating its responsibility to give direction to the civil services, instead leaving many substantive decisions to the ministries and to the bureaucrats who run them. In addition, the lowering of the power, influence, dignity and efficiency of the Parliament may also be attributed to the increasing role of the non-elected institutions because of the restructuring of the regulatory framework. The Parliament in recent times has been found wanting in maintaining the required institutional standard of performance both in quantitative and qualitative sense. The number of parliamentary sittings has been declining drastically in recent decades. This is contrary to the expectation in the early years of independence. It was expected then (and rightly so) that with the challenges increasing and governance becoming much more complex, the Parliament would need to have many more sittings and sessions as the years would pass by.46 The Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs record, however, presents a dismal picture. It shows that the number of days when the two houses sit every year has actually been reduced rather than increased. While the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha respectively sat on an average for 127 and 100 days in a year respectively, the Parliament sat merely for 73 days in 2011.47 In 2012, the two houses had only 74 days of sittings each.48 However, only 61 percent of the available time in the Lok Sabha could be used for the parliamentary work. In case of the Rajya Sabha, it was 66 percent.49 Even when the sittings of the two chambers actually take place, the attendance of the members is found wanting. Even the ministers are no longer regularly present in the Parliament, even when they are required to be present when either of the houses is debating a matter concerning their ministry. Astonishingly, several ordinary members also remain absent even when their questions come up for the answer by the ministers in the House.50 Lately there has also been a perceptible decline in the quality of debate/informed discussion in the Parliament, for deliberations in both the Houses are much shorter and absenteeism has reached a stage that many times

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even the required quorum as mandated by the Constitution is lacking. What is most deplorable is that the members seem to be disinclined to present and participate in the discussion on the bills that address the substantive issues related to the ordinary masses. However, they are in full strength when trivial but media-friendly issues are being debated. Telecasting the debates in the Parliament has hardly had any sobering impact on the members behaving as gladiators. The anti-defection law passed as Fifty-Second Constitutional Amendment Act that is enshrined in the tenth schedule of the Constitution deserves a special mention. Though somewhat successful in checking the Aya Ram-Gaya Ram (i.e. frequent defections) culture51 that became rampant in the wake of decline of the Congress since the 1967 general elections, the law has also not helped the members in using their conscience/autonomy to exercise their vote on the bills going against the party directive, which leads to their expulsion not only from the party, but also from the membership of the house. At the most, they can suggest amendments or even criticise the bill inviting the displeasure of their party bosses, which does not mean much. The entire legislative process seems to have been overtaken by a small cabal of powerful ministers and party notables in the Parliament. The apathy on the part of the members as well as the government in the successive Parliaments has resulted in a situation that most of the bills, including the important ones, hardly undergo the mandatory three reading stages, some of them are passed in a matter of minutes without any fruitful discussion. Only a small number of the legislative bills are referred to the select committee. The impression that goes around and has some substance in it is that only a handful of members actually draft the bills; and they are the members (mostly lawyers by training) who are active in the Parliament as well as in the standing committees. Then, not only the committees but also the parliamentary procedures have faced criticism, as of late, the committee members have been openly taking partisan positions rather than maintaining objectivity. It was recently on evidence in the way the Joint Parliamentary Committee constituted to examine the scams under which the UPA regime functioned. Reforms have long been suggested to ensure the effective working of the committee system in the Parliament.52 There has also been decline in terms of the parliamentary conduct of the members. There are frequent disruptions of the proceedings by the unruly members who often indulge in verbal vehemence, even physical altercation (though rarely, thankfully), refusing to uphold the obligation of a modicum of civility and decorum. Authority of the presiding officers has badly eroded in the recent Lok Sabhas as the futility of

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their frequent appeals to the members to maintain and uphold the discipline is played out in full public gaze courtesy live telecast.53 The Indian Parliament has thus not evolved into a model for the state legislatures. Even worse, the presiding officers in the recent past have faced accusations of being partisan, or asked to follow the party line (e.g. Somnath Chatterjee).54 This raises a questions about parliamentary ethics involving both the members and the sanctity of the chair–Speaker (Lok Sabha) and Chairman (Rajya Sabha). The print/electronic media and social media reflect public dismay at the massive loss of public money due to frequent disruptions of parliamentary proceedings. Naturally, newspapers prominently display facts and figures on hours lost during sittings55 installed proceedings and adjournments due to disorderly conduct and argue ‘through a cost-benefit analysis that the country is not getting value for money in supporting parliament’.56 With a significant percentage of the members (10 to 30 percent) having criminal antecedents and many facing serious corruption charges, naturally the questions are raised about the integrity and competence of the party leaders to play a proactive role to put a check on the entry of unscrupulous elements in the Parliament by strictly adhering to the Election Commission of India’s guidelines. In the Fifteenth Lok Sabha, 30 percent of the members had criminal cases against them in the court of law. The Sixteenth Lok Sabha is worse in comparison as 34 percent of the members are facing criminal charges, including serious ones.57 Arguably, if the Parliament is full of tainted members and is also badly divided across the party lines with members refusing to rise over and above party loyalty even when required, it can hardly be expected that CAG damning reports will lead to corrective actions.58 In a country that remains largely poor despite being one of the fastest growing economies in the world, the Parliament seems to be primarily of and for the rich people. In the Fifteenth Lok Sabha, 58 percent of the members were multi-millionaires. The percentage was particularly high in case of the two polity-wide coalition-making parties namely the Congress (71 percent) and the BJP (51 percent). In case of the Sixteenth Lok Sabha, the percentage has gone further high as 84 percent of the BJP members and 80 percent of the Congress members are multi-millionaires.59 The use of money to influence the members’ parliamentary role and conduct as well as to ‘buy’ support was evident in the way majority was allegedly ‘managed’ to secure majority to win confidence vote for the Congress minority government in 1993. It also happened more recently when the UPA-I government was saved on the nuclear deals issue after the Left parties withdrew their support. Reference may also be made about the controversies like some members

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seeking monetary considerations for asking questions60 in the fifteenth Parliament. While lack of involvement in the developmental needs of the constituency explain the under-utilisation of the MPLAD funds, in many cases where the funds have been utilised there are reports of the mismanagement of allocations (`Fifty million at present) for personal gains by the members.61 The members, whose parliamentary behaviour have often raised public suspicion, have not hesitated in abusing the privileges and immunities enjoyed by the members. Corruption charges against some of the prominent MPs including the ministers under the UPA regime regarding the allocation of the spectrum and coal blocks in a manner that resulted in the huge loss to the public exchequer caused unprecedented loss of the credibility of the institution, weakening it considerably. This was evident in the capitulation of an otherwise recalcitrant Parliament in the face of fast of Anna Hazare in Ramlila Maidan in 2011 (‘India Against Corruption’ protest). The protest duly exhibited not only the growing weakness of the Parliament but also drew attention towards growing trust deficit in the institution. During the protest, the parliamentarians were made fun of publicly as they were caricatured and lampooned. Ironically, what was argued more than a decade ago seems truer now: ‘Parliament faces an acute deficit of perception management, with its public image at very low ebb’.62

III The foregoing discussion leads us to a puzzle. Can one establish a possible link between the changing compositions of the Parliament being hailed as the process of democratisation of the institution and the decline it has suffered over the years, most drastically in the recent decades? To what extent can the new entrants, whether in the form of the newly established state parties or the elected members, coming from the newly mobilised/politicised social groups across the party lines be held culpable for the overall institutional decline in terms of both authority as well as functioning?63 More specifically, can the pervading sense of instability/inertia and frequent occurrence of the incidents of blockades/unruly behaviour as well as the perceived lack of legislative skill/application/apathy be attributed to the new entrants? And also, given the pivotal role played by the MPs from the state parties in shaping the agenda and strategy of their parties in the Parliament in the present coalition era, can one also raise question about their ‘special contribution’ to the ‘decline’ as they are accused of nurturing a very narrow/parochial vision of their representation? Do the

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emerging state parties play the role of meaningful opposition enabling the Parliament to ensure executive accountability? How have the MPs of such parties performed in the Parliamentary committees, if they have found place? Alternatively, can one argue that culpability of the ‘new’ state level parties in this regard is as much as that of the ‘old’ national parties and the same can be said about the members irrespective of their social background?

IV Arguably, the enhanced representative character of the Parliament has not led to the institutional well-being but rather has come in the way of its effective functioning both as a law-making body as well as an oversight institution. In this context, the state parties (recognised as such by the ECI or simply registered parties) and their ‘leaders’ take larger blame though one cannot absolve the polity-wide parties either. Why focus on the state level parties? Given the lack of numbers64 as well as most of their MPs lacking adequate legislative experience, they tend to indulge in extra-parliamentary practices in an attempt to pressurise the government and make their ‘presence’ felt. Such ‘pressure tactics’ to earn recognition adversely affect the working of Parliament.65 In a comparative mode, obstructions in proceedings of the Parliament, especially in the Lok Sabha, have been most visible since the Ninth Lok Sabha with the presence of as many as twenty-four parties, mostly state parties as coalition era started witnessing either a minority government depending on outside support or surviving on a fragile coalition. The numbers of the state parties, as mentioned earlier, have increased further. Frequent disturbances and trial of strength on the floor of the House has since then been recurrent phenomena and has now become a routine affair than an aberration.66 Despite relative stability after the 1999 Lok Sabha elections, the coalition-making parties, i.e. the Congress and the BJP, have remained dependent on the state parties for the survival of their coalition government formed by them for coming to power, rather than on the basis of a common agenda. Despite winning a majority in 2014, the BJP is dependent on state parties, both those that are parts of the NDA and the ones who are not in the UPA, for ensuring smooth passage of even the ordinary bills related to everyday governance. Then, in elections to state Legislative Assemblies, both the Congress and the BJP need regional allies to broaden their respective social support bases. It was demonstrated in the 2015 Bihar Legislative Assembly election. Ostensibly, the state parties increasingly have greater bargaining capacity

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in the present coalitional era. They have often resorted to pressure tactics67 over coalition governments bordering on blackmail to pursue their narrow agenda.68 Moreover, party bosses drive personal agenda like securing lucrative portfolios or securing ministerial berths for their family members (e.g. DMK during its alliance with the Congress or the BJP at the centre). In order to strengthen their constituency, some have attempted squeezing larger resources from the Union government for their respective states (e.g. Chandra Babu Naidu-led TDP during the A.B. Vajpayee-led NDA regime). In the recent past, a host of inefficient ministers from state parties have served at the centre. Their focus on their states and their party bosses’ directives has stymied them.69 Mamata Banerjee as Railway Minister under the UPA regime reportedly remained absent from the Parliament most of the time. As a result, reportedly, the departmental files would go to Kolkata for her perusal. Similarly, Lalu Yadav (RJD) and Nitish Kumar (JDU), the two railway ministers from Bihar, were accused of using their ministries for unduly benefiting their states. In this context, however, it is surprising as to why the MPs from poorer states like Bihar and UP, who are mostly from state parties, have not been much inclined to utilise the MPLAD funds effectively for the development of their constituencies, as it would have brought them electoral dividend.70

V Given the opportunistic nature of alliances devoid of policy-specific alignments, there is hardly any ideological commitment on the part of the state level parties who ‘come together’ to be part of the coalition government at the centre to be able to exact concessions from the coalition-making national party. Their politics is all about the patronage politics based on narrow/parochial electoral agenda. So support of these parties for ensuring the smooth functioning of the Parliament or their support/opposition on a legislative bill/motion is often coloured by partisan consideration other than the principled one. In addition to the cold unprincipled electoral calculations aimed at sharing the spoils of power, the narrowness of the vision and concerns of the state parties can also be understood by referring to the internal structure of these parties. Most of the state level parties are ‘family parties’ and depend completely on the ‘leader’ to set the agenda for their party members. Since these leaders are more often than not safely ensconced at the state level71 with unfettered access to huge political resources, organisation, money and votes, they do not have much at stake in ensuring the effectiveness of the Parliament. Significantly, the NES survey data 2004 and 2009 showed that contrary to the popular perception that

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it is only the performance of the state and the national government that matters to the electorates while casting their votes in assembly or Lok Sabha elections, it is also the performance of the incumbent parliamentarian from a given constituency that matters in determining the electoral choice of the voters from that constituency.72 Arguably, in the considered opinion of the honourable members, their performance in the form of effective participation in the deliberations in the Parliament is not going to help them electorally. Very seldom one finds the media highlighting the performance of the sitting members of Parliament as law makers at the time of the elections. A note of caution! At a time when even the two polity-wide parties, the BJP and the Congress, have not shown much inclination to ensure a smooth functioning of the Parliament, the entire blame cannot be put on the state parties, as often even the bosses of the national parties use some of their members in a house as ‘foot soldiers’ to put pressure on the government. Also, these coalition-making parties do not hesitate in undermining the authority of the Parliament when it suits them especially when they are in power. Consequently a weakened and divided Parliament losing its hard-earned prestige and reputation as a vibrant law-making/deliberative body has witnessed erosion of its authority at the hands of the other two organs of the government, namely the executive as well as the higher judiciary.

Notes * The author wishes to thank Vikas Tripathi and the Delhi-based LoknitiCSDS team for valuable assistance while writing this chapter. 1 Yogendra Yadav and Suhas Palshikar, ‘Revisiting Third Electoral System: Mapping Electoral Trends in India, 2004–09’, in Sandeep Shastri, K.C. Suri and Yogendra Yadav (eds.), Electoral Politics in Indian States, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2009, pp. 393–429. 2 ‘India does well on most measures of success in a democracy: voter turnout, turnover of incumbents, the empowering of new groups and the maintaining of a core set of federal freedoms. . .and political contestation’ (Niraja Jayal and Pratap Bhanu Mehta (eds.), The Oxford Companion to Politics in India, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2010, p. xvi). 3 Balveer Arora, ‘The Indian Parliament and Democracy’, in Ajay K. Mehra and Gert W. Kueck (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Comparative Perspective, New Delhi: Konark Publishers, 2003, p. 15; Rahul Verma and Vikas Tripathi, ‘Making Sense of the House: Explaining the Decline of the Indian Parliament Amidst democratisation’, Studies in Indian Politics, 1(2), 2014, p. 153. 4 Shankar and Rodrigues have referred to four dimensions of representation in the context of the Indian Parliament. They include changing social composition, changes in the concept of representation, shifting from English

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Ashutosh Kumar as the mode of expression to assertions in the Indian languages and the change in conception of the nation as a pluralist and diverse entity. B.L. Shankar and Valerian Rodrigues, The Indian Parliament: A Democracy at Work, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2011, p. 15. Christophe Jaffrelot and Sanjay Kumar (eds.), Rise of the Plebeians? The Changing Face of Indian Legislative Assemblies, New Delhi: Routledge, 2009; G.C. Malhotra, ‘The Changing Profile of Lok Sabha: A SocioEconomic Study of Members (1952–2002)’, in G.C. Malhotra (ed.), Fifty Years of Indian Parliament, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat, 2002, pp. 108–132. Thirty-one percent of the MPs in the Sixteenth Lok Sabha have agriculture as their main occupation, http://164.100.47.134/intranet/PARINFOR_BULLE-English.pdf (Accessed on 2 October 2015). Article 330 of the Constitution of India mandates that the allocation of the seats for the scheduled castes in a state or UT ‘shall bear, as nearly as may be, the same proportion to the total number of seats allotted to that State or Union territory in the House of the People as the population of the Scheduled Castes in the State or Union territory’. Article 87 of the Constitution provides for delimitation of constituencies every decade, taking into consideration proportion of the SC/ST population to overall population of a state as per the latest census and then allocates the seats accordingly. See, Niraja Gopal Jayal, Representing India: Ethnic Diversity and the Governance of Public Institutions, Houndsmils: Palgrave, 2006, pp. 135– 136 and Shankar and Rodrigues, op. cit., p. 90. Ayyangar and Jacob have presented a classification of the state parties by focusing on whether they aspire to ‘represent certain ethnic groups or regional concerns’ sub-dividing them further into ethnic, territorial and ad hoc splinter parties. ‘Ethnic parties are primarily interested in the mobilization and empowerment of particular ethnic groups – which could span multiple neighbouring states – and aim to capture state power to redistribute resources to their targeted groups. State parties mobilize citizens within their respective states usually against the dominant national party in the state. Unlike ethnic parties, their focus is geographical, and they are concerned with issues such as self-determination, regional autonomy or simply access to a larger share of national resources. Ad hoc splinter parties are usually too small to aspire to come to power by themselves even at the state level’. Srikrishna Ayyangar and Suraj Jacob, ‘Question Hour Activity and Party Behaviour in India’, The Journal of Legislative Studies, 21(2), 2015, pp. 232–249. A doctoral study has pointed out that in the recent decades, sitting parliamentarians, whether they are from the polity-wide parties or from the state parties, are less likely to win than incumbents from the opposition parties, thereby underlining the significance of ‘anti-incumbency factor’ in India’s electoral democracy. Nirmala Ravishankar, Voting for Change: Turnout and Vote Choice in Indian Elections, Harvard: Harvard University Press, 2007. Ashutosh Varshney, ‘Asian Democracy Through an Indian Prism’, The Journal of Asian Studies, 74(4), 2015, pp. 917–926. Educational level of the parliamentarians has improved significantly compared to the seventies. For instance, in the Sixteenth Lok Sabha, 419

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members (77 percent) are either graduates and above. Devesh Kapur and Pratap Bhanu Mehta, Public Institutions in India: Performance and Design, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2005, p. 5; also refer to Devesh Kapur and Pratap Bhanu Mehta, The Indian Parliament as an Institution of Accountability, Democracy, Governance and Human Rights Programme, Paper No. 23, January 2006, United Nations Research Institute for Social Development. The number of parties represented (at least one member forms the party) was twenty-two in the First Lok Sabha, which has increased to thirtyseven in the Sixteenth Lok Sabha. Jayal, 2006, op. cit., p. 107. Going by their electoral presence in recent India, only the Congress and the BJP would qualify as ‘polity-wide’ parties. The Left parties like the CPI and the CPM have been reduced to the status of multi-state parties. www.thehindu.com/news/national/1652-parties-including-bsp-cpi-dmkscore-zero-in-lok-sabha-polls/article6020508.ece (Accessed on 25 March 2016). A political party is designated as a state party by the ECI provided it has been engaged in political activity for a continuous period of five years, and has, at the latest general elections held at the state/union territory for the Lok Sabha, or for the Legislative Assembly, returned either (1) at least one member to the Lok Sabha for every twenty-five members of that house, (2) or any fraction of the number elected from that state/UT for every thirty members of that assembly or any fraction of that number. Jayal, 2006, op. cit., pp. 218–219; Shankar and Rodrigues, 2011, op. cit., p. 66. Sanjay Kumar, ‘Regional Parties, Coalition Government and Functioning of Indian Parliament: The Changing Patterns’, Journal of Parliamentary Studies, 1, 1 June 2010, pp. 75–91. Elected MLAs constitute the electoral college for electing the Rajya Sabha member. Social composition of the Parliament when compared with the state assemblies in the seventies showed comparability. See Iqbal Narain (ed.), State Politics in India, Meerut: Meenakshi Prakashan, 1976. The two polity-wide/coalition-making parties at the centre, namely the Congress and the BJP, however, still won 322 seats out of 543 seats in the Fifteenth Lok Sabha. The number of the seats (233) won by the state parties remained constant in the Sixteenth Lok Sabha despite the Congress managing to win only 44 seats, as the BJP made most of the Congress loss in the states like UP, Maharashtra and Rajasthan. ‘Polity-wide or national parties are often associated with national elections and/or government formation at the national level and their role in state politics is reduced to an incidental position. This should not be, because polity wide parties are an integral part of almost all state level party systems. In some states the main competition is effectively between polity-wide parties, with state-based parties playing a marginal role. More importantly, polity-wide parties also run governments in many states of the country’. K.K. Kailash, ‘Federal Calculations in State Level Coalition Governments’, India Review, 10(3), 2011, pp. 246–282 (248). For instance, the SAD in the last two Lok Sabha elections has given ticket to Sher Singh Ghubaya who belongs to a numerically small and hitherto politically marginalized Rai Sikh community, ignored by the Congress and the BJP in the state. Ghubaya incidentally won both the times from Ferozepur constituency.

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21 JD (U) in Bihar and SP in Uttar Pradesh have mobilised the lower OBCs (Ati Pichda) and lower Dalits (Maha Dalit) by treating them as distinct social categories for state patronage. 22 Weiner has pointed out that the Congress leaders only promoted lower castes political leaders to strengthen their position within the factional fight within the Congress organisation. 23 Referring to ‘the sad decline of the Parliament’, Inder Malhotra, a senior journalist, observed that ‘the life story of the Indian Parliament begins with and to an extent revolves around Jawaharlal Nehru’ (quoted in Shankar and Rodrigues, 2011, op. cit., p. 23). 24 Kapur and Mehta, 2006, op. cit., p. iii; P.A. Sebastian, ‘Decay of Parliamentary Institutions in India’, Economic and Political Weekly, 24(31), 5 August 1989, pp. 1749–1750; Ajay K. Mehra, ‘Introduction’, in Ajay K. Mehra and Gert W. Kueck (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Comparative Perspective, New Delhi: Konark Publishers, 2003, p. 3; Arora, 2003, op. cit. ‘There is an increasing concern about the decline of Parliament, failing standards of debate, erosion of the moral authority and prestige of the supreme tribune of the people’ (Report of the National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution, quoted in Shankar and Rodrigues, 2011, op. cit., p. 5). 25 ‘The division of authority between courts and the Parliament has always been a matter of contestation. This contest has extended not only to claims to be the supreme arbiter of the constitution; it now extends to the issue of governance as well. There is a palpable sense that the Parliament is in decline’. Niraja Gopal Jayal and Pratap Bhanu Mehta (eds.), ‘Preface’, in The Oxford Companion to Politics in India, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2010, p. xvi. Also see, Ajay K. Mehra, ‘“Due Process” or “Procedure Established by Law”’, in Pran Chopra (ed.), The Supreme Court Versus the Constitution: A Challenge to Federalism, New Delhi: Sage, 2006, pp. 115–130. 26 Ruma Pal, ‘Separation of Powers’, in Sujit Choudhry, Madhav Khosla and Pratap Bhanu Mehta (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of the Indian Constitution, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2016, p. 264. 27 Madhav Khosla, The Indian Constitution, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2012, p. 155. 28 Ibid. 29 Ananth Padmanabhan, ‘The Right to Education’, Seminar, 642, February 2013, pp. 19–24. 30 Khosla, 2012, op. cit., pp. 122–123, 136. 31 In 1998, the Supreme Court directed a floor test in Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly to resolve the competing claims for the post of Chief Minister between Jagadambika Pal and Kalyan Singh. In 2005, a three-judge Supreme Court bench directed the Speaker of the Jharkhand State Assembly to hold a trust vote and provide video recording of the proceedings (See, Shankar and Rodrigues, 2011, op. cit., p. 288). In another incident, the Delhi High Court also took up the case filed on behalf of the members expelled for raising questions in the Parliament after taking cash from the interested parties. This invited a strong objection from the then Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee. 32 Pal, op. cit., p. 263.

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33 Lavanya Rajamani and Arghya Sengupta, ‘The Supreme Court’, in Niraja Gopal Jayal and Pratap Bhanu Mehta (eds.), The Oxford Companion to Politics in India, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2010, p. 88 and Khosla, 2012, op. cit., p. 155. 34 Durga Das Basu, Introduction to the Constitution of India, 22nd edition, Gurgaon: LexisNexis, 2015, pp. 325–326. 35 The NJAC was mandated to recommend to the President about the appointments, promotions and transfers of the High Court and the Supreme Court Judges. The eight-member NJAC was to consist of the Prime Minister, the law Minister, the leader of the opposition/the largest party in the Lok Sabha, CJI, two senior most judges of the Supreme Court and also two eminent jurists to be collectively nominated by the CJI, PM and the Leader of the opposition. The Ninety-Ninth Constitution Amendment Act was passed with near unanimity. It was, however, subjected to the judicial review and was declared as unconstitutional by a five-member Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court invoking the Basic Structure Doctrine, stating that the amendment infringed upon the independence of the judiciary. This was a view shared by eminent lawyers also. For instance, Indira Jaisingh (‘National Judicial Appointments’, Economic and Political Weekly, 49(35), 2014, www.epw.in/journal/2014/35/commentary/ national-judicial-appointments-commission.html (Accessed on 7 May 2016)) argued that the new law would have made the ‘judiciary subservient to the executive and thus (posed) a fundamental challenge to the Constitution and Indian democracy’. As of now things stand, the whole issue has once again raised the apprehension about the spectre of a simmering tension between the two institutions namely the executive and the judiciary. 36 Kapur and Mehta, 2006, op. cit., p. 26. 37 Shubhankar Dam, ‘Making Parliament Irrelevant: A Postcard From India’, City University of Hong Kong, Spring, April 2016, pp. 1–11, works.bepress.com/shubhankar_dam/48/download/ (Accessed on 14 April 2016). See other related links. Some of the links, for example, are: www. livemint.com/Specials/ZRtVJMBfOLoQ4l9Z0MA2wK/Decoding-Indiasordinance-system–Shubhankar-Dam.html (Accessed on 14 April 2016). www.business-standard.com/article/opinion/ordinances-have-underminedour-parliamentary-system-shubhankar-dam-115072600772_1.html (Accessed on 14 April 2016). http://barandbench.com/indian-courts-have-been-remarkably-reticentwhen-it-comes-ordinances-prof-shubhankar-dam-smu/ www.thehindu.com/opinion/columns/legal-eye-column-repromulgation/ article7275518.ece (Accessed on 14 April 2016). 38 This when the Supreme Court had observed in 1986 itself that the practice of repromulgation of ordinances was unconstitutional in the D.C. Wadhwa case against the Bihar government’s proclivity to repeatedly repromulgate ordinances, www.thehindu.com/news/national/repromulgation-of-ordinancesa-tool-for-weaker-coalitions/article7287549.ece (Accessed on 13 April2016). 39 Jessica S. Wallack, ‘India’s Parliament as a Representative Institution’, India Review, 7(2), 2008, p. 91. 40 Raghbir Singh (ed.), The Legislature and the Judiciary, New Delhi: Orient Blackswan, 2011, p. 96.

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41 Arun Agarwal, ‘Indian Parliament’, in Devesh Kapur and Pratap Bhanu Mehta (eds.), Public Institutions in India, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2005, pp. 77–14. 42 There has been a growing tendency on the part of the ministers avoiding answering orally to even the starred questions asked during the Question Hour, preferring to say that a detailed written answer would be tabled in the House, thereby avoiding the trouble of facing incisive supplementary questions that are routinely allowed by the presiding officer. Many a times the ministers come to the house without proper homework, depending on the written replies prepared by the bureaucrats. In the Fifteenth Lok Sabha, only 10 percent of the listed questions could be answered orally because 40 percent of the scheduled time for the Question Hour was wasted due to the disruption in the House. Mahendra Prasad Singh, ‘The Decline of the Indian Parliament’, India Review, 14(3), 2015, pp. 352–376 (p. 362). 43 Even the standing committees in the Parliament like the Public Accounts Committee, the Estimates Committee or the Committee on Public Undertakings do not go into the issues of policy. Their functions are of an exante nature. For discharging their duties, these committees are very much dependent on the audit reports prepared by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (Singh, 2010, op. cit., pp. 98–99). What has also weakened the committee system is the fact that the members in the committees often take the partisan role instead of being neutral while performing their task. 44 Kapur and Mehta, 2006, op. cit., p. iii; Agarwal, 2005, op. cit., p. 94. 45 Ibid., p. iii. 46 W.H. Morris-Jones, Parliament in India, London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1957, p. 129. 47 Sudha Pai and Avinash Kumar (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Critical Appraisal, Hyderabad: Orient Blackswan, 2014, p. 14. 48 Singh, 2015, op. cit., p. 362. 49 Verma and Tripathi, 2013, op. cit., p. 157. 50 Ibid., p. 173. 51 The crucial role of the presiding officer (speaker/chairperson) in having the final ruling regarding the application of the law has been under scrutiny, though not to the extent that has been the case with the state assemblies. 52 The standing committees supervising the financial matters like the Committee on Public Accounts, Committee on Public Undertakings have to rely on the report of the Comptroller and Auditor General submitted annually to the President. Moreover, the committees can only make recommendations. 53 Singh, 2010, op. cit., p. xiii. 54 It was not the first time when the role of Hamid Ansari as the Rajya Sabha Chairman came under scanner with the opposition parties accusing him of favouring the Congress-led UPA government by abruptly bringing to an end the session of the Rajya Sabha during a debate over the Lok Pal Bill. Several such incidents can be referred from the past. Lok Sabha Speaker Balram Jakhar and Vice President and Rajya Sabha Chairman R. Venkatraman were also criticised in 1987 for absolving the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi of his accountability to the Parliament for his failure in performing his duties towards the President. It happened when then

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President Giani Zail Singh denied Rajiv Gandhi’s claim made in the Parliament that he had never failed to keep the President informed of national interest as mandated under Article 78 of the Constitution. Speaker Shivraj Patil’s motives came under scrutiny in 1992 when he declined to disqualify twelve JD MPs who had defected along with the eight expelled members under the anti-defection law. Significantly, his ruling came after a gap of ten months after the Janata Dal application. See, A.G. Noorani, Constitutional Question and Citizens’ Rights, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2006, pp. 189–204. While actual hours of sitting as a percentage of available hours were as high as 95 percent in the first session of the Lok Sabha in 1985, it came down to 59 percent in its last session in 2011 (See, Singh, 2015, op. cit., p. 366). In another example of the deficit in terms of work culture, the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Lok Sabhas devoted on an average thirty-five hours each year to discuss the budget in contrast to the first three Lok Sabhas, which spent as much as 135 hours on an average (Verma and Tripathi, 2014, op. cit., p. 367). Arora, 2003, op. cit., p. 36. Singh, 2015, op. cit., p. 363. Kapur and Mehta, 2005, op. cit., p. 17. Singh, 2015, op. cit., p. 364. The legislators in the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly faced allegations about manipulations regarding questions in 1987 (Sebastian, 1989, op. cit., p. 1749). Arguably, what happens in the Parliament does occur in the case of the state Legislatures also. Agarwal, 2005, op. cit., p. 96. Arora, 2003, op. cit., p. 36. ‘Signs of disorder that India’s parliamentary system frequently displays are in fact the consequence of its progressive democratisation’ (Arora, 2003, op cit., p. 15). In the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Lok Sabha, there were fifteen state level parties whose members were less than ten in numbers (EPW, 2009: 203). However, of late, both the national parties Congress and BJP as opposition parties have equally been responsible in disrupting the proceedings. Subhash Kashyap, Our Parliament: An Introduction to the Parliament of India, New Delhi: National Book Trust, 2004, pp. 299, 305. Vote of no confidence procedure provides smaller state parties leverage over the rest of the coalition, as they threaten to defect (Wallack, 2008, op. cit., p. 110). Even the state units of the national parties having their local compulsions also put pressure over their party high command to disrupt the Parliament, as Sushma Swaraj recently admitted. Suresh Prabhu, a Shiv Sena member in the Sixteenth Lok Sabha, had to resign from the House and had to join the BJP, as party boss Uddhav Thackeray did not allow him to take the office of the Union Railway Minister. Dinesh Goswami, Railway Minister in the UPA II government, was removed from the ministry for not complying with the recommendations of party chief Mamata Banerjee while presenting the railway budget, though he had the confidence of the then Prime Minister.

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70 Agarwal, 2005, op. cit., p. 96. 71 Ostensibly to avoid meeting the fate of H.D. Deve Gowda who accepted Prime Ministership under the Janata Dal–led coalition government leaving Chief Ministership, never being able to recapture his influence in the state despite forming Janata Dal (Secular). 72 Rahul Verma, ‘What Determines Electoral Outcomes in India? Caste, Class, or Voters’ Satisfaction With Government Performance?’, Asian Survey, 52(2), March/April 2012, pp. 270–297.

Part II

Issues in representation

4

The Indian Parliament and its modes of political representation Asha Sarangi

The question of political representation and its various forms is central to the understanding of Parliament as an institution of democratic functioning. Even more pertinent in this is to understand the idea of the ‘political’, its origins and locations of emergence and the newer modes and practices of various kinds embedded within the larger domains of the social and cultural spheres. It is this kind of a dialogical and communicative habitus of the political and its representational forms that gradually shape the institutionalization of the representational politics. The conceptual inquiry into the understanding of this institution must ask the following questions – how do the politics and practices of political representation work themselves out? How, and in what ways, has the idea of the ‘political’ been defined and elaborated through the constant re-negotiation of a set of political practices and processes in a given society? The ethnography of political representation can be located and deciphered from various sites. It can be more visible from politically constituted legislative and executive bodies as well as from the civil society at large. In order to locate the substantive and not just procedural aspects of political representation, it is important that we consider it as an activity, a performative act which takes the form of an institutionalized arrangement. In this specific sense, the modes and modalities of representation emerge as collective exercise embedded both in the social and political workings of the institution. However, the forms of political representation can be varied and heterogeneous and drawn at times from more complex and comprehensive public imaginaries. The pertinent question as to how the domain of the political becomes institutionalized and legally constituted based on the certain notions of a public reason and morality remains important in considerations over any idea of political representation. In the Indian case, it is far more interesting to locate the newer sites of political representation, and their gradual

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evolution from a rather patrimonial to more public forms of authority, the latter intensely sutured within bureaucratized and formally rationalized spheres of parliamentarian deliberation and contestation. The political history of modern India has to be read along with the specific political regimes and their ideological and political formations and shifts at a given historical moment. The forms that political representation can take at times of restricted democratic space can contribute to the rise and sustainability of particular political regimes and their perpetuation. The question of boundary or more appropriately put ‘democratic limit’ as Chantal Mouffe and Laclau suggest is to indicate how in particular ways the modes of protest and consent in a society can be shaped or determined.1 Can we say that this form of institutionalized political representation also signifies some kind of a democratic limit which is indicative of an absence of a more dialogical, participatory and representational political space? We can also presume that the primacy of the political – and its emerging domain – produced in the oppositional terms taking on the languages of exclusion/inclusion, individual/collective and singular/plural can be seen operating at various levels at times in more subdued forms. This compels us further to think through the constantly negotiable relationship between the representational politics and its modes and modalities of power.

The domains of the political The emerging domains of the political can possibly explain the intricacies involved in the creation of ‘overlapping consensus’ which can contribute to the maturing of the political. This view of the political requires new forms of moral enunciations affecting the subject-positions of the individuals of a society. The interaction between moral and political begins to call for newer forms of discursive formations which can go beyond the mere institutionalized representational forms of power and its democratic upsurge. However, over- and underinstitutionalization of the representation reinvents and revives modes of the political in different ways. The uproar over the formation of Telangana as a separate state both in the Indian Parliament and the state legislature of Andhra Pradesh witnessed numerous sites of dissent and protest, some of which even questioned the mandate given to the representatives of the people of undivided Andhra Pradesh. The triangular relationship between the representer, represented and representation was visible on a number of issues dealing with the disputes over boundaries of the new and old states, ownership and distribution of the natural resources, administrative restructuring of the newly

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constituted state and transfer of manpower and resources between the two states of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. Each of these issues invited critical reflection on the question of political representation of the social constituencies which were stakeholders in this enterprise. The Telangana debate pointed out anxieties over the question of equality of democratic representation of various communities, particularly the socially marginalized and disadvantaged ones, and various modes and modalities of such representation. Furthermore, the demand for Telangana statehood premised on the logic of representation being multiple and collective, challenging any singular authorial signifier of it. In other words, political representation in a democratic government can take various forms mediated and authorized by people themselves. This kind of representational political order can be made sense of if we can identify the processes of transmission between discursive, deliberative and legislative modes of representation. All societies carefully navigate through these two processes to arrive at some sort of overlapping consensus on the road leading to democratization. It is also important to note whether or not all legitimate and relevant discourses get represented or not and in what forms. While terming India’s road to democratization as one of exceptionalism, Alistair McMillan considers the Indian case as one of a transitional and deviant democratization due to the absence of high economic growth, educational and literacy development and high urbanization patterns needed for the growth of democracy in developed countries.2 In this context, whether or not the idea of political representation is adequately democratic needs to be further probed into. Similarly, we need to carefully analyze and critically engage with the particular forms it can possibly take. It is of considerable value to think whether political institutions and representatives can be truly democratic and representational of varied interests and identities in a deeply hierarchical society such as India? Is it the case that a particular form of political representation can possibly approximate to democratic representation more than others? The modes of protests and possible matrix of conflicts in any society at a given point of time must contribute to the vitality of representation within the given democratic political order. There can also be specific democratic norms by which the representatives and represented have to abide by and adhere to. It is both a certain kind of representational authorization and accountability that the representatives have to deliver and stand by while performing their calls for fulfilling the mandate behind political representation and its objectives. All of this is further subject to the claims made on the principles of political legitimacy and the rules of representation thereof. Isn’t it the

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case that, often time, the political domains of legitimacy and representation can possibly cohabit certain degree of imaginaires that can readily influence and affect the instantiation of political communities and their interests? The latter emerges out of a curious mix of political vortex over the intertwined relation between political dissent and consent. The institution of Parliament has come to symbolize the idioms of political legitimation in a given democratic-representative form of government. The representatives are bestowed, at times, with undue optimism, the responsibility of protecting, promoting and patronizing particular interests of their constituencies. Often this can call for newer registers of representation and the capable decipherability assumed within them.

The unequal political In the given geographical inequality of regions and communities of people inhabiting them, the question of unequal representation of their interests is inevitable. The single-member constituency does not ensure a fair, equal and just form of representation in either state or national legislature since it is based on the first-past-the-post system whereby the non-majority sharing votes are not converted into seats and hence the representation remains primarily of the largest number of votes obtained by particular parties or individuals when the latter contest as independents. Many Members of Parliament get elected with a minority of representation and with a marginal number of votes cast by the electors for their representatives. Therefore, the aggregative representation can often time be without an absolute majority of electors electing their representatives. Devin Joshi, while comparing Sri Lanka and India over this issue, suggests that geographic, ideological and demographic representation in these two countries varies a great deal due to the reasons of proportionate representation system in the former case and of single-member district system in the other.3 In India, this kind of unequal parliamentary representation is primarily because of the population size, its density and complexity, and how it gets transformed into numerical representation through seats selected. In this differentiated mapping of representation, the dual level of accountability matters the most. Kapur and Mehta rightly emphasize that ‘parliament is an agency that holds government accountable, and parliamentarians are held accountable through elections.’4 The most important question in this regard is how the institution of Parliament ensures the survival of parliamentary democracy. In other words, to what extent does the procedural indulgence of this institution define its substantial character?

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Is it the case that the substantive-normative question of representation is reduced to mere number-crunching exercise over the years? It is also imperative that the parliamentary democracy enters a new age of representational politics which rests upon the normative issues of public reason, democratic ethos and plural political order of a certain kind. In this regard, both procedural and substantive aspects of Parliament get closely inter-linked. But it is possible to de-link them sometime for specific purposes. The institution of Parliament has to be in synch with other governing institutions of the country. This sort of institutional collaboration allows Parliament to fulfill its representational mandate in the procedural manner, enabling it in its legislative decision-making functions in a more accountable way. The last few years have seen an intense conflict or rather a logjam between Parliament and judiciary or Parliament and executive. The substantive increase in the number of political parties from the first general elections onwards testifies the plural, diverse and heterogeneous character of the political representation in contemporary India. The institutionalized representation of early decades as it was envisaged by the founders of this majestic institution has become much more politicized and to a certain extent hastily disordered. The debate in Indian Parliament over the question of one-third reservation for women has continued to inform us about the ideas and ideals of political in the last two decades. It has been nineteen years since the debate on women’s reservation bill started in the Indian Parliament. The acrimonious nature of the debate and un-parliamentary behavior of some members of the Parliament on this issue continues to erupt every time there is an attempt to discuss the unequal women representation in the national and state assemblies of the country. The disruptions and uncivil manners of parliamentarians and political leaders throughout the country clearly indicated the sharper hierarchies of gender, caste, class and regional inequalities which are intermeshed with gender discrimination and disadvantage in the social and political life of Indian society.5 The intense political debate on this question has brought forth a number of issues related to the social and economic deprivation and disadvantage that women and minorities have been subjected to in the country for so long. But it has also raised an interesting question whether reservation of seats in Parliament would restrict choice of voters to women candidates. To avoid this, it has been suggested by some to provide alternate methods by providing reservation in political parties or dual member constituencies. Such suggestions are regressive and undermine the strength of political representation and recognition based on gender quota. Similarly, the idea of rotation

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of reserved constituencies in every election may reduce the incentives for an existing member of Parliament to work for his/her constituency at a time of his/her re-election from that constituency. The patriarchal opposition to the bill has continued and been expressed through the speeches and verbosities raised by different political parties over the last two decades resulting in not having the bill being passed and made into an act of legislation. Instead of engaging and enacting over laws related to the political representation of women, Dalits, backward classes and other minorities, the question of gendered representation has been pushed aside from the main debates and discussions on the floor of the national and legislative assemblies for far too long.

Political in the parliamentary democracy It is evident that some form of populism has come to find respectability in parliamentary democracy. This could question the democratic limits of the political subjects (citizens) in a given polity. Most of these forms of populism inhere in them multiple ideas of the political and how best to make sense of them through popular struggles and civic engagement along with mass protests and agitations of various kinds. Parliament as a discursive institution of political participation and democratic commitment is aimed at producing and generating meaningful acts through various forms of substantive articulative habits and means of debates and discussions among parliamentarians across party affiliations and trans-generational representatives. The distinction between political and politics can be made along the same lines as that of social and society made by Laclau. Dileep Gaonkar, while analyzing Laclau’s ideas of the social, suggests that just as society can be imagined by reifying the social, so also politics, conceived in terms of parties, campaigns, interest groups and so on can only be imagined by reifying the political. . .the political institutes the social; it can’t be absorbed into the social nor be entrapped by the systemic imperative of economy and technology, nor be held hostage by the normative civil society. Such is the primacy of the political. It is the constitutive force.6 This political, in Laclau, according to Gaonkar, is made up of the heterogeneous and the contingent. He further elucidates how the political is realized through hegemonic discursive articulatory devices and strategies in straightening and fixing its terrain of fuzziness and unfixable large semblance of meanings associated with the social. In other words,

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the journey from the social to the political is complex and combative in nature and also disquiet, chaotic and unpredictable. For Laclau, radical democratic projects can be hegemonic-political. Laclau, in On Populist Reason, while dealing with the global imaginary of democracy considers populism as part of the unfolding of the political with people as political subjects globally situated and embedded, settling new equations between the global social and global political. The debates in both houses of the Indian Parliament in the last six decades reveal an interesting travesty of passions, principles and prejudices over various themes and controversies related to representation and its various modes and modalities. Over the years, passions have soared high and dramatic turn of events have taken place on the floor of the house leading to long disruptions, and adjournments of the sessions. The earlier modes of discursive and dialogical engagements over questions of regional autonomy, secessionism, separatism, federal structure, constitutional provisions dealing with various powers of the center and the states, the economic viability and strength of the states and many other issues of deep democratic concern have shown how prominent leaders and various representatives took the democratic mandate forward through numerous sitting and sessions of Parliament. For example, the resignation speech of C.D. Deshmukh on July 25, 1956 in the Parliament, in protest against Prime Minister Nehru’s June 3 announcement about placing Bombay under the central administration, called it unconstitutional as the cabinet was not consulted nor provided with any written text about this decision. Therefore, he requested a more authentic assurance from the Prime Minister the next day at the All India Congress Committee meeting at Bombay. Several prominent leaders like H.V. Kamat, Ashok Mehta of PSP and N.V. Gadgil of Congress-Bombay too expressed their anxiety over such an announcement. Nehru, however, assured Deshmukh that the announcement was in accordance with the Cabinet approval and decision for the same. Over the decades, uproar over the demand for newer and smaller states has led to intense acrimonious exchange and war of words and languages among leaders of various political groups and parties. With the coalitional governments in power for the last two and half decades, the consensus building over major political decisions has been affected primarily due to the competing varied interests of leaders belonging to different ideological view-points and political parties. A significant degree of democratic delays and deficits have been part of the larger processes of democratization and political negotiation over some of the fundamental policies and programs initiated by the Indian State in the last two and half decades. The cases such as

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of Telangana, Gorkhaland, Bodoland, Harit Pradesh, Koshal Pradesh and others have drawn members of Parliament at loggerheads with one another. This kind of democratic encounter, more often visible when the Parliament is in session, has also shown ugly and unpleasant exchanges of verbal expressions and idioms. The collective decision to delay has proved to be less democratic and more oppositional, resisting the powers of the government in power. In the long run, such a move undermines the primary discursive duties of this institution by not allowing and promoting genuine discussions and debates on the floor of the Parliament for effective and urgent legislations.

‘Democratic limits’ of the political In his analysis of Laclau’s theory of democratic limits, Dileep Gaonkar tells us how Laclau’s analysis is built around three significant conceptual terms of heterogeneity, contingency and discursivity. The conceptual tectonic shifts in the realm of radical social and political democracies around the world are increasingly hinged on these three signifiers of modern democratic limits of our own times. Ivor Chipkin too suggests that the democratic revolution enshrines the idea of political authority in the free and equal will of the people, and thus sets the idea of democratic limit too.7 The Indian Parliament shows the limits of heterogeneous representability of the electors. We can safely ask this question: Does the Indian case fit in with the Laclau’s model of radical pluralist democracy or is it coming closer to Habermasian idea of deliberative democracy? It will not be wrong to assume that the deliberative democracy is primarily discursive depending upon the notion of representation of discourses, ideas, opinions and views of people. All of this suggests that discursive representation rests on some sort of communicative acts of people speaking on behalf of one another. In this case, parliamentarians as representatives of the people of their constituencies have to represent local, regional and national interests in an intertwined way by participating in debates, Question Hours, discussions on the starred questions and zero hours inside the Parliament. The institutional constraints have, over a period of time, affected the representative functioning of the Indian Parliament. Jessica Wallack tells us that the sitting time for the deliberations in Parliament has reduced to one-third from the 1950s and the time on legislative debate has also reduced considerably.8 The parliamentary representation has been unequal on many counts. Devin Joshi tells us about three distinct forms of this inequality. The geographical inequality known as ‘malapportionment’ indicates how

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different regions have unequal parliamentary representation. This can be ascertained through the fact that geographically larger states have more parliamentary seats than the smaller ones. The second kind is an ideological inequality whereby the ratio between the parliamentary or legislatures seats and vote share is unequal. The demographic inequality, he tells us, occurs when Parliament/and or legislatures ‘fail to reflect age, gender, class, religion and ethnic makeup of the population.’9 Thus the inequality in political representation is also reflective of the social hierarchies and inequalities existing in a society at a particular historical juncture. To what extent does the legislative stability both at the center and in the states affect the political stability in the parliamentary system? This is a question that needs careful analysis of the parliamentary representation as a concept and its empirical forms in different and diverse political systems on a broader level. With increasing fragmentation of the representation in the multi-party coalitional governments, the question of parliamentary stability is also one that would determine its sovereign character. The ideological fragmentation gets translated into the ineffective law-making process in the Parliament. The instability and ineffectiveness thus caused would contribute to the decline and erosion of legitimacy of the parliamentary political system. A puzzling question then arises whether a single-party dominance in power would ensure better stability and durability of the governments and the political system as opposed to the fragile, discordant and unstable political coalitions. But it also runs the risk of becoming majoritarian authoritarianism at the cost of dissent and divergent view-points of various parties, groups and associations at large. Ricardo Pelizzo tells us that the level of fragmentation is seventy percent higher in 2004–09 than it was during the 1952–57 period in the Indian Parliament, and this has been coupled with the decline of the largest single party and the rise of the multi-party coalitional governments over the last two and half decades.10 This kind of fragmentation obviously affects the quality of the legislation process and its eventual outcome in the passing of the law under the due parliamentary system of government. To what extent can we say that the representatives should act as social trustees of the people or communities that they represent? Should they be more like elected voices representing territorially diverse and disparate groups, communities and sections of the society with minimum consensus and thus be like delegates? The socially transmitted and inherited conventions of consensus-generating mechanisms usher in the specific political behaviors giving a distinctive idea of the ‘political’ in the society. For Morris-Jones, the Parliament is a link between

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the government as an institution and the political forces expressed in the form of political parties.11 The Parliament, in his view, must work for the people and not for one dominant party alone. He thinks that representation in the Indian Parliament through the territorial constituencies, and size as the basis of elections, should be regulated by ordinary laws of the Parliament. The electoral system should be mainly single-member constituencies with a simple first-past-the-post system for determining the winning candidate.12

Political representation: old and new forms If the Parliament is about the representation of people through their political representatives who are members of different political parties, it is important to bear in mind the fact that the gradual evolution or decline of these political parties and the social movements that they originate from, or social issues that they are part of, become important for their sustenance of the social and political ideology they stand for. For example, the left-ruled states of Kerala, West Bengal and Tripura have varied, over the decades, in their developmental trajectories which have impacted their forms of representation and so on. The political patronage and its culture have come to affect the representational forms of democratic participation and mobilization in the national and state level legislatures. Are there forms of political representation that look similar to semiotic representation? As W.J.T. Mitchell tells us that in both cases, ‘representation is always triangular – of something or someone, by something or someone, to someone.’ He also adds the fourth dimension to it, that is of intender, who says ‘x’ stands for ‘y.’ He further clarifies that ‘the representational sign never seems to occur in isolation from a whole network of other things.’13 This means that representational signs have their own indices of codes and symbols. For Aristotle, too, representations differ from one another in three distinct ways – objects, manners and means. Hence, the relationship between the representatives and the constituents is one based on the idea of the former working for the latter but ideally with the consent of the latter. In a literal sense, representation should mean presenting again, which is only possible if the present and not-present are re-presented again. What is more urgent in our times is to locate the idea of the ‘political’ and its heterogeneous meanings and the conceptual universe that it inhabits. A number of thinkers like Badiou, Ranciere, Agamben, Butler, Wendy Brown, among others, have pointed out the complex radical realms of the politics identified within the domain of the political.

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In their views, more stable categories such as state, government, law, rule, order and power are constantly redefined and rather radically ruptured with a more nuanced understanding of the idea of the ‘political’. In the parliamentarian representation, the world of political is located in multiple sites – both visible and invisible. It is the publicpolitical domain that remains crucial for the modes of representation and its institutionalization through Parliament. The idea of the ‘political’ embedded in the institution of Parliament has to reflect the social plurality and its locations in order to understand the dynamism between politics and political which has far more complex and multiplying effects than the universe of the politics can indicate. Like Wittgensteinian language games inhabiting the dual worlds of differences and similarities, the modes of political representation can be located in both un/familiar domains with certain fundamental conceptual likeliness. It is then possible to go beyond the conflictual understanding of the politics and enter the realms of negotiation, argumentation, deliberation and even contestation on certain issues of common concerns and consensus democratically defined and adhered to. It could be possible through Chantal Mouffe’s ‘agonistic pluralism’ which is not achieved by eradicating social antagonisms, rather by sharpening the existing conflicts with the intervention of the political and the legitimacy accrued thereof to those conflicts. For her, democracy can only survive and thrive by not mitigating but emboldening the political, and by strengthening the plural nature of the political. Over the years, the institutions of national and state legislative assemblies in India have witnessed the increase in the elected members from the marginalized and subordinated sections of the society. This has democratically altered the existing elitism by bringing in representatives belonging to lower classes and castes. Not only has it opened up the possibilities of newer ways and means of reaching the political consensus on a variety of issues but it has also expanded the meaning of the term political in our times. The subalternity of politics has come at a new age when the public discourses and practices of power have acquired a significant calling for the ‘politics as vocation.’ The idea of the ‘political’ can’t be made sense of without understanding some notion of pre-political too. Maybe one of the ways to make sense of it could be by thinking through a kind of consciousness outside the institutional logic of capitalist modernity but having its multiple domains of contestations and protests internally specified and limited within the boundaries of polis, civitas and ethnic among others. The world of peasants’ revolt, tribal conflicts, monarchical wars and imperial conquests has shown the critical relations embarking on the boundaries

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of pre-political and political. In each of them, the habitations of community ties, bondage of various kinds and their representational sites are evident while dealing with their conflict of interests. The specific political content in each of them is located in varied forms – some of which may not find passages into neat normative categories like community, law, justice, equality, freedom and democracy. The transition from the pre-political to political is one imbued with complex historical journey of concepts like power, politics, state and their representational forms. It is the ‘politics of the people,’ as Ranajit Guha claimed in the context of colonial India that remains at the heart of the political representation for the institution like Parliament in independent India. The wall of separation between the politics of the elite and the politics of the masses ideally should begin to crumble, giving way to various domains differently organized and mobilized on grounds of community rights, entitlements and historical injustice. The constitutive relations of power in these domains begin to affect the constitutional validity to an extent that the institution of Parliament becomes the ground for staking these claims. The domains of civil society begin to shift dramatically into the domains of the state and its institutional apparatus. Parliament in this instance becomes a deeply entrenched political site providing dynamic dis/aggregation of conflicts between the dominant and the subordinate groups in the society through their representatives. In other words, the neat categorization of elite and subaltern is threatened and takes on new forms of representational public and its political forms. It is also true that the legal institutional framework of democratic representation becomes much more contested and is constantly being interrogated and frequently probed for its legitimization through the civil society struggles and their impact on the question of individual rights and state power. The movements like India against Corruption (IAC), Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) and Right to Information (RTI) among others have unsettled the binaries between elite and mass or dominant and subordinate in various ways. However, what is significant for our analysis here is newer forms of political representation emerging out of these distinctive modes of protest and struggles. The newer forms of political mobilization and communication have re-invented the grammar of politics with unusual idioms and vocabularies related to the modes of protest. All of this has unsettled binaries of elite and subaltern politics as well as their oppositional strategies in their long march to un/re-making of the new and old political institutions of independent India. The emergence of political then is with new twists and turns on the idea and ideals of representational democracy.

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The discourses of power and politics merge and converge on the contours of the idea of the ‘political’ in ways that fundamentally alter the boundaries of the political and non-political. The affective ties around kinship, caste, community, religion, region, language and even ethnicity begin to express themselves in newer forms of democratic representation. Thus the world of political in this journey is heteroglossic and plural with inter-locking hierarchies and binaries of various kinds. The politics of democracy has to sit beside the politics of difference and the idea of the ‘political’ will enable us to unwrap and unravel the multiple layers of their inter-linkages. In doing so, both the modes and the ideas of political will be expressed and made sense of in a far more heterogeneous way than otherwise understood. Andrew Rehfeld has even suggested that political representation is not necessarily a democratic phenomenon.14 In the Indian context, it is even more appropriate when the coalitional politics has come to stay as a form of government more than simply a reflection of the representational politics. Coalitional strategies and tactics at times even subvert the representational norms in democratic politics and the mere survival of the government becomes its instant objective. The idea of the ‘political’ and its varied forms in the representative democracy has to emanate from social domains where people continue to contest and protest against the existing structures of domination and hegemonies of power. The text of political representation is (re)written in its modes of contestations, giving rise to newer institutional structures and their democratic living. The merits and demerits of forms of political representation can be judged beyond simple participative or mobilizational strategies and outcomes of both represented and representatives.

Notes 1 Ivor Chipkin, ‘Notes Towards a Theory of the Democratic Limit’, Cultural Studies, 26(2–3), 2012, pp. 260–281. 2 Alistair McMillan, ‘Deviant Democratization in India’, Democratization, 15(4), July 2008, pp 733–749. 3 Devin Joshi, ‘Who Gets Unequal Parliamentary Representation? A Comparison of India and Sri Lanka’, Contemporary South Asia, 20(3), September 2012, pp. 401–406. 4 Devesh Kapur and Pratap Mehta, The Indian Parliament as an Institution of Accountability, Paper No. 23, January 2006, United Nations Research Institute for Social Development. p. 8. 5 The Indian Constitution (One Hundred and Eighth Amendment) Bill 2008 seeks to reserve one-third of all seats for women in the Lok Sabha and state legislative assemblies. The allocation of reserved seats shall be determined

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Asha Sarangi by such authority as prescribed by the Parliament. The one-third of the total number of seats reserved for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes shall be reserved for SC/ST women in the Lok Sabha and the legislative assemblies. Furthermore, as per the bill, reserved seats may be allotted by rotation to different constituencies in the states or the union territories. It is also proposed that the reservation of seats for women shall cease to exist fifteen years after the commencement of this Amendment Act. Dilip Gaonkar, ‘The Primacy of the Political and the Trope of the “People” in Ernesto Laclau’s on Populist Reason’, Cultural Studies, 26(2–3), 2012, pp. 185–206. Ivor Chipkin, ‘Notes Towards a Theory of the Democratic Limit’, Cultural Studies, 26, 2012, pp. 2–3. Jessica S. Wallack, ‘India’s Parliament as a Representative Institution’, India Review, 7(2), May 2008, pp. 91–114. Devin Joshi, ‘Who Gets Unequal Representation? A Comparison of India and Sri Lanka’, Contemporary South Asia, 20, 2012, pp. 401–406. Ricardo Pelizzo, ‘Fragmentation and Performance: The Indian Case’, Commonwealth and Comparative Politics, 48(3), 2010, pp. 261–280. W.H. Morris-Jones, ‘Parliament and the Dominant Party: Indian Experience’, Parliamentary Affairs, XVII(3), 1964, pp. 296–307. Ibid. W.J.T. Mitchel, ‘Representation’, in Frank Lentricchica and Thomas Mclaughlin (eds.), Critical Terms for Literary Study, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990. Andrew Rehfeld, ‘Towards a General Theory of Political Representation’, Journal of Politics, 68(1), February 2006, pp. 1–21.

5

Parliament as a representative institution An assessment Ajay K. Mehra

We must make our political democracy a social democracy as well. Political democracy cannot last unless there lies at the base of it social democracy. What does social democracy mean? It means a way of life which recognises liberty, equality and fraternity as the principle of life. [. . .] On the 26th of January 1950, we are going to enter into a life of contradictions. In politics we will have equality and in social and economic life we will have inequality. [. . .] We must remove this contradiction at the earliest moment, or else those who suffer from inequality will blow up the structure of political democracy which this Assembly has so laboriously built up. B. R. Ambedkar on 25 November 1949, Constituent Assembly Debates, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat, 1989, vol. IX, p. 979. Institutions are a mirror of national character. Today we see widespread cynicism and disillusionment with the governance and functioning of institutions in our country. Our legislatures look more like combat arenas, rather than fora that legislate. . . . We need a Parliament that debates, discusses and decides. Pranab Mukherjee, President of India, Address to the nation, 14 August 2013. Every single rule in the rule book, every single etiquette is being violated. . . . If the Honourable members wish the House to become a federation of anarchists, then it is a different matter. Hamid Ansari, Vice President of India and Chairman the Rajya Sabha, 13 August 2013.

Even as data on political representation in India shows a ‘silent revolution’1 towards plebeianization2 of the country’s representative institutions, the process of widening of the social base of representation,3 still on, has thrown up several trends that have been looked at in a variety of ways – from dysfunctionality and distortions of the institutional

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processes, even of the edifice, to larger institutional anomalies. A major question that inevitably gets discussed is whether the evolution of representative parliamentary institutions in India since independence has declined in its democratic and constitutional roles, as also in democratic practices and values even as ritualized practices are sustained. The three epigraphs above juxtapose a caution a day before the draft Constitution was affixed with the signatures of the Constituent Assembly members with the circumspection of the two top constitutional functionaries on the eve of the 66th Independence Day. The first is part of the speech by Dr. B.R. Ambedkar on 25 November 1949, which is a still-relevant, oft-quoted reflection. Despite India’s claims of success in reducing poverty, and the continuous rise in the middle class since 1991, the liberalization of the Indian economy, and the social and political democracy equilibrium, is still skewed. Indeed, the rise of the Plebeian thesis negates the possibility that ‘those who suffer from inequality’ ‘will blow up the structure of political democracy’; instead they have used the electoral process and parliamentary democracy to climb up the political ladder to the extent possible. However, there is no denying the fact that India’s representative institutions and democracy have developed tendencies in recent times that have evoked concerns from different quarters. The anomalies lately pointed out in the Indian parliamentary democracy, reflected in the reactions from the President4 and the Vice President of India, raise the question if Dr. Ambedkar’s prescription of the parliamentary system for India because ‘[t]he daily assessment of responsibility which is not available under the American system is, it is felt, far more effective than the periodic assessment and far more necessary in a country like India’ and assertion that ‘(t)he Draft Constitution, in recommending the parliamentary system of executive has preferred more responsibility to more stability’5 has come out true or not. Hence the parliamentary disruptions in India deserve a nuanced assessment.

Parliament as a political arena: significance for representation On 21 March 2013, Rajya Sabha witnessed bedlam over the issue of the Sri Lankan Tamils. A heated exchange between Congress member Renuka Choudhary, chair of the House, and some DMK members followed by some AIADMK members first storming the well of the house loudly shouting slogans, wrenching two mikes on the table of the Chair and throwing some papers and stationery up in the air, was the first violent incident in any House of Parliament, though such

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incidents have happened in several state Legislative Assemblies during the past few decades.6 Indeed, both the Houses have witnessed the proceedings being stalled by the opposition parties for days together, angry exchanges between parties and their leaders and members trooping into the well. Aside from the issues relating to parliamentary culture, the incident raises several issues of representation. First, what is the commitment of the MPs towards the institution they have been sent to by their electors? Indeed, parliamentary politics is part of larger party politics and partisanship, but it is equally linked to parliamentary decorum, democratic dissent and bipartisanship, which emphasize debates and disagreements in the process of its three primary roles – representation, legislation and accountability-responsibility.7 Second, the MPs from Tamil Nadu, belonging to the two ethnic Tamil parties in the state that have dominated the state politics since 1967, raised issues regarding the plight of the Sri Lankan Tamils, more particularly about human rights violations by the Sri Lankan Army during the military operation against the LTTE. They expressed concerns regarding the protection of political rights of the Tamils against Sinhala chauvinism. It led to the ugly incident with total disregard for the impact of their politics for the people they were agitating for and an inappropriate parliamentary precedent they were setting.8 Third, though it is perfectly legitimate for the Indian political parties and their MPs to raise foreign policy issues in Parliament and criticize and pressurize the government where they think the national interest is being compromised, but to lower the dignity of the House they have been elected to in order to influence their constituency on a question that affects the Indian position in the region adversely, deserves a debate. Equally, it is about the role of the Rajya Sabha, earlier described as the Upper House,9 which has been the arena of the politics of an imbalanced parliamentary majority, wherein both the houses have majority of different parties.10 Hence, since the sixteenth general election (May 2014), the Rajya Sabha, where the BJP does not have a majority, has witnessed repeated disruptions on a variety of issues, reflecting the impact of parliamentary disequilibrium in a bicameral situation where the Upper House (Rajya Sabha in the Indian context) does not have a majority of the ruling party. This brings in both legislative and executive distortions and dysfunctionality.11 Analysts observed that the stalling of the proceedings of the house was less about the issues that were pressed from the perspective of secularism-communalism discourse or some remarks from either side; they were more about checkmating the new PM Narendra Modi before his persona became a legend.12

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Following the sixteenth general election there has apparently been a role reversal, but initial optimism of a better performance, possibly because the Congress and other parties in the opposition role were still working out their strategies, gradually gave way to a predictable distress of parliamentary pandemonium. The data for the winter session in 2015 showed that Lok Sabha passed 98 percent of its Bills, while Rajya Sabha’s productivity was 50 percent.13 Clearly, the opposition focused and strategized on the Rajya Sabha to stall and embarrass the government. A. Surya Prakash first raised this issue.14 According to PRS Legislative Research, only 61 percent of available time was used for parliamentary work in the Lok Sabha and 66 percent in the Rajya Sabha in 2012; obviously one-third of the time was lost in protests and pandemonium. The Monsoon Session (2012) was disrupted over the alleged irregularities in the allocation of coal blocks. Around 77 per cent of the time was used by the people’s representatives in protests and slogan shouting and both Houses only sat for 51 hours (of the allocated 220 hours). The Winter Session the same year was stalled over the government’s decision to allow 51 per cent FDI in the retail sector and the introduction of quotas for SCs and STs for reservation in promotions. On 25 April, during the budget session in 2013, a combined opposition moved in to demand the ouster of JPC chairman P.C. Chacko on the issue of 2G spectrum allocation. In retaliation, the government (Congress in particular) wanted to debar BJP’s Ravi Shankar Prasad, Yashwant Sinha and Jaswant Singh from voting on a conflict of interest charge as they were either the Minister for Telecom, or were part of the Group of Ministers.15 Succinctly put, more than half-way through the Fifteenth Lok Sabha, productive time was at 70 per cent, significantly lower than previous Lok Sabhas.16 Assessments of parliamentary performance in the Social Watch India in 2006, 2007 and 2013 as well as during the Thirteenth and the Fourteenth Lok Sabhas reinforced the conclusion that parliamentary culture in India changed significantly during the 1990s. This had an impact on the functioning of the Parliament in the new millennium as well. The Congress during 1998–2004 as well as since 2014 (when it was reduced to an abysmal 44 seats for the first time since 1952) and the BJP during 2004–14, have followed the methods that Dr. Ambedkar described as ‘the grammar of anarchy’, as the parties suffered from paying back in the same coin syndrome.17 However, a simplistic and mechanical yardstick of time loss and number of bills enacted/deferred leaves out subtleties of political strategies, hence caution is needed in analyzing the methods of protests within

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the two houses of Parliament. Hence, there is a need for a nuanced research and analysis to discover a method in this madness. Though difficult, a qualitative analysis of the nature of the issues raised, questioned asked and an effective manner in which the government was put on the mat irrespective of the numerical strength of the opposition would be a better yardstick for analysis. The use and display of ‘street politics’ within the precincts of the Parliament by political parties and leaders is carefully choreographed and carries their own political logic of an easy way to national limelight and reaching their constituencies through the electronic media in exercising opposition-by-stalling strategy; that it is ‘the grammar of anarchy’ is immaterial. A fractured party system since the ninth general election in 1989 weakened the Congress without a similar political pivot. Emerging coalition politics gave the state parties a national presence, and they have used the floor of Parliament as their political stage to send political message to their home constituency.18 A content analysis of some recent reports on Parliament in the print media indicates two things clearly. First, the adjournments are increasingly being seen by parties and their state units as a potent parliamentary instrument against the government. Sushma Swaraj (Minister for Information and Broadcasting in the NDA government 1998–2004 and Minister for External Affairs in Narendra Modi government since May 2014) admitted in 2011 that various state units pressured BJP parliamentary party to adjourn Parliament. The parliamentary party’s plea that they can force adjournments for a day or two, not for days together, did not convince them. Commenting on the stalling of Parliament by the BJP, Shekhar Gupta observed that due to this the UPA was sliding into paralysis. He even questioned if the opposition would want that to happen to the NDA. Interestingly, disruptions did not need a definite issue.19 The dilemma of the political leadership was expressed by Sushma Swaraj that if they forced adjournments they were seen to be disrupting, if they did not, they were seen to be colluding with the government.20 Indeed, whichever party, or coalition, was in power, the onus of disruption would always be on both the sides.21 During the Anna Hazare movement against corruption, Parliament was witnessing din on a daily basis, the government was reaching out to the opposition for cooperation in functioning of Parliament and important Bills such as Lok Pal, land acquisition, food security, higher education, mining and nuclear energy were in the House for consideration, Sushma Swaraj was quoted as saying that they (BJP) would decide on the functioning of Parliament, ‘Each morning the (BJP) core parliamentary committee meets and takes a decision whether to allow

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Parliament to function that day.’ She was accompanied with another senior leader Arun Jaitley (as the Finance Minister in the Narendra Modi government since May 2014, he expresses frustration at disruptions caused by the opposition), who nodded in consent.22 Parliamentary disruptions and political discourse on the phenomenon in India thus resonate with déjà vu. These are only a select content analyses of a crucial period in the contemporary Indian politics, an exercise spread over a larger period would reveal more about the prevailing and growing parliamentary culture in India that sees political advantage to make the institution dysfunctional by the representatives of the people who have been elected to the august House to make it function for the welfare of the people. When 17 per cent of the Bills are cleared by the Lok Sabha in less than five minutes,23 obviously without a debate, and a large number of the pending Bills in the Lok Sabha lapse,24 the parliamentary culture of stalling government’s legislative initiatives leads increasingly to a decline in informed debates on issues of national importance and the opposition repeatedly fails in its duty to criticize – the reference is to informed criticism – the government. This culture grew from the beginning of the 1990s, when the decline of the Congress appeared conclusive without the emergence of a single party as the alternative, fracturing of the party system with a distinct rise of smaller parties from states that came to the national stage with their own agenda which was rooted in their own constituency. A significant change also took place in the nature of representation.25 However, in most cases the apex leadership that takes strategic decisions on their parliamentary behaviour is not plebienized as yet. Since both the Congress and the BJP, the two largest national parties, have been in the government and opposition in the past decade and a half, and several state-based parties too have shared power as part of the alliance system, the culture of disruption could be described as pervasive in practicing what Vice President and Chairman of the Rajya Sabha Hamid Ansari described in frustration as ‘competitive hooliganism’.26 The reactions of the parties to disruptions reflect partisanship and hypocrisy. Pandemonium in the Fifteenth Lok Sabha was, for example, endemic. In August 2013, a signed article in The Hindu urged the Speaker of the Lok Sabha to suspend the agitating MPs to deter the culture of disruption and pandemonium. Rules 349, 350, 351, 352, 354, 357, 371, 373, 374, 374A and 375 in Chapter XXVII of the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the Lok Sabha have set out in detail how members are to conduct themselves and the powers of the Speaker to suspend members.27 Congress leader Digvijay Singh also

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expressed concern at the growing disruption and urged the Speaker to suspend the MPs who obstructed the Parliament.28 However, when Speaker of the Sixteenth Lok Sabha Sumitra Mahajan (belonging to the BJP) suspended 25 Congress MPs for five days, Sonia Gandhi described it a ‘black day’.29 The practitioners of the contemporary parliamentary culture justifying disruptions, din within the institution, walkouts, declining debates and legislative outputs should remember Ivor Jennings’ characterization of the role of Parliament, which is to criticize, but it is still constructive.30 Viewing the phenomenon from the perspective of representation, the following conclusions emerge. First, the way the representatives of the Indian people perceive their role in Parliament has changed. Whether this new culture reinforces or inhibits the principle of representation remains a question. Second, whether this has a popular endorsement, or if questions regarding their parliamentary performance is raised or not, if not amongst the general public, at least in the informed circle of voters. The transformation of the parliamentary culture in India since its inception is remarkably stark. W.H. Morris-Jones, first to study the Indian Parliament in 1957, said in a later study: Parliament is a talking place. . . . The talk in a parliament is between those who are in power and those who might be in power. . . . Parliaments were not invented because there was a need or demand for laws. There were laws before there were Parliaments. . . . Parliaments introduce a new element, the element of representation, quite distinct from appointment by nomination from above.31 He emphasizes the principle of representation and participation in the legislative process, where Parliament is the institutional platform. But is the parliamentary culture discussed in the foregoing paragraphs damaging to or violative of the principle of representation? Lord Bryce had observed: Every traveler who, curious in political affairs, enquires in the countries which he visits how their legislative bodies are working, receives from the elder men the same discouraging answer. They tell him, in terms much the same everywhere, that there is less brilliant speaking than in the days of their own youth, that the tone of manners has declined, that the best citizens are less disposed to enter the chamber, that its proceedings are less fully reported and excite less interest, that a seat in it confers less social

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Ajay K. Mehra status, and that, for one reason or another, the respect felt for it has waned.32

However, since political institutions are ‘the work of men’ which ‘owe their origin and their whole existence to human will’, they also have to be, according to John Stuart Mill, ‘worked, by men’: Let us remember, then, in the first place, that political institutions (however the proposition may be at times ignored) are the work of men; owe their origin and their whole existence to human will. Men did not wake on a summer morning and find them sprung up. Neither do they resemble trees, which, once planted, ‘are aye growing’ while men ‘are sleeping.’ In every stage of their existence they are made what they are by human voluntary agency. Like all things, therefore, which are made by men, they may be either well or ill made; judgment and skill may have been exercised in their production, or the reverse of these. And again, if a people have omitted, or from outward pressure have not had it in their power, to give themselves a constitution by the tentative process of applying a corrective to each evil as it arose, or as the sufferers gained strength to resist it, this retardation of political progress is no doubt a great disadvantage to them, but it does not prove that what has been found good for others would not have been good also for them, and will not be so still when they think fit to adopt it. On the other hand, it is also to be borne in mind that political machinery does not act of itself. As it is first made, so it has to be worked, by men, and even by ordinary men. . . . They must be capable of fulfilling the conditions of action, and the conditions of self-restraint, which are necessary either for keeping the established polity in existence, or for enabling it to achieve the ends, its conduciveness to which forms its recommendation.33 Mill makes the following significant point regarding any institution: they are created, shaped, nurtured, worked by ‘ordinary men’ and they must fulfill conditions of action and of self-restraint. Obviously, these are as true of any Parliament as of the Indian Parliament, meaning the conditions of representativeness are not fulfilled merely by being elected and going through the motions of sessions that are unproductive for the people whom the body represents, it has to be nurtured into a body that is effective in representation, fulfilling the objectives of representation and useful and productive

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for the people it represents. Hence, in case of Indian Parliament, while there is a prominent decline thesis, Balveer Arora has argued that ‘despite outward appearances and commonly held beliefs, the signs of disorder that India’s parliamentary system frequently displays are in fact the consequences of its progressive democratisation’. He attributes the decline in quantity and quality of work accomplished by the institution to the increasing competitiveness in the Indian polity leading to contentious issues being aired and contested on the floor of Parliament and changing composition of the representative body (‘Oppression, subjugation and humiliation of dalits, minorities and women seeking their rightful place under the sun’).34 Clearly, an evaluation of Parliament in an evolving democracy like India should be undertaken keeping in view the contemporary stirrings in society and their impact on processes and institutions, as well as how the developments manifest in the arena of representation.

Historically speaking An assessment of and perceptions about the Indian Parliament at the beginning of its journey would put the current situation historically. In his memoir, former British Prime Minister Sir Anthony Eden wrote: Of all the experiments in government, which have been attempted since the beginning of time, I believe that the Indian venture into parliamentary government is the most exciting. A vast subcontinent is attempting to apply to it tens and hundreds of millions a system of free democracy which has been slowly evolved over the centuries in this small island. It is a brave thing to try to do and is so far remarkably successful. The Indian venture is not a pale imitation of our practice at home, but a magnified and multiplied reproduction on a scale we have never dreamt of. If it succeeds, its influence on Asia is incalculably for good. Whatever the outcome, we must honour those who attempt it.35 W.H. Morris-Jones studying the first Indian Parliament was struck by its positivity, indicating that the venture began with tremendous goodwill:36 On the whole, however, life on the floor of the House is rather earnest. There is a perceptible difference of atmosphere between the House and the Council. The Upper House is smaller in numbers

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Ajay K. Mehra and less pressed for time. . . . The result is a less tense and more friendly tone of debate – to which the urbane and good humoured personality of the Chairman contributes greatly. . . . This is not to say that the House of the People is ill-tempered or unfriendly. It is simply that it is busy and has serious work to do, and that it is main arena of struggle. Seriousness, however, does not make for dullness. In fact, the House is dull neither to look at nor to listen to.37

Yet, scholars have advised against a very formal approach to studying Indian Parliament, which operates in a unique political environment. Palmer and Tinker point out the inexperience of the institution and its members, many of whom were poorly educated. Muchaki Kosa, an illiterate Scheduled Tribe MP from Bastar in Madhya Pradesh, who could speak only in local Mari dialect, defeated the local Congress stalwart. He reached New Delhi, helped by the Maharaja of Bastar, but his trials and tribulations in travel, the city and the Parliament, where he was completely lost and was found sobbing in the corridor once, reflected the tough journey ahead for the Indian democracy!38 These are indicative of teething trouble in putting representation of this diverse, unequal and uneven country in place. Hardgrave and Kochanek have pointed out that the Nehru era Parliament was often criticized as the Prime Minister’s durbar.39 This is an interesting observation. Nehru’s parliamentary era of 12 years (1952–64) spanned first, second and two years of the Third Lok Sabha, when he lost his sheen due to the Chinese debacle and had poor health before his demise. Since Morris-Jones’s account of the First Lok Sabha does not make such a mention, the reference apparently is to the Second Lok Sabha. The Fourth Lok Sabha witnessed a diverse Parliament in representation and functions, the Fifth Lok Sabha, more particularly since the imposition of emergency, was reduced to a rubber stamp. Since the 1980s, both Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi are reported to have attempted to dominate the Parliament with their majority and treated it with indifference both in their responses and presence. The behaviour of MPs too is analyzed to have ‘declined’ by any standards.40 The analyses since independence thus clearly indicate both ‘consolidation’ of India’s apex representative institution as well as a ‘decline’ in, what could be called, its ‘representative functions’. Obviously, we would have to factor in dynamics of and disorders in Indian democracy to fully comprehend this.

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Dynamics, disorder, distortions and issues in representation Arun Shourie has questioned the parliamentary system in India on representational and procedural grounds: ‘[t]he key problem today is that the parliamentary system, and the electoral system from which it springs are fragmenting the electorate’ and ‘are not yielding persons who have the competence, integrity and dedication to govern a billion people’. Thus, for him, the Indian ‘legislatures are the root of the problems we face in governance today.’ Though the legislatures are accountable to the electorate and have a role to hold the government responsible to it, ‘(w)e should seek to secure accountability through institutions other than legislatures’.41 Shourie refers to Ambedkar’s disillusionment with the system and he dissociated himself with the framing of the Constitutions. He told the Rajya Sabha on 2 September 1953, ‘People always keep on saying “O, you are the maker of the Constitution.” My answer is I was a hack. What I was asked to do, I did much against my will’. He further said, ‘Sir my friends tell me that I have made the Constitution. But I am quite prepared to say that I shall be the first person to burn it out. I do not want it. It does not suit anybody’.42 The Constitution and Parliament have survived nevertheless. Also, despite concerns at distortions in the procedural and substantive output aspects of the Parliament, they have brought in great degree of political dynamism into the society and politics in India. Since election analyses point out the increasing participation of the disadvantaged classes in the country’s electoral processes at various levels43 as well as the greater representativeness amongst the legislators44 then, despite weaknesses in the first-past-the-post system and a plea for the PR system,45 representation is undergoing persistent changes that deserves a closer look. Gender Representation: The issue of gender representation occupied centre stage of political discourse in the country since the SeventyThird and Seventy-Fourth Amendments to the Constitution ensured one-third representation to women in the Panchayati Raj Institutions and the urban local bodies. The demand for a similar representation in the Parliament and the State Legislatures has since been vociferous amongst women politicians across the political divide. Civil society institutions, think tanks and women’s bodies have articulated this demand in a more scientific manner, critically examining the proposals put forward by the government. The demand for a 33 percent representation in elected bodies is also based on research conducted in the

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United States in the 1970s on women’s participation in business, which showed that 30 per cent representation by minorities could significantly influence the majority verdict. Drude Dehlerup of the University of Stockholm extended these findings to women’s reservation in politics. She observed that while quotas are necessary to jump-start the process of equality, the demand for quotas is a manifestation of growing impatience with unequal political and social citizenship.46 The argument is well-taken and holds relevance for India too, except that the politics of and discourse on reservations in India is a little more complex. Table 5.1 does not present an encouraging picture of gender representation in the Indian Parliament. The number of women MPs in the Lok Sabha has gone up from 22 (4.41 percent) in the First Lok Sabha in 1952 to 65 (12 percent) in the Sixteenth Lok Sabha, the highest so far, doubling in both numbers and percentages during six decades of Table 5.1 Representation of women in Indian Parliament47 Year

1952 1957 1962 1967 1971 1977 1980 1984 1989 1991 1996 1998 1999 2004 2009 2014 Average

Lok Sabha Seats

No. of women MPs

499 500 503 523 521 544 544 544 517 544 543 543 543 543 543 545 531.2

22 27 34 31 22 19 28 44 27 39 39 43 49 44 58 65 36.93

Rajya Sabha percent

Seats

No. of women MPs

percent

4.41 5.40

219 237 238 240 243 244 244 244 245 245 223 245 245 244 244 242 240

16 18 18 20 17 25 24 28 24 38 19 15 19 28 27 31 22.9

07.31 07.59 07.56 08.33 07.00 10.25 09.84 11.48 09.80 15.51 08.52 06.12 07.76 11.47 11.00 12.80 09.52

6.76

5.93 4.22 3.49 5.15 8.09 5.22 7.17 7.18 7.92 9.02 8.10 11.00 11.97 6.94

Source: Compiled from: http://ushome.rediff.com/news/2004/may/26women.htm and www.ipu.org/wmn-e/classif.htm (Accessed on 15 January 2016)

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India’s representative democracy. However, their number and percentage in the Rajya Sabha does not indicate a trend indicating a conscious effort to alter the gender gap in political representation. It is a matter of coincidence that in 2014, for which we have the data, representation of women in both the houses is almost at par, though in the Rajya Sabha it has been more inconsistent, the best being in 1991 at 15.51 percent. Elections are not only about representation from people’s point of view, from the perspective of political parties; they are also about maximizing their presence in legislatures. In a parliamentary system, it is particularly important to form the government. In short, grabbing and/or maximizing political power is the ultimate aim of any political game. Therefore, fielding candidates is about political strategies. Table 5.2 suggests a poor success rate of women candidates in the thirteenth, fourteenth, fifteenth and sixteenth general elections. However, these figures do not take into account several related issues such as whom were these candidates pitted against, whether they were fielded as losing candidates in strong constituencies of others, in how many constituencies the women contested against women and in how many they contested against men and looking at the large number of candidates contesting elections, what has been the success rate of the male candidates? Another related issue which tends to weaken the case for gender representation, but considered wise as an electoral strategy, is to field a woman kin of a deceased leader. It is not surprising therefore that within a couple of years of granting of 33 percent reservation to women under the Seventy-Third and Seventy-Fourth amendments in local government on a rotation basis, the demand for such a reservation in Parliament as well as in the State legislatures has been conceded as a matter of principle. However, that Table 5.2 Success rate of women contestants Lok Sabha

Women contestants

Elected women MPs

Success rate %

Thirteenth Lok Sabha Fourteenth Lok Sabha Fifteenth Lok Sabha Sixteenth Lok Sabha

247

49

19.83

177

44

24.85

556

58

10.43

640

62

9.8

Source: Annual Report, Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs, GOI

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was obviously not enough for this principle to find a place in the Constitution of India. Unfortunately, attempts to establish reservation for women in the Indian Parliament have evoked stiff resistance – even insecurities – among the MPs unwilling to share power. The argument for gender-based reservation has been successfully stopped with the argument for quota within quota on caste basis every time it has been tabled. SP and RJD are among the prominent protagonists for such an arrangement.48 Ironically, these parties are in power in states that are among the worst in gender indicators – maternal mortality, women’s literacy, etc. Neither is their stance consistent – while demanding a caste quota within the women’s reservation efforts, they show very little interest in women’s reservation within the already existing SC/ST reservation quotas. The Eighty-First Constitutional Amendment Bill tabled in the Lok Sabha in 1996 for the purpose by the UF government was not passed. The Eighty-Fifth Constitutional Amendment Bill, introduced in the Lok Sabha in December 1999 for the same purpose also fell through. Committed to ‘fully empower women politically, educationally, economically and legally’ the UPA-I government that came to power after the fourteenth general election promised in its common minimum programme that ‘it will take the lead to introduce legislation for one-third reservations for women in the Vidhan Sabhas and the Lok Sabha’. However, this legislation was not attempted during the Fourteenth Lok Sabha (2004–09). It was passed by the Rajya Sabha in March 2010 as the One Hundred and Eighth Constitution Amendment Bill, but the UPA II and the Fifteenth Lok Sabha allowed it to lapse. The Bill included the following key provisions: • • • •

One-third of all seats in Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabhas shall be reserved for women. Such reservation shall also apply in case of seats reserved for the Scheduled Castes (SCs) and the Scheduled Tribes (STs). There shall be rotation of seats so reserved for women. Such rotation shall be determined by draw of lots, in such a manner that a seat shall be reserved only once in a block of three general elections.

Obviously, the uncertainty introduced by reserving 181 seats of the Lok Sabha for women has led to a stiff resistance from the maledominated political parties against such an amendment. It arises from the fact that not only would they lose such an overwhelming number of seats compulsorily to women, but also from the fact that the rotation

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clause would bar them from contesting from a constituency for more than two consecutive terms. Many experts have also been concerned about emergence of a situation similar to Panch Pati (husband of the Panch or the head of a village panchayat) at the State and national levels as well, i.e., since the male members of a political family in villages could no longer contest due to rotation based on gender reservation, wives contested and got elected, but the husband remained the de facto rulers, while the wives as the de jure Panch were reduced to proxies. A repeat was apprehended in the Parliament too. The proposal for restrictions to curb such situations violated fundamental rights as well as the basic principles of democratic representation. Further, an all-women contest as well as a rotation of constituency might not be advantageous to women in the long run. The proposal also restricted the reservation of seats in the Lok Sabha and the state Legislative Assemblies, leaving out the Rajya Sabha and the Legislative Councils. It continues to remain one of the major issues relating to representation in the Indian Parliament. Corrupt Practices: Certain procedural aspects relating to the party and electoral systems lead to unholy nexus that eventually distort the process of representation, abetting criminalization of politics. Rajeev Gowda and Sridharan point out how party financing and the electoral expenditure law lead to distortions from the word go as parties and leaders end up violating the laws.49 An analysis of the impact of a nexus between the real estate lobby and politicians on election finance reveals that Politicians park their black money earned while in office with builders, who help them to launder black money: while politicians channel money to the sector and provide discretionary access to land, builders in turn help to launder these funds safely in a rapidly appreciating asset. More importantly . . ., at the time of elections real estate developers route part of these funds back to the politicians to help finance their election campaigns.50 Increasing number of business persons contesting elections, which as citizens of the country they have every the right to do, bring distortions due to lack of transparency in their business interests and their efforts to bankrolling the entire political movements.51 Wealthy individuals are now contesting elections directly and find support from political parties too. For instance, the mining magnate three Reddy brothers of Karnataka were rewarded for using their vast mining wealth to bankroll the BJP’s rise to power in cabinet births for two

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and directorship of a powerful state corporation for the third.52 These obviously involve quid pro quo between the politicians and financers. That conflict of interest between the role as representatives and the business interests does impact the functioning of the legislatures at all the levels is obvious. Election to the Rajya Sabha, which is elected with a state as a constituency to elect members on the number of seats constitutionally allotted to each state with the elected MLAs constituting the Electoral College, has been controversial for over a decade. The election of industrialist Vijay Mallya to the Rajya Sabha in 2002 (with the support of the Congress and the JDS) and 2010 (with the support of the BJP) is reflective of a larger rot in India’s parliamentary democracy. Mallaya has been under controversy over his low-cost Kingfisher Airlines closing down due to losses. He defaulted in paying back the loans to public sector banks and escaped to London before a legal action could be initiated in March 2016.53 Earlier in 2012, the poll for the two Rajya Sabha seats in Jharkhand was countermanded by the ECI because of horse trading.54 Criminalization of Politics: There are three dimensions of the phenomenon of criminalization of politics that relate to representation. First, with the increasing compulsions of retaining political power at any cost, as well as due to the increase in corrupt practices for self-perpetuation and self-aggrandizement amongst the political class, political transgressions into criminality have become visible and brazen. Second, since the line between criminality and political goals blurred as a consequence, the use of criminals not only to win elections with strong-arm methods but also to serve other larger political goals became prevalent. Third, not only some politicians became tainted with criminality, high-profile dons with political connections succeeded in getting acceptance for their political stakes and entered the Parliament and the state legislatures. No wonder the debate on criminalization of politics in India over the past two decades has shifted from the use of criminals in politics to the entry of criminals into politics.55 It is a paradigm shift both in representative politics (including in the operation of representative institutions of governance) in India and in the theory and practice of representation. For, the use of criminals for instigating violence, terrorizing the voters to alter their voting options and ‘capturing polling booths’ were aberrations introduced by desperate as well as unethical politicians, subsequent assertion and later successful entry of the criminals in the electoral and political arena is a cancerous growth in the Indian body politic, which is threatening the rule of law and the very basis of Indian democracy.

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The parties and leaders have actively pursued a winnability formula in giving powerful dons election tickets, soft-pedaling the issue with the arguments that ‘my criminal is cleaner than yours’ and that no one should be dubbed a criminal till convicted by a court of law. Analyses indicate that candidates with criminal record have had brighter chances of winning elections at any level. An analysis, for example, shows that whereas only 12 percent candidates with a clean record could win, 23 percent candidates with criminal records won.56 Lok Sabha in its special session to commemorate the Golden Jubilee of Indian independence on 31 August 1997 resolved: ‘That more especially, all political parties shall undertake all such steps as will attain the objectives of ridding our polity of criminalisation of politics.’57 This issue has also been raised by the ECI since 1998. Disqualification for criminal offences and corrupt practices is provided for in Sections 8 and 8A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, which disqualifies a person from contesting election only on conviction by the Court of Law, that is a time consuming and difficult process.58 In 2003, following a Supreme Court order, respecting the rights of the voters under the RTI, an affidavit by each candidate declaring criminal cases against her/him was made compulsory. This has made it possible to put together the data on criminal cases against the contesting candidates. The data on criminal cases pending against the MPs (party wise) of the past three Lok Sabhas, put together on the basis of mandatory affidavit submitted by each candidate, is indicative and clearly shows a rising trend in most parties (Table 5.3). When this trend began to bare, the parties were in denial. Now they question the methodology that brands a politician ‘criminal’, but are apparently unwilling to mend their political strategy that brings in representatives who are on the other side of the law, or clearly the parties attach no stigma to their leaders and members crossing the line drawn by the law. Further, several parties also court local strong men who could fetch votes and secure a seat. Importantly, in planning protests and agitations, parties are not averse to violence, which ends up in cases being registered under the IPC provisions that bring in criminal charges against the leaders. In fact, this data hides more than it exposes. It shows that the main national parties like the Congress and the BJP and other parties – variously described in political science literature as ‘regional’, ‘multistate’, ‘state’ parties – such as SP, RJD, DMK and Shiv Sena MPs have different kinds of criminal cases against them. First, the trend over three general elections is either of increase, both modest and sharp, or of a steady continuity. Second, all categories of political

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Table 5.3 MPs with criminal cases by major parties in 2004, 2009 and 2014 Major parties

Indian National Congress Bharatiya Janata Party Communist Party of India (Marxist) Bahujan Samaj Party Communist Party of India (CPI) Samajwadi Party All India Trinamool Congress Rashtriya Janata Dal Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam AIADMK Shiv Sena Biju Janata Dal Telugu Desam Party Telangana Rashtra Samiti Others All Parties

2004

2009

2014

#/Σ (%)

#/Σ (%)

#/Σ (%)

25/145 (26.13)

44/206 (21.0)

8/44 (18.0)

28/110 (29.3)

44/116 (38.0)

98/281 (35.0)

7/42 (16.6)

3/16 (19.0)

5/9 (56.0)

7/18 (39.0)

6/21 (29.0)

–

2/10 (20.0)

–

–

11/36 (30.5) –

9/23 (39.0) –

– 6/37 (21.0)

10/23 (43.5)

3/4 (75.0)

4/4 (100.0)

5/15 (33.3)

4/18 (22.0)

–

– 7/12 (41.7) 1/11 (9.1) –

– 9/11 (82.0) 4/14 (29.0) –

6/37 (16.0) 15/18 (83.0) 3/20 (15.0) 6/16 (38.0)

–

–

5/11 (46.0)

22/88 (25.0) 123/538 (23.3)

36/128 (28.0) 162/543 (29.8)

29/66 (44.0) 185/543 (34.0)

Source: Compiled from: www.adrindia.org/ (accessed in January 2016 for the compilation) Notes 1. Figures in parenthesis are percentages. 2. #: Number of MPs with criminal cases based on affidavit; Σ: Total Number of Seats held in Lok Sabha.

parties – rooted-in-independence movement Congress, Hindutva oriented BJP, the Left, the Lohiaites as well as the sundry others – have made it as part of their political culture to have such members and ‘leaders’ that could be fielded for election as people’s representatives. At 34 percent, there is a 4.2 percent increase from the Fifteenth Lok Sabha, but significantly, CPM, RJD and Shiv Sena show significant

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rise and high percentage. For a highly doctrinaire party such as the CPM it may seem surprising, the Shiv Sena’s strategy has always been sectarian, militant to the extremity and contemptuous of the law, and the RJD has been controversial on corruption and criminality during its prolonged rule in Bihar. How serious are these charges? One in 30 MPs face murder charges. One in 51 MPs face kidnapping charges. A similar trend is for charges on robbery/dacoity. Also, the bigger the criminal charges, the richer the MPs are. Such leaders also have greater chances of winning an election. Obviously, the charges are not trivial and indicate a trend in political degeneration.59 However, there has also been a complaint that some new leaders belonging to the SC and the ST communities have been slapped with criminal complaints by their upper caste rivals to harass them that shows up against their names. But this has not been empirically established yet. It is, however, significant to research this phenomenon for a better understanding of the criminal politics nexus.60 Another limitation of candidates’ (both elected and defeated) affidavit-based analysis is that charges slapped on politicians while leading a demonstration could also convey a false sense of criminality.61 State-wise analysis (Table 5.4) for three Lok Sabhas shows states such as Assam, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and Uttarakhand in the nil-to-low category. Bihar, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh (showing a steep rise), Kerala, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat and Jharkhand appear consistently on the higher range. There is a definite state wise trend, but there is no region wise trend. However, from 22.5 percent MPs with criminal records in 2004, rising to 29.8 percent in 2009 and 34 percent (i.e., one-third) in the Sixteenth Lok Sabha shows a consistent trend of those with criminal records elected and those in active politics carrying no qualms in having a brush with the law. This nonetheless leaves room for further analysis with the support of the parties and the ECI. Public protests and agitations on political issues and as part of normal political activity and of dissent and stir from the opposition space cause violations that show up in such data. Strictly under the law of the land, disqualification to contest an election arises only after the conviction of a person. Since lengthy legal procedures in India make convictions difficult even in grave and heinous offences, a charge-sheeted person contests elections till convicted. The bench of Justice A.K. Patnaik and S.J. Mukhopadhaya of the Supreme Court of India gave a significant judgement on a writ petition of Advocate Lily Thomas and Lok Prahar, a voluntary organization, on 10 July 2013 that attempted to alter section 8(4) of Representation of the People Act.

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Table 5.4 MPs with criminal cases by states 2004, 2009 and 201462 Major states

Andhra Pradesh63 Assam Bihar Chhattisgarh Gujarat Haryana Himachal Pradesh Jammu and Kashmir Jharkhand Karnataka Kerala Madhya Pradesh Maharashtra Odisha Punjab Rajasthan Tamil Nadu Uttar Pradesh Uttarakhand West Bengal Others Total

2004

2009

2014

#/Σ (%)

#/Σ (%)

#/Σ (%)

3/42 (7.14) 0/14 (00) 13/39 (33.3) 2/11 (18.2) 7/26 (26.9) 2/10 (20.0) 0/4 (00) 0/6 (00)

11/42 (26.2) 2/14 (14.3) 18/40 (45) 2/11 (18.2) 11/26 (42.3) 2/10 (20.0) 0/4 (00) 1/6 (16.66)

20/42 (48) 4/14 (29) 28/40 (70) 1/11 (9) 9/26 (35) 1/10 (10) 1/4 (25) 1/6 (17)

7/14 (50.0) 6/28 (21.4) 8/19 (42.1) 7/29 (24.1) 20/48 (41.7) 3/21 (14.3) 4/13 (31.8) 4/25 (16.0) 8/38 (21.1) 22/79 (27.8) 0/5 (00) 5/42 (11.9) 2/7 (28.57) 123/520 (22.65)

8/14 (57.14) 9/28 (32.14) 7/20 (35.0) 4/29 (13.8) 26/48 (54.16) 5/21 (23.8) 2/13 (15.4) 2/25 (8.0) 10/39 (25.64) 31/80 (38.75) 1/5 (20) 7/42 (16.66) 3/9 (33.33) 162/526 (30.8)

4/13 (31) 9/28 (32) 9/20 (45) 7/29 (24) 32/47 (67) 4/21 (19) 1/13 (8) 2/25 (8) 7/39 (18) 28/80 (35) 1/5 (20) 8/42 (19) 9/25 (36) 186/540 (34.4)

Source: Tables 5.3 and 5.4 have been compiled from the data taken from the reports and analyses of the fourteenth (2004), the fifteenth (2009) and the sixteenth (2014) general elections of the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR). The website of the ADR, is an active one and has been consulted over a period of time during January 2016. Notes 1. Figures in parenthesis are percentages. 2. #: Number of MPs with criminal cases based on affidavit; Σ: Total Number of Seats held in Lok Sabha.

Going beyond the 2005 Supreme Court judgement that had given immunity till an appellate court’s decision and had imposed disqualification on MPs and MLAs once a trial court convicts an accused politician, the Bench argued:

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Once a person, who was a member of either house of parliament or state legislature becomes disqualified by or under any law made by parliament under Articles 102(1)(e) and 191(1)(e) of the constitution, his seat automatically falls vacant and parliament cannot make a provision to defer the date on which disqualification of a sitting member will have effect.64 However, the Parliament acted fast to enact The Representation of the People (Amendment and Validation) Act, 2013, which received the assent of the President in September same year and restored status quo ante.65 The representational anomalies arising out of the criminalization of politics manifested when Shibu Soren, Union Minister for coal in the UPA government, went underground in July 2004 when an arrest warrant was issued against him in a 30-year-old case of rioting and killing of 11 persons in Chirrudih in the undivided state of Bihar (now in Jharkhand). He later resigned on 24 July 2004, but the damage to both the Parliament and the government was done from two perspectives. First, there were hints that the BJP-led government in Jharkhand had dug up the case to embarrass the UPA government and to neutralize Shibu Soren’s claim to the State’s Chief Ministership. Second, even if three decades back, the political movement had transgressed democratic norms to the extent that criminal charges could be framed against a Union Minister who had to abscond forgetting his oath to the Constitution and the rule of law. No wonder, in a different context, reacting to security provided to MPs and MLAs, and definitely to those who became ministers, the Supreme Court asked as to why should the Indian state pay for the security for those with criminal cases.66 Poll financing has continued to be a related area of serious concern across the world, as the influence of money power has negatively impacted democratic culture. Though the monetary ceiling has been prescribed on a candidate’s expenditure during the elections, lavish expenditure during elections by some make some contests uneven and representation skewed. The parties convert enabling provisions such as cash contribution below ₹20,000 from individual donors as loopholes to get unaccounted cash contributions from the sectors operating in black money. A provision making contribution by cheque mandatory, the option of state funding of elections and auditing of the account of political parties by public agency such as the CAG also needs to be considered and debated to find a satisfactory solution so as to minimize the role of money power in elections.67 Election funding has been discussed elaborately in the country – from streamlining and

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regulating corporate funding to public funding, from setting a limit to poll expenditure to providing necessary state support despite resource crunch, from academic inquiry to discussions in the corporate world, the media, civil society activism, judicial interventions and discussion in the public domain – the issue has been live for over six decades. The ECI too has brought in reforms with some salutary effects. However, this continues to be a complex issue impacting political representation and, despite efforts, a solution has eluded so far. Selective and limited state support, if not full state funding, is one of the solution suggested.68 The ECI has been making efforts to check the entry of criminally tainted politicians in the electoral arena. It had proposed amendment in the law to provide for disqualification of any person accused of an offence punishable by imprisonment for five years or more from contesting election even when trial was pending, provided charges had been framed against the person by the competent court. However, the counter view to this proposal based on the doctrine that a person is presumed innocent until proved guilty came in the way. Further, apprehensions were also expressed regarding motivated cases against the opposition and dissenting leaders initiated by the ruling party. As a precaution against such motivated cases by the ruling party, the ECI proposed that only those cases which were filed six months before an election alone would lead to disqualification and persons found guilty by a Commission of Enquiry should also stand disqualified from contesting elections. This would be hopefully complemented with the Supreme Court judgement of 10 May 2013 discussed earlier and could instill some discipline and morality in political behaviour and political organization. The dawn of the new millennium exposed a few more weaknesses in the institutional and representational dimensions of the Indian Parliament, as also of the legislative institutional structure of the country. Revelations through sting operations by media and civil society groups bared love for lucre among the people’s representatives in India. Some of the prominent ones are discussed here. Cash for Questions: A sting operation codenamed Operation Duryodhana, conducted by a Cobrapost-Aaj Tak69 team for nearly eight months in 2005, led to the broadcast of news bulletins with video footage on 12 December 2005, which showed that eleven MPs, ten from the Lok Sabha and one from the Rajya Sabha belonging to four parties had accepted cash for asking questions in the House. During the operation, 14 MPs were contacted through ‘middlemen’,70 assorted persons, some on the staff of the MPs and the Parliament,

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with requests of raising questions and offers of money to be paid from representatives of a fictitious body called the NISMA for asking certain questions in the Indian Parliament relating to its interests. While three declined, eleven (seven belonging to the BJP, two to the BSP and one each to the RJD and Congress) accepted money, some even made proposals for doing it on a regular basis on an annual price to be paid monthly, some bargained on the price being paid. In all, more than 60 questions were submitted by eleven MPs of which 25 questions (at last count) were tabled in the Parliament. The Lok Sabha constituted a ‘Committee to Inquire into Allegations of Improper Conduct on the Part of Some Members’.71 Pawan Kumar Bansal (Chair) and Vijay Kumar Malhotra, Mohammad Salim, Ram Gopal Yadav and C. Kuppusami (members) heard the representative of the Cobrapost.com and the ten of its accused MPs and submitted their report to the Speaker of the Lok Sabha on 21 December 2005, recommended expulsion of all the ten, which the Lok Sabha did. Vijay Kumar Malhotra (BJP) did not concur with the recommendation that, he argued, was not ‘as per the procedure established by law’: 1 2 3

4

No member of the House can be expelled except for the breach of privileges of the House. The matter must, therefore, be dealt with according to the rules of Privileges Committee. So, the matter must be referred to the Privileges Committee on a motion moved in the House, or the Committee adopted the rules of Privileges Committee. In the Privileges Committee the tainted members will have a right of cross examination, arguments, defence etc., which is necessary for Natural Justice.

He was in favour of the matter being referred to the Privilege Committee. The Rajya Sabha too expelled its member involved in this scandal. Questions have been raised about the Committee coming to a conclusion and submitting its report within a week and recommending expulsion of the members. The details of the sting operation, however, starkly bring out the rot in the country’s highest representative-legislative body. One was even reported to be making suggestive, lewd passes at the lady journalist impersonating as the representative of the fictitious NISMA. Equally disturbing were the comments made by some of the MPs regarding their colleagues in the House and of the middlemen about the MPs.72 Though the accused MPs were not given a chance to cross-examine the sting operation team, who were questioned by the

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Committee, a detailed reading of the 140-page report exposes the thin defence presented by each of them. The first case of cash for question came to light nearly six and a half decades back, in the provisional Parliament, when H.D. Mudgal’s dealings with a Bombay Bullion Association, which included canvassing support and making propaganda in Parliament on certain problems on behalf of that association, in return for alleged financial and other business advantage rocked the Parliament and conscience of the nation even when the Indian Republic was just finding its feet and the first general elections under India’s republican constitution were still a few months away. Jawaharlal Nehru while speaking in Parliament on the motion for expulsion of H.D. Mudgal on 24 September 1951 said: The question arises whether in the present case this should be done or something else. I do submit that it is perfectly clear that this case is not even a case which might be called a marginal case, where people may have two opinions about it, where one may have doubts if a certain course suggested is much too severe. The case if I may say so, is as bad as it could well be. If we consider even such a case as a marginal case or as one where perhaps a certain amount of laxity might be shown, I think it will be unfortunate from a variety of points of view, more especially because, this being the first case of its kind coming up before the House, if the House does not express its will in such matters in clear, unambiguous and forceful terms, then doubts may very well arise in the public mind as to whether the House is very definite about such matters or not. Therefore I do submit that it has become a duty for us and an obligation to be clear, precise and definite. The facts are clear and precise and the decision should also be clear and precise and unambiguous. And I submit the decision of the House should be, after accepting the finding of this report, to resolve that the Member should be expelled from the House. Since Nehru’s unambiguous rejection of such practices by the legislators in the country, the situation has obviously deteriorated. It is equally difficult to believe that corruption in and criminalization of the country’s political life has affected only a few MPs, who are prepared to sell their conscience for a consideration, when scams worth millions with political involvement have been unearthed. It would not be farfetched to expect that this could be a proverbial tip of the iceberg and it could well be that bigger fishes have escaped this net. However, if the MPs could sell their support for cash – the JMM bribery case73 is

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still fresh in public memory – accepting cash to ask questions could be considered only a minor deviation. The pertinent question, therefore, is not whether some MPs or legislators have been caught in this unsavoury affair, neither is the question that smaller fishes have been caught and bigger have been spared, the real issue is if a robust institutional mechanism has been devised to strengthen probity in public life at the highest level in a sustained manner and resolve such issues to optimum satisfaction of the public in a non-partisan fashion. An absence of such an institutional mechanism, either as a parliamentary organ, or as a statutory body, would encourage such deviance. Interestingly, the matter did not end with the expulsion of the erring MPs. On the one hand, some of the expelled MPs appealed against the expulsion, challenging the power of either House of the Parliament to expel any member, to the Supreme Court, on the other, in response to a letter written by V.K. Malhotra, the BJP deputy leader in the Lok Sabha, leading political parties had a meeting with Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee in August 2006 and decided to set up a Review Committee if the MPs withdrew their petitions in the Supreme Court challenging the decision of the House. In September 2006, ten months after the expulsion, however, the petition came up for hearing in the Supreme Court before a five-judge Constitution Bench headed by Chief Justice Y. K. Sabharwal, where it was argued that the Article 105(3), relating to powers, privileges and immunities of each House of Parliament, MPs and committees of each House, of the Constitution does not confer on either House of the Indian Parliament all the privileges that the British House of Commons exercised at the time of the coming into force of the Constitution of India and that the Indian legislatures were not superior courts and their non-speaking warrant of contempt was subject to judicial scrutiny under Article 226 (defines the powers of High Courts to issue certain Writs) or other appropriate proceedings. The counsel argued that disqualification of members has to be governed by law and not by the resolution of a single House, in other words, the Parliament or State legislatures did not have the powers to expel their members even if they thought that an act of the member(s) had brought the house under disrepute. However, maintaining that provisions of the Representation of the Peoples Act create disqualifications, Ram Jethmalani, a leading criminal lawyer and an MP, said, ‘the disqualifications created by these sections are not merely disqualification for being chosen as member but also produce a post-election termination of membership’. Supporting the Centre’s stand that Parliament has power to expel its member for abusing the privileges, the

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Attorney General justified before the Supreme Court the expulsion of MPs for their involvement in cash-for-query scam. However, on 28 September 2006 the Supreme Court reserved its verdict on power of Parliament to expel MPs. In 2011, the SC dismissed the appeal of the Delhi Police against the two journalists who carried the sting operation, thus legally sanctifying sting operations. In any case, the tolerant stand of political parties and the political class on corruption and probity in public life nonetheless became clear with the moves to review the expulsion following V.K. Malhotra’s (BJP) letter to Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee. Operation Chakravyuh: The MPLADS has continued to be in the news since its launch in 1993–94. The scheme has been characterized by a mixed performance, underutilization, corruption, incomplete work, inefficient implementation and supervision and so on.74 ‘Operation Chakravyuh’, a sting operation conducted on similar lines as the ‘Operation Duryodhana’ by the same people, brings out fault lines not only of the scheme, but also within India’s parliamentary system and its representative architecture. On 20 November 2005 Star News in collaboration with DIG aired the sting operation on six MPs, capturing the MPs on camera seeking commissions while allotting funds under the scheme for developmental works in their respective constituencies. The six MPs (three from BJP and one each from SP, Congress, BSP and RKD) on ‘Operation Chakravyuh’ were these: former Union minister and BJP Lok Sabha member from Madhya Pradesh’s Mandla constituency Faggan Singh Kulaste, former Goa Chief Minister and south-Goa Congress Lok Sabha MP Churchill Alemao, former UP Minister and SP Lok Sabha MP Paras Nath Yadav from Jaunpur constituency, BJP MP from Madhya Pradesh’s Sidhi constituency C.P. Singh, BJP MP member Ramswaroop Koli and SP MP Sakshi Maharaj. The Saidpur (UP) MP Toofani Saroj refused to accept any commission. Churchill Alemao was shown asking the DIG reporters on camera to open a bag full of money as commission for a project and the personal secretary of a BJP MP was shown taking money on behalf of two MPs of the party. One of these MPs was also exposed in the cash-oncamera ‘Operation Duryodhan’. The sting team was shown discussing the commission with a BJP MP at his house. The audio records the transaction to establish that money has been paid and that the MP will get ₹20,000 for a ₹500,000 job. The SP MP was approached by the reporters and a 20 percent commission was agreed upon for a ₹1–1.5 million project, but when the team offers him only ₹50,000, the MP threw a tantrum. A Rajya Sabha MP from UP openly discussed

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the commission and promises to take the sting team, posing as an NGO, to some other MPs, including one person who was suspended in the wake of the cash-on-camera operation. The RKD MP justified accepting such commissions saying it would be difficult to contest the Lok Sabha polls if one did not take such money. The BSP MP said the issue of commissions on the MPLADS would be worked out after consultations with colleagues, hinting a larger racket. The inquiry committees instituted by both the houses expressed reservations about such sting operations, but they were unsparing about the lure of money among the people’s representatives. The Rajya Sabha Committee headed by Dr. Karan Singh felt that ‘there is an imperative need to bring about some kind of regulatory mechanism for under-cover operations which have the potential of encroaching upon the right to privacy of an individual’.75 The Lok Sabha Committee expressed ‘concern over the fact that the media has been indulging in a race to achieve viewership through denationalization on a competitive basis’. However, that came as no respite to Rajya Sabha MP Dr. Swami Sakshi Ji Maharaj, who expressed his regrets and displayed a feeling of shame for his utterances, because the Committee observed that ‘The facts and circumstances of the case leave no doubt that the Member has not only committed gross misdemeanour but by his conduct he has also compromised the dignity of the House and its Members and has acted in a manner which is inconsistent with the standards which the House is entitled to expect of its Members’. The Committee recommended his expulsion from the House. The Lok Sabha Committee too found that ‘the conduct of none of the four members was above board and they need to be handed out appropriate punishment’. They were suspended for varying periods. Both the committees further recommended that the Union Government may suitably revise the guidelines governing MPLADS with a view to plug various loopholes. The controversy also brought the MPLADS under judicial scrutiny when some voluntary organizations, including Lok Sevak Sangh, challenged constitutional validity of the scheme, because it was breeding corruption in the absence of accountability, monitoring and checks and balances usually applicable to governmental expenses. Prashant Bhushan, counsel for Lok Sevak Sangh, pointed out that the CAG report too discovered several shortcomings in the scheme. Appearing for another petitioner senior counsel K.K. Venugopal (on 16 February

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2006) termed MPLADS as unconstitutional, saying Parliament could not appropriate funds from Consolidated Fund of India except in accordance with Article 282 of the Constitution. He said it was a peculiar situation where there was no monitoring, no accountability and no criminal offence under Prevention of Corruption Act for the irregularities committed in the implementation of the Scheme. The government, however, maintained that it was a good scheme, though it needed some reforms.76 A Constitution Bench of Chief Justice K.G. Balakrishnan and Justices R.V. Raveendran, D.K. Jain, P. Sathasivam and J.M. Panchal gave its verdict on a bunch of writ petitions filed against the MPLADS on 5 August 2010 and ruled that the MPLAD scheme does not give carte blanche to the MPs with respect to the kind of works they can recommend. The scheme falls within the meaning of “public purpose” aimed at fulfillment of the development and welfare of the State as reflected in the Directive Principles of State Policy. . . . Thus, the MPLAD Scheme is valid as Appropriation Acts have been duly passed year after year.77 However, the scheme continues to be caught in controversies. It is a unique scheme, a creation of the Indian Parliament and replicated in the legislatures too. However, only control mechanism attached to it has been that money is not directly given to the MPs; it is only sanctioned by them against development schemes and specific work in their constituencies, to be released and the work completed by the district administration, which in many cases is not above corruption. Operation Chakravyuh has only revealed what has long been believed about corruption prevailing in it and skeletons have not stopped coming out. In 2013, the NABARD Consultancy Service NABCONS discovered that MPs diverted millions from the fund to trusts, societies and NGOs they promoted.78 Underutilization of the grant by several MPs, which has committed non-lapsable fund drawn from Consolidated Fund of India, also indicates the disregard many MPs have for it. It has also created confused accountable amongst the representatives structures and disturbs the federal balance.79 Even if far-fetched conclusions to link the underutilization of the MPLADS to the tendencies reflected in the Operation Chakravyuh are avoided, it is clear that lack of transparency and prevailing corruption and criminalization have plagued the scheme over the years. It also gives an undue advantage to a sitting MP.80

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Conclusion The idea of representation in a way emanates from the idea of political citizenship. Obviously, both the nature and manifestations of representation impact citizenship in any country. In the foregoing discussion we have gone beyond looking either at changing nature of representation in the Indian Parliament, or whether close to a mirror representation is happening in the Indian Parliament. We have picked up a number of issues that have impacted representation generally as well as in Parliament in recent years. As indicated earlier in the discussion, looking at these from the perspective of Bryce, one must not jump at the conclusion of decline of Parliament thesis, yet we must keep in mind Mills’s analysis that institution building is a serious business that involves sustained human effort. There are both the perspectives present, that of a breakdown of political order and that of a kind of democratic political struggle. Yet, there are a few holes in India’s gigantic democratic ship sailing for over six decades. We must pay serious attention to them.

Notes 1 Christophe Jaffrelot, India’s Silent Revolution, Delhi: Permanent Black, 2003. 2 Christophe Jaffrelot and Sanjay Kumar (eds.), Rise of the Plebeians? New Delhi: Routledge. Even though the study is about the changing social profile in the state Legislative Assemblies, the trend is applicable to the Lok Sabha as well. 3 Yogendra Yadav, ‘Electoral Politics in the Time of Change: India’s Third Electoral System 1989–99’, Economic and Political Weekly, 34(34–35), August 21–September 3, 1999, pp. 2393–2399. 4 The epigraph is from the speech of the President of India in 2013 when the Congress-led UPA was in power, he expressed concern again on 10 January 2015, when the BJP-led NDA was in power, over such a situation (The Times of India, 11 January 2015). Obviously, there was merely a role reversal with the change in the government. The UPA constituents resorted to the same stalling techniques that the NDA constituents did for a decade of the UPA rule. This reflected a worrying consensus on negative techniques where the President thought that a parliamentary law was needed to streamline procedures for a smooth functioning of the Parliament. 5 CAD, vol. VII, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat, pp. 32–33. 6 For details see www.indianexpress.com/news/shocking-scenes-of-violencehits-rajya-sabha-as-aiadmk-mps-run-amok/1091954/ (Accessed on 6 January 2016). 7 Accountability means answerability, blameworthiness, liability, and the expectation of account-giving. Responsibility refers to being in charge, being the owner of a task or event. While responsibility can be shared, accountability cannot be shared. Being accountable not only means being responsible for something but also ultimately being answerable for your

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actions. Also, accountability is something you hold a person to only after a task is done or not done. Responsibility can be before and/or after a task. (See S.K. Chaube, ‘Parliamentary Reform in India’, in Ajay K. Mehra and Gert W. Kueck (eds.), Indian Parliament: A Comparative Perspective, Delhi: Konark, 2003, pp. 425–426). For a discussion on the issue see Partha S. Ghosh, ‘India’s Flawed Sri Lanka Policy’, Geopolitics, April 2013, pp. 76–77. Also, commentators have pointed out that the Tamil politics of India that attempts to incite sentiments in Tamil Nadu on the Sri Lankan Tamil issue, more particularly the recent disclosure that the Sri Lankan army mercilessly killed in cold blood LTTE chief Prabhakaran’s teenage child Balachandran after capturing him, for their electoral advantage, and have completely ignored that the LTTE used young children as cannon fodders and human shields against the Sri Lankan army. P. Jayaram, ‘The Many Balachandrans of Jaffna’, The Hindu, 3 April 2013. The practice of calling the two houses as the Upper and Lower House was given up in India in the 1990s at the request of some Lok Sabha MPs. Following that, the two houses have been referred to as their proper name and one refers to the other as the Other House. For a discussion on the significance of the Rajya Sabha see Ajay K. Mehra, ‘The Role of the Rajya Sabha’, in Ajay K. Mehra and Gert W. Kueck (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Comparative Perspective, New Delhi: Konark, 2003. Arghya Sengupta, ‘The New Leviathan’, The Times of India, 20 February 2015, p. 24. On 1 December 2014 Union Minister Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti exhorted the Delhi voters to choose between Ramzadon (the descendents of Lord Ram) and Haramzadon (the illegitimately born, i.e., Muslims and other non-Hindu minorities). Rajya Sabha was stalled by the Opposition on 3 December 2014. (www.rediff.com/news/special/battleground-rajya-sabha/ 20141219.htm, http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-others/unionminister-spells-out-choice-in-delhi-ramzada-vs-haramzada/ & http://articles. economictimes.indiatimes.com/2014-12-03/news/56684733_1_rajyasabha-uproar-remarks; Accessed on 21 February 2016). www.prsindia.org/sessiontrack/winter-session-2015/productivity (Accessed on 21 February 2016). A. Surya Prakash, What Ails Indian Parliament, New Delhi: Indus, an imprint of Harper Collins, 1995, http://socialwatchindia.net/publications/ citizens-report/citizens-report-on-governance-and-development-2003/ view (Accessed on 3 April 2013). P.R. Ramesh, ‘Eyeball Confrontation’, The Economic Times, 26 April 2013, p. 2. www.prsindia.org/parliamenttrack/vital-stats/parliament-in-2012-2621/ (Accessed on 3 April 2013). In the speech in which Dr. Ambedkar had made a significant distinction between social and political democracy, he also described methods of protests as the ‘grammar of anarchy’. He said: If we wish to maintain democracy not merely in form, but also in fact, what must we do? There are first thing in my judgment we must do is to hold fast to constitutional methods of achieving our social and eco-

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nomic objectives. It means we must abandon the bloody methods of revolution. It means that we must abandon the methods of disobedience, non-cooperation and satyagraha. When there was no way left for constitutional methods for achieving economic and social objectives, there was a great deal of justification for unconstitutional methods. But where constitutional methods are open, there can be no justification for these unconstitutional methods. These methods are nothing but the Grammar of Anarchy and the sooner they are abandoned, the better for us.

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Dr. B.R. Ambedkar on 25 November 1949, Constituent Assembly Debates, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat, 1989, vol. XI, p. 978. Also see Chaitanya Kalbag, ‘Reaping the Whirlwind in the 16th Lok Sabha’, The Economic Times, 10 July 2014, p. 4. See, Ajay K. Mehra, ‘Parliament Under Social Watch: Representation, Accountability and Governance’, Citizens Report on Governance and Development 2006, National Social Watch Coalition, Delhi: Pearson, 2006 and ‘Indian Parliament and the “Grammar of Anarchy”’, Citizens Report on Governance and Development 2007, National Social Watch Coalition, Delhi: Sage Publications, 2007. For a discussion on parties see essays in Ajay K. Mehra, D.D. Khanna and Gert W. Kueck, Political Parties and Party Systems, New Delhi: Sage, 2003 and Ajay K. Mehra and O.P. Sharma, Emergence of Regional Parties in India: Implications for National Parties, Policies and the Democratic System, New Delhi: KASCPA, 2009, Mono. Shekhar Gupta, ‘That Funny Bofors Feeling’, The Indian Express, 27 October 2010, p. 14. Neena Vyas, ‘BJP State Units Pressure Us to Get Parliament Adjourned: Sushma’, The Hindu, 12 August 2011. See the Editorial in The Indian Express, 10 May 2016. See Vipul Mudgal, ‘For Better Laws, Debate and Discuss Bills First’, The Times of India, 17 July 2011; Neena Vyas, ‘We’ll Decide on Functioning of Parliament: Sushma’, The Hindu, 11 August 2011; The Hindu, 13 August 2011; Ronojoy Sen, ‘Get Down to Work: Time for Our Legislators to Stop Their Extra-Curricular Activities and Actually Legislate’, The Times of India, 10 August 2011. The Times of India, 7 February 2014. It was reported in February 2014 that 72 pending Bills in Fifteenth Lok Sabha could lapse. The Times of India, 3 February 2014. See Jaffrelot and Kumar, op. cit. Even though the study is about Legislative Assemblies in sixteen states, it is applicable also to Parliament. The Times of India, 22 April 2013. The opening paragraph reads:

In order to maintain the highest tradition of parliamentary system and proper functioning of parliamentary democracy, it is very essential for the Members of Parliament to observe a certain standard of conduct; both inside the House as well as outside it. Their behaviour should be such as to enhance the dignity of Parliament and its members in general. Arvind Datar, ‘Suspend the MPs Madam Speaker’, The Hindu, 27 August 2013, p. 9. 28 The Times of India, 13 February 2014.

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29 The Indian Express, 4 August 2015. 30 Ivor Jennings said, ‘The function of Parliament is not to govern but to criticise. Its criticism, too, is directed not so much towards a fundamental modification of the government’s policy as towards the education of public opinion’. Cabinet Government, 3rd edition, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1959, Chapter XV. 31 W.H. Morris-Jones, Legislatures in New States, New Delhi: IIPA, 1983, p. 2. 32 Lord Bryce, Modern Democracies, London: Macmillan, 1921. 33 John Stuart Mill, Considerations on Representative Government, 1861, www.constitution.org/jsm/rep_gov.htm (Accessed on 4 April 2013). 34 Balveer Arora, ‘The Indian Parliament and Democracy’, in Ajay K. Mehra and Gert W. Kueck (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Comparative Perspective, Delhi: Konark, 2003, pp. 15–26. 35 The Manchester Guardian wrote in praise of the Indian Parliament as it began its work: ‘Parliamentary institutions have not had a very good time in Asia. . . . All that is happening in Asia throws a spotlight on the Parliament in Delhi as the one institution of the kind which working in an exemplary way. . . . Pericles said that Athens was the school of Hellas. Mr. Nehru without boasting may say that Delhi is the school of Asia’. Quoted by W.H. Morris-Jones, Parliament in India, London, New York and Toronto: Longmans, Green and Co., 1957, p. 327. 36 Morris-Jones, 1957, op cit. 37 The accounts given of both the Houses contrast starkly with the contemporary parliamentary culture in India. Compare the reference to Rajya Sabha with the recent incident quoted earlier. Even the seriousness of business attributed to Lok Sabha puts a question mark over today’s culture of the Parliament. Morris-Jones, op cit., p. 143. 38 Norman D. Palmer and Irene Tinker, ‘Decision Making in the Indian Parliament’, in Richard L. Park and Irene Tinker (eds.), Leadership and Political Institutions in India, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1959, pp. 115–136. 39 Robert L. Hardgrave, Jr. and Stanley Kochanek, India: Government and Politics in a Developing Nation, 4th edition, San Diego, CA: Harcourt Brace Jonarich, 1993, p. 80. 40 Ibid., p. 80. 41 Arun Shourie, The Parliamentary System: What We Have Made of It; What We Can Make of It? New Delhi: ASA, Rupa & Co., 2007, p. 11. Surprisingly, Shourie, who has been a member of the BJP, represented the party in the Rajya Sabha and has held ministerial position for six years in the Atal Behari Vajpayee-led NDA government, does not fault political parties, which have been selecting candidates to represent them from different constituencies in the legislatures and are responsible for their role and behaviour. 42 Ibid., p. 18. We do not have an account as to why Ambedkar said this despite scholars and analysts finding the Indian Parliament’s functioning to be as good as it could be. Shourie does not give the source from where he quoted. Interestingly, the statement attributed to Ambedkar goes against everything he said in the Constituent Assembly, particularly his famous speech on 25 November 1949, different parts of which have been

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43

44 45 46 47 48 49 50

51

52 53 54

55

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quoted in different contexts. However, that Arun Shourie would not have quoted Ambedkar without using an authentic source, it could be checked in the Rajya Sabha debate and the context of his comments deserves to be explored and analyzed. Christophe Jaffrelot, a biographer of Ambedkar, has indicated how between 15 August 1947 and 26 November 1949 his energies were focused on framing the Constitution. He resigned from the cabinet in September 1951 due to Nehru’s reluctance to accept his views on the Hindu Code Bill. Thus, he remained the Law Minister for two years after the making of the Constitution was complete. Obviously, he had lost neither his faith in the Constitution, nor in the parliamentary system. Christophe Jaffrelot, Dr Ambedkar and Untouchability, Delhi: Permanent Black, 2004, pp. 5–6. Yadav, op. cit.; Ajay K. Mehra, ‘Indian Elections 2004: Multiple Transformations’, Think India, 7(3), July–September 2004, pp. 62–71; and India’s Fifteenth General Election: Realities, Implications, Prospects, Working Paper No. 56, Heidelberg Papers in South Asian and Comparative Politics, South Asia Institute, University of Heidelberg, July 2010, http://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/volltexte/2010/10916/ pdf/HPSACP_Mehra.pdf. B.L. Shankar and Valerian Roderigues, The Indian Parliament: A Democracy at Work, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2011, ch. 2; Jaffrelot and Kumar, op. cit. Shourie, op. cit. www.indiatogether.org/2005/sep/opi-reserve.htm (Accessed on 15 January 2016). Compiled from: http://ushome.rediff.com/news/2004/may/26women.htm & www.ipu.org/wmn-e/classif.htm (Accessed on 15 January 2016). The Indian Express, 9 June 2009 and The Economic Times, 10 June 2009. M.V. Rajeev Gowda and E. Sridharan, ‘Reforming India’s Party Financing and Election Expenditure Laws’, Election Law Journal, 11(2), 2012, pp. 226–240. Devesh Kapur and Milan Vaishnav, Quid Pro Quo: Builders, Politicians, and Election Finance in India, Philadelphia: Centre for Global Development, University of Pennsylvania, Working Paper No. 276, December 2011, http://ssrn.com/abstract =1972987 (Accessed on 31 March 2013). Milan Vaishnav, ‘The Market for Criminality: Money, Muscle and Elections in India’, 2011, http://casi.ssc.upenn.edu/system/files/Market% 2Bfor%2BCriminality%2B-%2BAug%2B2011.pdf (Accessed on 31 March 2013). Kapur and Vaishnav, op. cit. www.abplive.in/india-news/vijay-mallya-and-his-relations-with-politicalparties-305634 (Accessed on 14 March 2016). B. Muralidhar Reddy, ‘Rajya Sabha Poll in Jharkhand Countermanded’, The Hindu, 31 March 2012, www.thehindu.com/news/national/rajyasabha-poll-in-jharkhand-countermanded/article3262172.ece (Accessed on 14 March 2016). Ajay K. Mehra, ‘Corruption and Criminalisation in Public Life in India: An Historical View’, in Subhash Kashyap (ed.), The Constitutional History of India: Federalism, Elections, Government and Rule of Law, Vol. XIV, Part 5 B, PHIPC, New Delhi: Centre for Studies in Civilizations, 2015,

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pp. 519–570 and ‘Criminalisation of Indian Politics’, K.M. de Silva, G.H. Peiris and S.W.R. de A. Samarasinghe (eds.), Corruption in South Asia: India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, Kandy, Sri Lanka: International Centre for Ethnic Studies, 2002, pp. 99–138. 56 The Indian Express, 1 July 2013. 57 Mulayam Singh Yadav, then Union Defence Minister, added a qualifier to this resolution: ‘the N.N. Vohra Committee Report had talked of a nexus between judges and criminals, and bureaucrats and criminals as well. But only the nexus between politicians and criminals is mentioned.’ (The Pioneer, 29 August 1997). The resolution was overwhelmingly supported by the entire House, but Mulayam Singh Yadav’s qualifying remark was not isolated, it echoed wider feelings across the parties, pointing out the Achilles’ heel in the Lok Sabha resolution on the solemn occasion. On the same occasion, in his address to the nation on 15 August 1997 at the joint sitting of the two houses of Parliament the then President of India K.R. Narayanan said: Sheer opportunism and valueless power politics have taken over the place and principles of idealism, relationship between people, groups and parties. . . . And corruption is corroding the vitals of our politics and society. . . . It seems the people have to be in the forefront of the fight against corruption, communalism, casteism and criminalisation of politics and life, in the country. (Italics mine). 58 http://lawmin.nic.in/legislative/election/volume%201/representation%20 of%20the%20people%20act,%201951.pdf (Accessed on 8 January 2016). 59 http://indpaedia.com/ind/index.php/Criminals_in_politics:_India (Accessed on 15 January 2016). 60 Ajay K. Mehra, ‘The Indian Parliament and “Grammar of Anarchy”’, in National Social Watch India (ed.), Citizen’s Report on Governance and Development, Sage, 2007. 61 Also see, Christophe Jaffrelot and Gilles Vernier, ‘Lawmakers and LawBreakers’, The Indian Express, 2 July 2014, p. 11. 62 http://adrindia.org/sites/default/files/Ten%20Years%20of%20 National%20Election%20Watch%20Report.pdf. www.adrindia. org/files/High%20level%20criminal,%20financial%20&%20educational%20analysis%20LS%202009.pdf; file:///C:/Users/Ajay/Downloads/ Winners_Lok_Sabha_2014_Analysis_of_Criminal_and_Financial_background_details_of_winners_English.pdf and http://adrindia.org/sites/ default/files/0.10%20full%20report%2020-05-2010.pdf. 63 Includes Telangana, which went to the general election for the first time after becoming a state. 64 The Indian Express, 10 July 2013, pp. 1–2. H.K. Dua commented: The reasons political parties do not want to stop criminals from joining Parliament or State Assemblies is because they want to sue them to win more seats. . . . The Supreme Court has shown the way, Parliament is entitled to remove some of the infirmities in its judgment, but the court’s view cannot simply be ignored.

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71

72 73

74

75 76 77 78 79 80

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‘Parliament Should Back the Court, Not Criminals’, The Hindu, 22 July 2013, p. 11. See http://indiacode.nic.in/acts-in-pdf/292013.pdf (Accessed on 11 February 2016). The Indian Express, 4 April 2013. Devesh Kapoor, ‘The Puzzle of Poll Financing’, 8 October 2012, www. business-standard.com/article/opinion/devesh-kapur-the-puzzle-of-pollfinancing-112100800040_1.html (Accessed on 15 January 2016). Gowda and Sridharan, op. cit., provide a comprehensive analysis of poll funding with international comparisons. The former is a web-based news site and the latter a Hindi news channel of the India Today group. The eight middlemen COBRAPOST-AAJTAK team met were Harish Badola, M.K. Tripathi (Chotiwala), Chandrabhan Gupta, Dinesh, Vijay, Sudeep Mishra, Ravinder, Ajay Singh. See www.cobrapost.com/documents/mm.htm (Accessed on 10 May 2006). See, ‘Report of the Committee to Inquire into Allegations of Improper Conduct on the Part of Some Members’, Fourteenth Lok Sabha, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat, December 2005, http://164.100.24.208/ls/ Inquiry/IReport.pdf (Accessed on 10 May 2006). www.cobrapost.com/documents/mm.htm and www.cobrapost.com/documents/fdec%20.htm (both accessed on 10 May 2006). On 28 July 2005 ten MPs belonging to the JMM and the JD cast their votes to defeat a no-confidence motion moved in the Lok Sabha against the minority government of P.V. Narasimha Rao. The CBI filed criminal cases against them saying they had received bribes to do so. Since under Article 105(2) of the Constitution of India makes MPs not liable to any proceedings in any court with respect to any vote given by him/her in Parliament, the Supreme Court dismissed all cases against them. http:// indiatoday.intoday.in/story/jharkhand-mukti-morcha-bribery-scandal-in1993-corruption-got-institutionalised-in-india/1/192408.html (Accessed on 17 January 2016). See, Ajay K. Mehra, ‘Parliament Under Social Watch: Representation, Accountability and Governance’, in National Social Watch Coalition (ed.), Citizens Report on Governance and Development 2006, Delhi: Pearson Education (India). Parliament of India (Rajya Sabha), Committee on Ethics, Eighth Report, New Delhi: Rajya Sabha Secretariat, 2006. www.outlookindia.com/news/article/mplads-comes-under-judicial-scrutiny/ 355838 (Accessed on 18 January 2016). www.thehindu.com/news/national/nothing-unconstitutional-aboutmplad-scheme-rules-supreme-court/article423882.ece (Accessed on 18 January 2016). The Times of India, 28 July 2013. Yamini Aiyar, ‘Confused Accountability’, The Indian Express, 20 June 2009, p. 12. The scheme which began with allocating ₹10 million annually to each of the 795 MPs, was later raised to ₹20 million per annum per MP, thus allocating nearly ₹80,000 over a five-year period. Given the prevailing corruption in the scheme almost since it came into existence, it is open to two

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levels of corruption – of MP and the district administration. Further, it has been rightly pointed out that ‘it takes away some of the responsibility for development activity from both the state and local initiative and makes it a matter of individual patronage. It is politically unfair because it gives an advantage to the incumbent (of whichever party) over his rivals by giving him a discretionary expenditure purse of ₹50 million (when it began, it was ₹10 million, now ₹100 million) over a term’. E. Sridharan, ‘Parties, the Party System and Collective Action for State Funding of Elections: A Comparative Perspective on Possible Options’, in Peter Ronald deSouza and E. Sridharan (eds.), India’s Political Parties, New Delhi: Sage, 2006, p. 336.

6

The nature of democratization of the Parliament A study of membership profile of Lok Sabha1 M. Manisha

Political institutions can be best understood in the context of the socio-cultural environment in which they function. While the constitutional and legal provisions determine the institutional framework, the contours of political institutions and the limits of their powers are defined to a large extent by the people who run these institutions. The political leadership of the time charts its course of development and imbues it with a vision and ideology that may be vastly different from the original scheme at the time of conceptualization. The Parliament lends itself to this premise more than any other institution on account of its corporate character and democratic composition. The changing profile of the Indian Parliament is a story of evolution of parliamentary democracy in India. It is a story of both the democratization of Indian polity and the limits to the process. It is an account of the redefinition of individual and institutional goals determined by the rapid politicization of the society. Yet, the socio-economic profile of parliamentary membership has often been reduced to nondescript numbers, or has been relegated to the footnotes in the study of Indian democracy. But for the attempts of a few scholars,2 the Parliament as a democratic political institution has remained a neglected area of study, even while political parties, federal politics and electoral politics have engaged much scholarly attention. It is only in recent times that some noted scholars have rekindled interest in the study of the Legislature.3

Theoretical context Parliament is the pivotal pillar of representative democracy. The nature of parliamentary membership evokes some interest, especially in emergent democracies. The study of members of Parliament broadly

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involves two fundamental questions that are inextricably related to the concept of representation: • •

What does Parliament, and parliamentarians, represent? What constitutes the nature of the activity of representation?

Based on these, it is possible to identify at least three dominant methods of studying parliamentary membership. The first involves the study of the profile of the Members of Parliament, which may indicate the socio-economic background of the members, their ideology and world view. Such a study would involve the descriptive or sociological interpretation of the concept of representation that subsumes that a representative body that resembles the political principles most closely, is also most likely to be representative.4 This idea does not rule out the possibility of cross or transcendental representation.5 Nor does it always imply replication of the voting community without reference to the representation of their interests. However, it assumes that the representative process becomes more effective if the voters and representatives share common traits. Such studies also indicate in the process, the permeability and openness of the ‘democratic’ political process. A second way to analyze parliamentary membership may be in terms of their performance. Such a study involves the conceptualization of representation as an activity, a depiction of interests.6 It is a responsibility that the representative has been authorized to do or has been entrusted with and for which he or she is held responsible.7 In performing this task of representation, the representative is expected to do what is in the interest of the citizens and what they might do if they themselves were acting. In this respect, the manner in which the members participate in parliamentary proceedings, the issues raised by them, the political groupings to which they belong, the party ideology and their personal beliefs shape and influence the nature of their participation in the Parliament. Closely related to the second is a significant mode of analysis: the performance of parliamentary membership in terms of its policy implications. Such method is related to the conceptualization of representation as ‘accountability’8 both towards the electorate which has ensured the presence of the official in the assembly, and the party that has paved the way for such representation. The representative in such cases is vested with the responsibility of interpreting the interest of the people, representing them through effective procedures and ensuring the conversion of demands into policy outputs. This mode of analysis considers the implications of the process of representation as more significant.

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Since a representative represents an entire constituency, an unorganized set of people, ‘the important question in the ultimate analysis is whether the representative must act on his own or on the basis of a mandate from his constituents.’9 The representative cannot be completely identified with the demands or interests of the represented, nor can the representative be completely divorced from those demands and interests. Both have to be balanced for representation to be effective. The emergence of political parties has added one more dimension to this complicated concept. Modern-day legislators are neither bound by the wishes of the electoral constituency, nor are they free to act on their own, but are bound to act according to the program of their party.10 The party is the link between the government and the people, between local and national interest. By electing the members of a particular party, voters express their preference of the program of a party. The legislators are bound by the party program and ideology because of their duty to the party and constituents.11 In the light of these debates the present chapter makes an attempt to analyze the changing nature of membership of Indian Parliament from its inception till the present. It relies largely (though not exclusively) on the first method of empirical analysis: examining the changes in the socio-economic profile of members of Lok Sabha, the popularly elected chamber of Indian Parliament. It also assesses the impact of the changing profile on the nature and functioning of Parliament as a national, political institution. Through this, the chapter makes an attempt to unravel the extent of the democratization of Parliament and the emerging contours of ‘political representation’ in India.

Evolution of Indian Parliament: three stages It is possible to identify three phases in the development of Parliament12 based on the study of the membership profile of the Lok Sabha. The first phase lasted from 1952 to 1967. The second phase began in 1967 and continued till 1984, and the third was from 1985 and continues with minor changes in the period till 2009. Between 1950 and 1967, the Lok Sabha was characterized primarily by the presence of two categories of members: the urban, educated and successful professional class and members of the traditional elite (including capitalists and landed gentry), with the former dominating (see Tables 6.1). More than three-quarters of the members of the Lok Sabha belonged to the classes that had the benefit of professional education. Lawyers, one of the largest occupational groups in the Lok

Table 6.1 Social and economic profile of MPs, 1952–1967 Age

1952

1957

1962

25–45 46–65 65 and above

41.7 48.7 2.2

47.0 47.0 3.2

37.4 56.3 5.7

Education Below graduate Graduates Post graduates

36.2 36.7 20

29.6 3 18.6

30.2 32.2 16.3

25.5 18.6 17.0

20.8 20.0 19.4

20.7 24.6 19.7

Occupation Lawyers Agriculturists Social and political workers13

Source: Who's Who of Lok Sabha (1952–1962), (Lok Sabha Secretariat, 1952, 1958, 1962, New Delhi). All figures in percentages.

Table 6.2 Social and economic profile of MPs, 1967–1984 Age

1967

1971

1977

1980

1984

25–45 46–65 65 and above

40.4 48.4 6.7

34.9 54.7 7.0

33.7 56.6 9.4

38.7 54.2 7.5

33.1 57.4 9.4

31.5

27.4

34.7

31.4

28.9

37.6 28.4

34.6 26.2

40.3 27.2

40.7 27.2

43.7 25.8

17.4 29.4 22.8

20.3 33.2 18.9

23.4 36.0 20.0

21.9 37.8 17.2

18.6 37.8 15.6

Education Below Graduate Graduate Above Graduate Occupation Lawyer Agriculture Social and political workers

Source: Who's Who of Lok Sabha (1967–1984), (Lok Sabha Secretariat, New Delhi); Parliament of India: Sixth to the Eighth Lok Sabha: A Study, (Lok Sabha Secretariat, 1977, 1979, 1985; New Delhi). All figures are in percentages.

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Sabha, constituted a third of its membership. In addition, military, police and civil service personnel, journalists and writers (one percent), were also a part of the Lok Sabhas of the period. Traders and industrialists constituted nearly one-tenth of the total membership of the Lok Sabha during the entire period. Each of these occupational groups formed a part of the urban, professional class. Given the costly nature of professional education and its limited reach, it may be surmised that the members of the Lok Sabha belonged to the prosperous middle class. Apart from the urban middle class, those with agricultural interests constituted a substantial segment of the Lok Sabha membership. A large number of these members were full-time social activists drawing their sustenance, in all probability, from agricultural property. Most of these members belonged to the Congress Party and were products of the nationalist movement. Socialized in national politics, a majority of the MPs were oriented towards national issues. The well-attended parliamentary proceedings of the period were good humored and well-informed.14 W.H. Morris-Jones found the debates ‘sparkling.’ Foreign policy issues and not the domestic matters elicited maximum participation from the MPs. Participants spoke in uncorrupted English or sometimes Hindi and the debate was in the ‘Oxford Union Style,’ with arguments and counterarguments, both often coming from within the same party – the Congress. Members of the ruling and opposition parties appeared serious about parliamentary work and were keen to foster a parliamentary opposition. The fourth general election in 1967 changed the socio-economic profile of the Lok Sabha, which impacted functioning of the Parliament as well. A new political elite emerged; older, educated in India, a product of capitalist development and democratic governance. Many of them had graduated from state politics to national politics and had risen from the grassroots level. They were the products of competitive politics and they brought with them their own political culture. This period witnessed the emergence of what may be described as a regional elite at the national level.15 1967-89 A study of the socio-economic indices of the composition of Lok Sabha indicate that the Lok Sabha was, and continued to remain, a body consisting of members with a reasonably high level of education (see Table 6.2). If early Lok Sabhas (First to Third) consisted of members who had acquired degrees from foreign universities and colleges, the later Lok Sabhas had a large number of graduates and postgraduates who had studied in India.

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The occupational status of the members of the Lok Sabha in this period provides the most startling evidence of the changed composition of the Lok Sabha. Statistical data reveals that agriculturists dominated the Lok Sabha. During this entire period, there was not a single instance of a decline in the numbers of members belonging to this occupation category, either in absolute or in percentage terms. Unlike in the first three Lok Sabhas, in the post-1967 period the class of practicing lawyers increased and the urban middle-class professionals had a sizeable presence in the Lok Sabha. There was a decline in the number of traders and industrialists while workers and trade unionists were still conspicuous by their absence. This change in the occupational character of the Lok Sabha was on account of the economic development of the country. The green revolution that had led to capitalist inroads into agriculture, increased food grain production in certain states of the country like Punjab and Haryana for a specific period of time, and among limited owners of large holdings, led to a monopoly of marketable food grains in the hands of a few landowners. The number of prosperous agriculturists (peasant proprietors) therefore multiplied. They belonged not to the upper caste Hindu community but to the intermediary castes. Thus, the political power of the prosperous agriculturist group increased together with their economic power. This was evidenced in the increasing presence of agriculturists not just in the Lok Sabha but also within the Congress party.16 The backward classes were still under-represented. The representation of the SC and ST members in the Lok Sabha remained almost unchanged in this period. Their presence in the Lok Sabha was more because of reservation of seats for them than the open competitive political process. Amidst these changes and continuities, the Lok Sabha’s efficiency in terms of debates, discussions and output declined. The rivalry between the modernizing, articulate and sophisticated elite, dominant earlier, and the emerging regional elite found reverberations in the functioning of the Lok Sabha. Parliamentary proceeding, thus, became less decorous and less efficient. The number of bills introduced and legislations enacted witnessed a steady decline from 487 in 1971 to 336 in the 1979. The percentage of time spent on legislative debates declined from 27 percent to 24 percent. Parliamentary procedures like Question Hour, Short Duration Debates and so on gave MPs an opportunity to engage and scrutinize the government and there was almost no decline in time spent on them, though the number of questions discussed declined marginally during this period. On the other hand, the time spent on raising matters of urgent public importance

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under Rules 55 and 56 increased.17 Thus, while the Sixth Lok Sabha spent four percent of the time for the purpose, the Seventh Lok Sabha spent nine percent on it. The ambit of parliamentary deliberations widened and the issues discussed also indicated the changes to the composition of the Lok Sabha. Most questions related to financial matters and agricultural issues. Economic issues such as increase in prices and a hike or a lowering of procurement prices of agricultural commodities found a significant place in parliamentary discussions. Situations arising out of droughts, floods, etc., which affected the agrarian populace in particular, were increasingly given more time and attention. Thus, for instance the Agriculture Minister was summoned 1,951 times every year in this phase.18 Parliamentary proceedings were no longer sophisticated, urbane or decorous. The debates were more and more in Hindi, emphasis, as mentioned earlier, was on agriculture and related issues, and local level concerns were frequently raised. The conflicting interests often led to loss of time on account of adjournments, walkouts and disorderly behaviour, though no statistical data is available on this. The origin of intense argument, ceaseless debate, the rise of ‘shouting brigades,’ and use of unparliamentary and even unethical language, walkouts, etc., can all be traced to this period. Consequently, there was a growing cynicism about the working of the Parliament and a lack of respect for the parliamentary institution. There were frequent references to the golden years of the Indian parliament and the high standards of its performance. As Inder Malhotra, a well-known journalist, pointed out, On few points is there such unanimity as on the sad decline of the Parliament. No one should try to evade stark reality. . . . No matter how one looks at it, the life story of the Indian parliament begins with and to an extent revolves around Jawaharlal Nehru . . . with the possible exception of Winston Churchill during the Second World War, no leader used the parliamentary forum to communicate his message to his people as Nehru did. . . . While Nehru will be reckoned as the most important single figure in this country’s parliamentary history, he was by no means the greatest parliamentarians of his time. The honour belongs to Syama Prasad Mukherjee, the founder of Jan Sangh, the forerunner of today’s BJP.19 These were nothing but reflections of an intense churning that was taking place at the societal level, which now found reflection at the institutional level too.

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The changed composition of the Lok Sabha ran together with changes in the policy priorities of the government. The economic recession and the food crisis of the period (1965–1969) encouraged the political elite to pressurize the government for certain major policy changes to cater to the immediate economic need of the dominant classes, including the liberalization of industrial policy, the downgrading of planning, the existence of strong Planning Commission associated with a strong center and the new agriculture strategy. There were demands of decentralization, greater state autonomy and more tolerance for state-based opposition parties. Though these demands were often not met by the Indira Gandhi government at the center, especially if the states were ruled by non-Congress parties, it resulted in serious tension between the center and states, particularly after 1969.

1989–2009 The third phase in the evolution of the parliament may be characterized as a phase of Bahujan (dalits and other lower caste groups) ascendency. Two changes stand out in the evolution of the Lok Sabha in the post-1989 period. The first was the remarkable decline in the presence of urban, educated professional classes, in particular of the lawyers. The percentage of lawyers in the Lok Sabha declined by nine percent in the period 1984–1991 alone. This, however, did not mean that the urban professional classes, who had a sizeable presence in pre1989 period had altogether lost interest in the political process. Taken together, lawyers, businessmen, educationists and urban professionals still constituted nearly 40 percent of the Lok Sabha membership in this phase (see Table 6.3). There was also a plateau in the growth of members occupied in agriculture and related activities during this period. In fact, the Eighth and Tenth Lok Sabhas witnessed a decline in members engaged in agriculture while the percentage of members involved in social and political work increased. A second and perhaps a more important change was in the caste composition of the Lok Sabha. Statistical analysis reveals the declining hegemony of Brahmins. Their representation in the Lok Sabha declined significantly from the Tenth Lok Sabha in 1991. From about 14–15 percent representation in the previous nine Lok Sabhas, their representation declined to 7.6 percent in the Tenth and 10.2 percent in the Eleventh Lok Sabha.20 Brahmins constituted the majority of the class of professionals. They were doctors, teachers, engineers, service holders and the like. A downward swing in both is indicative of the effective decline in the numbers of the educated, often English-speaking,

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Table 6.3 Social and economic profile of MPs, 1989–2009

Age 25–45 46–65 65 and above Education Below graduate Graduate Above graduate Occupation Lawyer Agriculture Social and political workers

1989

1991

1996

1998

1999

2004

2009

31.02 58.43 10.55

32.67 57.23 10.10

29.64 55.43 14.93

29.34 57.20 13.46

29.94 56.56 13.50

25.67 59.43 14.48

18.89 60.73 18.34

21.75

23.61

23.63

22.49

19.71

21.17

19.26

48.75 29.50

43.65 32.74

42.94 34.43

44.80 32.71

48.03 32.26

45.85 31.12

47.88 30.45

15.36 44.14 17.08

16.34 32.09 18.11

12.24 38.98 19.59

10.15 49.06 18.06

12.24 42.67 20.04

12.26 41.88 23.77

13.57 41.10 19.81

Source: Who's Who of Lok Sabha (1989–2009), (Lok Sabha Secretariat, New Delhi); Parliament of India; Ninth to the Twelfth Lok Sabha: A Study, (Lok Sabha Secretariat, 1989, 1991, 1992, 1997, 2000, New Delhi). All figures are in percentages.

professional class in parliamentary politics. It may be pointed out that decline in the representation of Brahmins coincided with the increased representation of the members from the SCs, STs and OBCs sections of society. In the same period, however, Hindu upper caste representation as distinct from Hindu Brahmin representation, registered an upward swing particularly since the Eighth Lok Sabha (1984–1989). An average of 32 percent upper caste Hindus and 12 percent Brahmins have occupied seats in the Lok Sabha during this period 1985–1998. The average rate of Hindu upper caste representation grew by one percent every term. Most significant, however, was the increased representation of the backward classes. Till 1989, their representation in the Lok Sabha never exceeded 19 percent, disproportionately lower than their 52 percent (approximate) share in the country’s population. The Ninth Lok Sabha (1989) witnessed a significant increase in the representation of the backward castes. Form 14.3 percent in the Eighth Lok Sabha, their representation registered a seven percent increase, to 22.4 percent.

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Since then, the representation of OBCs has been around 22.5 percent in every subsequent Lok Sabha.21 Majority of the new MPs belonging to state parties were from the backward classes and were older, more experienced and had moved from state politics to national level. Thus the Indian legislature witnessed a further increase in the average age and maturity of the members (51.7 years). The number of young entrants declined. The educational qualification of members improved further. It can be surmised with a degree of certainty that the Indian Parliament became one of the most qualified body of members, comparable to the legislature of any other developed country of the world notwithstanding the fact that nearly 40 percent of the India’s population was illiterate. Seen in conjecture, it is not difficult to surmise that the Lok Sabha has accommodated the prosperous and highly educated sections of the society who drew sustenance from urban professions, agriculture or full-time political work. An average legislator under the non-Congress majority Parliament was a graduate, came from a rural or semi-urban area, was involved in agriculture or in full-time politics, was prosperous and belonged to the backward class Hindu community. The third phase of the evolution of parliamentary democracy was characterized by the ascendancy of the Bahujans (middle class, lower caste members).22 The Bahujan ascendancy challenged upper caste dominance. Many of them came from small towns and villages and were products of the spread of education. The changed composition of the Lok Sabha had an impact on its functioning. It evolved with a more local character, which emphasized the ‘representation of persons’ rather than issues. Thus, the time spent on legislations was far less than the time spent on Question, Motions and Resolutions, raising matters of public importance, half-hour discussions and the like. The Ninth Lok Sabha spent only 16 percent of its time on the discussion of legislative enactments, compared to 25 percent in the Eighth Lok Sabha. The number of enactments also declined from 417 (83 annually) in the Eighth Lok Sabha to less than 122 (70 annually) in the Twelfth Lok Sabha and 146 in the Fifteenth Lok Sabha. There was also a decline in time spent on the discussion of the budget.23 Also, the supervisory function performed by the Lok Sabha suffered a setback. Thus, from approximately 50,000 questions that members sought to propose annually in the Eighth Lok Sabha, the figure declined to 19,000 in the Twelfth Lok Sabha. Notices received for adjournment motion declined from 1800 to 83 in the same period.24

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Concomitantly, there was an increase in time spent in airing the grievances of the people. In all, a third of the time of the Lok Sabha was spent on airing grievances.25 It was no longer the visits of foreign dignitaries or foreign affairs issues that elicited discussion, rather, issues that were raised by the media and that aimed at embarrassing the government found prominence. Resolutions that were of a general nature received almost similar attention from the members as in the previous phase. It appears, therefore, that there was a shift in the focus of the Lok Sabha. Members sought to control the executive through the process of representation of local and regional interests. The Lok Sabha now assumed a new role. It emerged as a body that provided numbers to form the government, bargained and compromised with the government on behalf of member’s constituencies and exercised control over the executive through representation.

The context of democratization of Parliament The changing profile of Lok Sabha membership, especially since 1989, must be understood in the context of two significant developments in Indian politics. The first has been the growing democratization and inclusiveness of Indian politics manifested in increasing participation of the masses in the electoral process. A second and related development has been the tremendous growth and consolidation of state parties. The increasing size of Indian electorate (from 17 million in 1952 to about 71.7 million in 2009), and the rise in electoral turnout especially from amongst the under-privileged sections of the society including the SC, ST, OBC and women have broadened the democratic process of the country. The increase in participation has come gradually in two phases referred by Yogendra Yadav as ‘First Democratic Upsurge’ and ‘Second Democratic Upsurge.’26 The first upsurge in mass participation was characterized by an increased turnout among the SCs and STs, while the second witnessed improved participation from the OBCs, women and Muslims, particularly in the relatively less developed states of the Hindi heartland. At the same time, the interest of the urban educated and the prosperous elite in the electoral process, has not declined substantially. A second important development has been the gradual consolidation of regional parties (See Table 6.4). The state parties such as the SP and BSP devised strategies of electoral mobilization based on traditional cleavages of Indian society or deprivation sentiments. This helped them in gaining rich political dividends and soon established them as

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Table 6.4 Performance of state and national parties, 1989–2009 Year

1989 1991 1996 1998 1999 2004 2009 2014

State parties

National parties

Seats

Vote share

Seats

Vote share

27 51 129 101 158 159 146 176

9.28 13.08 22.43 18.97 26.93 28.90 28.4 15.20

471 478 403 387 369 364 376 342

79.34 80.58 69.08 67.98 67.11 62.89 63.58 60.70

Source: Election Commission of India, Statistical Report on the General Elections to the Lok Sabha, First to the Fifteenth Lok Sabha, 1952–2014, New Delhi

important players in national politics. Their vote share doubled from nine per cent in 1989 to 15 per cent in 2014, while their seat share in Lok Sabha increased by more than six times from 27 in the same period. In contrast, the vote share of national parties has declined by 19 percent, and seat share from 471 in 1989 to 376 in 2009. Though these state parties were confined to one or a few states, their influence at national level was significant. Thus, between 1989 and 2009 no party at the center has been able to form a government without the support of state parties. It is no less significant that both the Congress and BJP entered the 2014 general election contest with their alliances consisting of state parties, not expecting absolute majority, and despite gaining absolute majority the BJP kept its flock of the NDA intact with all the state parties. State parties and democratization of Parliament In the light of the growing presence and gradual consolidation of state parties at the national level, it would have been logical to expect that regional parties would bring about substantial changes in the membership of the Lok Sabha. This is in the context of the strong support base that these parties enjoy from the hitherto deprived sections of the society, and new strategies of mobilization based on caste loyalties that they have adopted. However, empirical evidence suggests that apart from the larger presence of backward caste members, the increased presence of these parties did not bring any significant change in the character of the Lok Sabha. The average age of members of national parties and state parties are almost similar. In fact, majority of the young entrants to the last two Lok Sabha belonged to national parties such as the Congress. The

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average age of the members of state party MPs is higher than that of national parties. Statistical analysis of the representatives of the state parties reveal that the members of state parties are as educated as their counterparts at the national level (76 percent of regional party members compared to 78 percent in national parties in the Fourteenth Lok Sabha). Some state parties such as the BJD in the East and MDMK and DMK in the South have members with a high level of education. Even parties such as SP and BSP have a majority of highly educated members. It may be argued that the high educational qualification of members may be related to the spread of education in the country. While this is largely correct, it may be pointed out that many of these MPs have specialized education in fields such as engineering, management and law. The linkages between higher educational background and class status thus cannot be ignored altogether. The asset base of the members of regional parties is also high.27

A North-South divide? Within the larger picture, however, there are certain sub-trends that need to be highlighted. It is possible to identify a distinction between the membership of the state parties of the North and the South. Thus, for instance, the MPs of state parties from states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala were more educated than their northern counterparts. In the South, 81 percent of the MPs were graduates or above in 2009 compared to 79 per cent in North; while only 0.2 percent in the South are under-matriculates compared to 0.4 percent in the North. There was also a significant presence of members with intermediate level of education (16 percent) from the regional parties of South. In occupational terms too, there appears to be significant dissimilarities. The MPs of regional parties of South including Andhra Pradesh were industrialists, businessmen, traders or professionals. Thus, for instance, 38 members of state parties of North were agriculturist in 2004 as opposed to only 11 in the state parties of South. In addition to the aforementioned categories MPs of the South also belonged to occupational groups of medical practitioners, journalists, writers and teachers. The upper/intermediary caste, educated, urban middle-class professionals chose to contest parliamentary elections, rather than the intensely competitive State Legislative Assembly elections. The elite, upper caste, English-speaking politicians of the South too sought membership of the Parliament. Such members were often the spokespersons

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of state parties and state interests in the Parliament. One may recall the élan with which Kanimozhi of DMK, Renuka Chowdhury of TDP and A. Raja of AIADMK represented their parties in the Lok Sabha. Interestingly, most State party leaders in the southern states sought to utilize their dominance at state politics to leverage power at the national level. It is, therefore, not surprising that the southern satraps such as M.K. Karunanidhi of DMK and H.D Kumaraswamy of JDU showed less inclination to enter the Lok Sabha compared to their counterparts in the North such as Mayawati (BSP), Mulayam Singh Yadav (SP) or Lalu Prasad (RJD), all of whom have been members of Parliament.

Implications of changing membership profile The changed composition of the Lok Sabha unfolds a story of the development of parliamentary democracy in India. It unveils the impact of the process of democratization on the functioning of Parliament, and brings out the limitations of the process. These limitations may well determine the future course of Parliament. Despite the growing inclusiveness of electoral democracy as witnessed through increased voter turnout in subsequent elections and gradual improvement in representativeness of Lok Sabha, parliamentary membership remains confined to the educated and prosperous sections of society. The poor among the Dalits, the Tribals, Muslims and women remained under-represented in the Lok Sabha in all the phases of its development. Thus, while the English-speaking, urban, professional classes, together with the upper caste landed gentry, constituted the privileged group in the first phase of evolution, the intermediary castes from rural and semi-urban backgrounds found entry into this rank in the 1967–1989 period. The third phase of evolution was characterized by the ascendancy of members from of the semi-urban or rural backward classes, but who were educated and qualified. The increased presence of state parties has changed the caste profile of Lok Sabha, largely due to the mobilization strategies used by such parties. However, there has been no substantial change in the age, education and occupational profile of members and hence the class profile of Lok Sabha. On the contrary, as state politics increasingly became the domain of the dominant groups (backward caste, educated and prosperous), the Parliament, as discussed in the preceding section, appeared to be providing some refuge to the upper caste, urban, English-speaking and articulate elite especially from the states of South India.

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These developments seem to indicate that there is a disjuncture between elections and the representative institutions born out of it, namely, the Lok Sabha. While the electoral process has become increasingly inclusive in its character with increased participation from SC, ST, OBCs, women and Muslims, the Parliament has accommodated a widening circle of socially and economically elite. The poor and the subaltern are yet to be represented in proportion to their population. In a descriptive sense, therefore the process of the democratization of the Parliament is still a ‘work in progress.’ It may, however, be pointed out that representation in the Parliament is ensured through numerous intermediary institutions. Political parties are one among many such institutions, which appear to be of singular importance. The democratization of Parliament to a large extent is dependent of the democratization of political parties. The inadequacy of descriptive representation in the Lok Sabha may be on account of the inadequate inclusiveness of political parties. This, however, requires a separate enquiry. Notwithstanding its pace and adequacy, the democratization of the parliamentary membership is accompanied with a simmering conflict between different segments of the parliamentary members, each segment making an attempt to bring its distinct culture within the institution and establish their dominance. At the political level these conflicts have found reverberations in two major movements of the period; the implementation of the Mandal Commission recommendation by the V.P. Singh government to reserve to 27 percent seats for backward classes in educational institutions and government jobs, largely as a result of the consolidation of Backward castes and the students agitation against it; and the movement for the construction of Ram Temple in Ayodhya by the BJP, the VHP and its allies to consolidate its upper caste Hindu vote bank at a time when State parties like BSP and SP which had the support of backward castes were on the rise.28 The intense rivalry between them has resulted in less than adequate accommodation of popular aspirations. The result has been intense conflict, instability and agitational politics at the institutional level (read Parliamentary) and dissatisfaction about the functioning of parliament in public perception.29 As a result, law making, which constitutes one of the three most significant functions of the legislature, has witnessed a steady decline. The time spent on discussion of bills and the number of legislations enacted, the extent of discussion and the interest of members in the deliberative process, have declined gradually. The Parliament has emerged as an important adversarial space. The primary focus of political parties in

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the Parliament has been to question the credibility of the government, sometimes with a view to bringing it down.

Redefining parliamentary functions The changing membership profile of the Parliament has gradually brought about a change in the manner which members of Parliament have conceptualized their own role as well as the role of Parliament in Indian democracy. MPs appear to be acutely conscious of their ‘elite’ status, and the difficulties of representing a large and diverse population within a multifunctional institution. The fragmentation of political parties and the resulting rise of coalition politics, instable governments and lack of clearly distinguishable ideologies at a policy level have further compounded the problems of representation. Significantly, the primary roles of the Parliament – representation, deliberation, law making, enforcing accountability and responsibility of the executive – appear to have become merely the theoretical functions of the legislature. In the estimation of an Indian legislator, the Parliament apparently exists to perform the following functions: a b c d e f

Provide necessary numbers that are needed for government formation. Correct imbalances born out of the functioning of competitive politics. Provide the theatrical space for adversarial combat rather than of deliberative clarity. Launch an attack on government policy and its implementation. Represent local interest and constituency concerns, and Communicate with the electorate.

The most important function of the Parliament in the last two decades has been to provide the necessary numbers for government formation. This has emerged as the primary utility of the Parliament, the sin qua non of its existence. MPs anchor their actions such as demand for specific portfolios, state-specific concessions and waiver of all central loans to this. Such demands are justified on grounds of political biases of previous dispositions. They have assumed the status of democratic means of rectifying political imbalances. It is in this respect that the role of Indian Parliament appears to have outgrown its British counterpart from which it was inspired the most.

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Redefining representation: above all act as representatives The disjuncture between electoral participation and representative institution has had a second important consequence: it has led to a redefinition of what constitutes the very idea of representation. The new political elite has given a new interpretation to this complicated concept and the means of achieving it. Thus, representation is no longer defined as an act realized through deliberation, discussions or raising questions on the floor of the House. It has rather been interpreted to mean any act that leads to recognition of a parliamentarian by print and visual media, parliamentary colleagues, party leadership on the floor of the House. The recognition of a member is equated with representation of his or her constituency. To achieve the purpose of this kind of representation, members have relied primarily two methods. The first and relatively more acceptable method involves raising local issues at the national level. The importance of raising local or state level public concerns within the Parliament cannot be undermined, though many a times, an appropriate and effective forum for raising a local issue is the state legislature. However, given the publicity that an issue raised in the Parliament receives, MPs choose the Parliament over other institutions. MPs across party lines are keen on raising local issues and constituency concerns in the interest of maximizing political gains and gaining public attention. Discussions on national issues have also been interpreted from local stand points and parliamentary procedures of all types are used to achieve this end. This explains the significant increase in time spent by members in raising matters of public importance during Zero Hour, Discussions under Rule 55 and 56 and the like which allow member to raise constituency level (see Table 6.5). The Law Ministry too recognized this when it observed: much of the valuable time of the House is taken up by a variety of local and other unimportant issues. The House as a whole can illafford the time for lengthy discussions on such issues which drag on for day after day. It may, therefore, be in the fitness of things to suitably amend the Rules of Procedure in order to more firmly prevent Members raising in the House matters of local or limited interest with which the Houses as a whole is not vitally concerned. These may be raised in the committees. Similarly, the many controversial issues which are now usually raised during question time or soon thereafter in what has now come to be known as the ‘Zero

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Table 6.5 Percentage of time spent on different parliamentary activities Parliamentary Lok Sabha (in percentage) business 1977 1980 1984 1989 1991 1996 1998 1999 2004 2009 Bills Budget Question Hour Calling attention Rule 377 Short duration discussion

23.51 23.99 25.00 16.23 22.16 15.66 16.60 25.30 21.63 23.79 23.26 20.84 21.74 16.00 17.38 17.60 14.68 10.90 20.32 20.63 13.70 12.20 12.80 10.14 11.80 9.58 8.96 11.70 11.42 9.05 0.06 9.58 3.75 2.79 0.37 0.80 1.08 1.0

3.6

1.45

2.51 3.19 2.46 2.14 1.83 1.98 2.06 11 1.27 0.34 4.10 9.14 15.77 12.95 7.40 8.30 19.15 18.99 15.78 9.11

Source: Parliament of India, Sixth to the Twelfth Lok Sabha: A Study, (Lok Sabha Secretariat, 1977, 1979, 1985,1991,1992,1997, 2000); Resume of the Work Done by Lok Sabha, (Thirteenth and Fourteenth Lok Sabha), (Lok Sabha Secretariat, 2004, 2009, New Delhi)

Hour’ could better be dealt with in the Committees. . . . The floor time ought to be better utilised for major policy matters, matters of vital national interest and important legislative and financial business.30 A second method of representation has been the use of acts of protests such as rushing to the well of the House, sloganeering, walking out of the House or even boycotting it completely.31 They are regarded by most parliamentarians as a part of the process of representation, as tools of gaining recognition on the floor of the House or as an easy way to national limelight.32 Without a doubt, the use of such means of representation must be seen in the context of increasing work and decreasing time available for parliamentary work on the one hand and the rise of adversarial politics on the other hand. In the last two decades, the sessions of the Lok Sabha as well as the time spent by it has consistently declined.33 According to the PRS Legislative Research 61 percent of parliamentary time in the Fifteenth Lok Sabha, 87 percent in the Thirteenth Lok Sabha and 91 percent in the Twelfth Lok Sabha was used for parliamentary work. Nearly one-third of the time of the Fourteenth Lok Sabha was lost to disruptions (see Table 6.6). Question Hour, considered to be the most important part of parliamentary proceedings, was held for only 43 percent of the scheduled time of Lok Sabha.

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Table 6.6 Time lost in the Lok Sabha Year

Percentage of total time

1991 1996 1998 1999 2004 2009

9.95 5.28 10.66 22.4 26.0 29.0

Source: Parliament of India, Ninth to Twelfth Lok Sabha: A Study, (Lok Sabha Secretariat, New Delhi, 1971 1977, 1979, 1985, 1991, 1992, 1997, 2000); Resume of the Work Done by the Lok Sabha, (Lok Sabha Secretariat, 2004, 2009, New Delhi).

The loss of time coupled with the perception of instability created by coalition government creates pressure among political parties. MPs, particularly the backbenchers, who seldom get an opportunity to participate in parliamentary proceedings, attempt to make an impact and gain recognition in the shortest possible time through media spectacle rather than through serious discussions.34 The rise of ‘adversarial politics’ especially in the past has also contributed to this idea of representation through disruptions. Adversarial politics is characterized by lack of cooperation between the government and opposition for often no obvious reason. Traditionally, on issues of defense, finance and foreign affairs, there has been collaboration between the government and opposition. Of late however, this collaboration has been replaced by obstruction and even collusion. Tight party control on account of the Anti-Defection Law, lack of opportunities for the back benchers to air their opinions within the House and instability of coalition governments have been sighted as other important reasons for resorting to the use of unparliamentarily methods.35 Irrespective of the reasons for obstruction of parliamentary business, MPs concede that use of such methods has two main advantages – first, it gives instant publicity, and recognition to an MP and his or her party from the media and adds recall value to the member resorting to the use of such methods. Second, it also creates the façade of active participation and representation, wherein members and a political party are perceived as being in a ‘combative mode.’36 One may question whether such interpretation of representation is in conformity with the very idea of representation or whether representation of this kind has popular approval.

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Conceptualizing a limited role? A third related development relates to the role that MPs have conceptualized for themselves. A survey of MPs across party lines by the author showed that majority of MPs identified themselves as ‘intermediaries between the government and the people,’ communicating government policies, representing the constituency, state or region’s concern and demanding concessions and resources on behalf of the people they represented.37 While most representatives were aware that they were elected to participate in parliamentary deliberations, they associated their role as representatives with that of ‘attending to the social and economic needs of the constituents.’ MPs perceived themselves as ‘representing’ when they performed a constituency errand. Participation in the decision-making process, through deliberation or supervision, were of secondary importance in their role conceptualization. Nor did they see themselves as effective check on the arbitrary exercise of executive authority. What leads MPs of Parliament to imagine themselves as mere ‘agents’ of the party or people, or as delegates rather than as institutional functionaries with an independent area of functioning is an interesting area of enquiry?38 A few factors responsible for such conceptualization are easily identifiable. First, MPs opine that the performance of constituency functions has an impact on their long-term political prospects, and gave them dividends (in the form of re-election or party nomination) that frequent and effective legislative participation could not.39 There may be some truth in this. Thus only six of the top ten performing MPs of the Fifteenth Lok Sabha were re-elected.40 As Amitabh Behar, national convener, National Social Watch points out ‘even though they (such MPs) work well within the house, it does not get translated at the local level.’41 It is not surprising therefore that most MPs focused on attending to local problems and representing local issues. Second, such representation helps in forging local bonds and creating a perception among the electorate that members ‘acted as representative’ in an active and democratic manner. Third, sometimes though not always, the limited support base of a member forced them to conceptualize such a role, where the member would be ‘seen’ and ‘heard’ as having represented the constituency, though they may belong to a class/caste/gender that is different from the majority of his or her electorate. This list is, however, indicative and not exhaustive. The focus on constituency concerns to the near exclusion of others was not only due to these individual orient factors. The centralized nature of Indian parties, the high command culture and the lack of inner party

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democracy has meant that almost all important decisions, including the stand to be taken by the party members within the Parliament, on various issues are taken by party leadership. This has deglamorized the role of the legislators as an independent participant in the parliamentary activity. Though MPs are not discouraged from parliamentary participation, there appears to be no incentive structure to encourage such activity either. Added to this, each political party has groomed a group of parliamentarians who articulate on almost every issue. These members are almost always part of the top leadership, or are their close confidantes.42 A vast majority of members of Parliament have therefore neither the expertise nor the opportunity to fruitfully participate in the deliberative process. Legislative activity has thus been conceptualized as ‘individual’ rather than ‘corporate’/collective one and comprises of participation in Parliamentary activity by some, and performance of constituency functions by others. This limited conceptualization appears to have adversely affected the functional efficiency of the Parliament with members more keen on constituency functions. It has also contributed to gradual erosion of its legitimacy in public perception. Whether this has led to Parliament ceding grounds to other institution can be a matter of further enquiry.

Conclusion There can be little doubt that the development of Indian Parliament, especially in the last two decades, has led to changes in the nature of Parliament, and the transformation in nature of membership has played a significant role in this. The increasingly representative character of the Indian Parliament, notwithstanding its inadequacies, has changed the nature of the representative institution and the manner in which the act of representation is performed by MPs. •

•

•

From an efficient deliberative mechanism, consisting largely of urban, professional and English-speaking representatives, who debated, deliberated and legislated, it has transformed into a more democratic body consisting of semi-urban, agricultural and backward caste members that is disruptive and airs public concerns. It has resulted in prioritizing between law making, supervision and representation. Among the three, members have given maximum importance to representation. It has led to a redefinition of what constitutes ‘representation’ and the manner in which the ‘act of representation’ is performed within the Parliament.

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M. Manisha It has given a new dimension to the functioning of the Parliament in India, which is local, disruptive and sometimes obstructionist in nature.

These changes do not indicate a ‘decline of Parliament.’ The idea of decline of Parliament43 is based on two presumptions. The first presumption is that there is a clear and well-defined set of functions that the Parliament has to perform, irrespective of societal differences and the cultural milieu. Second, it integrates in itself the idea that there existed a ‘golden era of Parliament.’ Both these presumptions do not stand the test of valid enquiry. The functions performed by institutions may vary from nation to nation and each nation and every institution may evolve a set of roles that are unique to itself. The Indian Parliament has evolved distinctive functions, which are different, but not inferior to the legislatures of other countries. In addition, the British Parliament on which the Indian Parliament is modeled, does not provide an example of a perfect Parliament worthy of replication. The post-independence Indian Parliament, too, was a prisoner of the colonial past. It was led by westernized and modernized members who possessed a world view that was different from that of the vast majority of the Indian people. The modern Indian Parliament has evolved leadership, functions and roles that are indigenous and are rooted to India’s democratic societal milieu. It has created its own culture, functions and role that deserve to be noticed and acknowledged.

Notes 1 I am deeply indebted to Prof. Ajay K. Mehra for going through the draft of the chapter and making valuable suggestions to improve it. The shortcomings of the chapter are entirely mine. 2 For example, W.H. Morris-Jones, Parliament in India, London: Longman and Green Company, 1957. 3 See: Valerian Rodrigues, The Indian Parliament: Democracy at Work, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2010; Christophe Jafferlot and Sanjay Kumar, The Rise of the Plebeians? The Changing Face of Indian Legislative Assemblies, New Delhi: Routledge India, 2009. 4 Hanna Pitkin provides, perhaps, one of the most straightforward definitions of political representation; the activity of making citizens’ voices, opinions, and perspectives ‘present’ in the public policy making processes. According to Pitkin political representation occurs when political actors speak, advocate, symbolize and act on behalf of others in the political arena. Among the types of representation that Pitkin identifies is descriptive representation, which refers to the extent to which a representative resembles those being represented. It is concerned with the question: does the representative look like, have common interests with, or share

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6 7

8

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certain experiences with the represented? It assesses the representative by the accuracy of the resemblance between the representative and the represented. Others hold that representative stands for the people by virtue of a correspondence or a connection between them, which involves resemblance or reflection. Hanna Pitkin, Theories of Representation, Berkley: University of California Press, 1967. Also See: George Cave and Cecil S. Emden, The People and the Constitution, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1956, p. 4; Robert Luce, Legislative Principles, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1930, p. 284, C.A. Beard and John Lewis, ‘Representative Government in Evolution’, APSA, XXVI, April 1932, pp. 223–240. Other debates on representation include Michael Saward’s consideration of political representation as a dynamic process rather than a static relationship focusing on ‘what representation does, rather than what it is’ and to see representation as ‘the product of a performance.’ (Michael Saward, The Representative Claim, Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2010) and Iris Marion Young’s observation that representation is inherent even in participatory politics (Iris Marion, Young, Inclusion and Democracy, New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2000). Transcendental Representation refers to the representation beyond itself, a transcendental reality, e.g., Representing truth. As international, transnational and non-governmental actors play an important role in advancing public policies on behalf of democratic citizens, representatives ‘speak for,’ ‘act for’ and can even ‘stand for’ individuals within a nation-state. Hence, representation is not limited only those who share descriptive similarities, or are even to elected officials within the nation-state. It is not unusual, for instance, for men to raise issues related to women, or non-Dalits to stand for Dalits. In that sense, representation extends beyond institutional boundaries and NGOs and civil society organizations may also be involved in the process. Nadia Urbinati and Mark Warren’s work emphasizes on the multiplication of practices of including in deliberative forums Nadia Urbinati and Mark E. Warren, ‘The Concept of Representation in Contemporary Democratic Theory,’ Annual Review of Political Science, 11(1) 2008, p. 403. Pitkin, 1967, op. cit., p. 50. Pitkins (1967, op. cit., p. 55) does not consider the accountability theory systematically stated. Theorists of accountability argue that the electors hold representatives accountable or responsible to them. In his opinion, a representative body is an arena in which the general opinion of the nation, of every section of it, and of every eminent individual residing there, is reflected. See: Edmund Burke, Speech to the Electors of Bristol, vol. 2, Boston: Little Brown and Company, 1901, p. 95; Robert Hutchins, ‘Theory of Oligarchy: Edmund Burke’, Thomists, V, January 1943, pp. 61–78, http:// search.proquest.com/openview/ca50087c7ce1875fd3b7af8e37b0d9b5/1 ?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=1818586; John Stuart Mill, Considerations on Representative Government, New York: Liberal Arts Press, 1958. Pitkin (1967, op. cit.) describes representation as the ability of constituents to punish their representative for failing to act in accordance with their wishes, or the responsiveness of the representative to the constituents. It is concerned with one central question, how is the representative responsive towards his or her constituents’ references?

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9 The relationship between voters and MPs has predominantly been discussed in terms of whether representatives should act as ‘delegates, putting instructions from the represented above their own judgment, or as trustees,’ following their own judgment rather than that of their constituents. The right of a representative to act on his or her own, in the interest of his or her constituents, constitutes the basis of independence theorists. They treat political questions as complex and beyond the capabilities of ordinary people. Further, the diversity of the constituencies and the absence of a single will or opinion within the constituencies also necessitates that the representative acts as a trustee, interpreting and representing the perceived interests of the constituents. See: Pitkin, 1967, op. cit., Heinz Eulau and John C. Wahlke, ‘The Role of the Representative: Some Empirical Observations on the Theory of Edmund Burke’, American Political Science Review, 53, 1959, pp. 742–756; Henry Ford, Representative Government, New York: Henry Holt, 1924 and Burke, op. cit., pp. 145–147. 10 In their analysis of the style of political representation in France, Converse and Pierce (1986) pointed out that representatives are but another variety of the delegate, with the party rather than the people as the focus of representation, Philip E. Converse and Roy Pierce, Political Representation in France, Cambridge, MA: Belknap, 1986. Also See: Pitkins, op. cit., p. 147, Howard Lee Bam, The Living Constitution, New York: Macmillan, 1948; Anthony Downs, An Economic Theory of Democracy, New York: Harper, 1957. 11 ‘Independence theorist’ counter this on the ground that parties are biased and party interests are sectional, not national. Hence, the representative must be free of party obligation to act in national interest, as they see it. See: Simon Sterne, Representative Government, Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott, 1871. 12 For a discussion the three stages see M. Manisha, ‘How Democratic Is Our Parliament? Elite Representation and Functional Efficiency of Lok Sabha’, in M. Manisha and Sharmila Mitra Deb (eds.), Indian Democracy: Problems and Prospects, New Delhi: Anthem Publishers, 2007, pp. 66–80. 13 The category comprises professional politicians, employed in all probability in full-time political and social work. 14 Morris-Jones, 1957, op. cit., p. 156. 15 ‘Regional elite’ refers to the rural, semi-urban, prosperous class. Many of them belonged to the class of landed gentry and rich peasantry, but were generally of upper caste origins and, in some cases, belonged to the intermediary castes. Their ideological and cultural milieus were indigenous, in view of the fact that they were educated in the country itself. 16 The proportion of agriculturists among Congress members increased from 18.2 percent in 1952 to 27.2 percent in 1962 and 36.8 percent in 1967. Hung-Chao Tai, Land Reform and Policies: A Comparative Analysis, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1974. 17 Under Rule 55 (1) the Speaker may allot half an hour in three sittings in a week for raising discussion on a matter of sufficient public importance which has been the subject of a recent question, oral or written, and the answer to which needs elucidation on a matter of fact. Rule 56 provides that a motion for an adjournment of the business of the House may be made with the consent of the Speaker for the purpose of discussing a

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23 24 25 26

27

28 29

30 31

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definite matter of urgent public importance may be made with the consent of the Speaker. Computed on the basis of subject wise classification of Questions, Statistical Handbook Lok Sabha, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat, 2012. Inder Malhotra, ‘Parliament Since Independence’, The Hindu (Chennai), 19 May 1991. M. Manisha, Parliamentary Democracy in India: A Critical Study of Lok Sabha, 1975–1998, Unpublished thesis, Kolkata: Jadavpur University, 2007. CSDS Data Unit. Bahujan, meaning the majority people, is a term coined by the political leaders and parties representing erstwhile untouchable and other ‘lower’ caste communities, whom Gandhi had described as harijan (children of God). The leadership emerging and perpetuating in the 1980s and after challenged the nomenclature, which they considered patronizing. They asserted their majority character as compared to the upper castes and described the community as bahujan. Statistical Handbook of Lok Sabha, Lok Sabha Secretariat, New Delhi, 2014. Manisha, 2007, op. cit. While the Sixth Lok Sabha spent 4 percent of its time for the purpose, the Seventh Lok Sabha spent 9 percent, the Eighth Lok Sabha, 16 percent, the Ninth, 12 percent and the Twelfth, 19 percent on discussions. Yogendra Yadav, ‘Understanding the Second Democratic Upsurge: Trends of Bahujan Participation in Electoral Politics of 1990s’, in Francine Frankel, Zoya Hasan, Rajeev Bhargav and Balveer Arora (eds.), Transforming India: Social and Political Dynamics of Democracy, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2001, p. 121. In the Fifteenth Lok Sabha, 67 percent MPs of Congress, 50 percent BJP, 64 percent SP, 62 percent BSP, 62 percent of DMK had an asset of ₹10 million or above. The average asset base of member of the Fourteenth Lok Sabha was ₹31 million for the Congress, followed by BSP and Shiv Sena at ₹15 million. See Christophe Jafferlot and Thomas Blom Hansen (ed.), The BJP and the Compulsions of Politics, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1998. According to a survey, 56 percent people had trust in Parliament in 2013, while 23 percent had no trust. On the other hand, only 48 percent people had trust in MPs in 2009, while 36 percent did not trust them. Nearly 40 percent of all people surveyed in 2013 approved the statement that India should get rid of Parliament and elections and have a strong leader decide things, while 35 percent disagreed (the rest had no response). Similarly, nearly 40 percent of people agreed that we should have experts make decisions on behalf of the people rather than Parliament and elections, as opposed to 33 percent who disagreed. (Source: Democracy in India: A Citizens’ Perspective, Lokniti, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies: Delhi,2013.) Background Paper on the Working of the Indian Parliament and Need for Reforms, Ministry of Law, http://lawmin.nic.in/ncrwc/finalreport/v2b3-1. htm (Accessed on 8 July 2016). Ajay K. Mehra, ‘Indian Parliament and the “Grammar of Anarchy”’, in National Social Watch Coalition (ed.), Citizens Report on Governance and Development, New Delhi: Sage, 2007.

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32 Sushma Swaraj, The Hindu, 11th August 2011. 33 The first Congress government in 1952 and the last Congress-led government in 2009 were both in power for about 1,800 days. But the 1952 group of MPs spent almost twice as many days in the Lok Sabha as the 2009. Though the number of bills passed by the Lok Sabha has declined from 336 in First to 146 in the Fifteenth, the number of bills introduced has increased. 34 See Ajay K. Mehra, D.D. Khanna and Guert W. Kueck (eds.), Political Parties and Party System, New Delhi: Sage, 2003. 35 G.C. Malhotra (ed.), Fifty Years of Indian Parliament, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat, 2002. 36 Balveer Arora attributes the disorder and decline in efficiency of Parliament to the change in the composition of the Parliament and discussion of contentious issues such as oppression of Dalits in the House. See Balveer Arora, ‘Indian Parliament and Democracy’, in Ajay K. Mehra and Gert W. Keuck (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Comparative Perspective, New Delhi: Konark, 2003. 37 A survey of 100 Members of the Parliament was carried out by the author as a part of her ICCSR Research project in ‘Social Bases of State Parties: A Study of Legislative Performance of Fourteenth Lok Sabha’. 38 Edmund Burke characterized the representative as a delegate, whose function was to merely re-present the views of the electorate. Edmund Burke, Speech to the Electors of Bristol, vol. 2, Boston: Little Brown and Company, 1901, p. 95. 39 Interview with Basudev Acharya, MP, on 2 April 2005. Manavendra Singh, MP on 21 March 2005 in New Delhi, Suresh Bhardwaj, Former MP on 11 March 2003, Sushma Swaraj on 17 March 2012 in New Delhi and Rajnath Singh, 21 March 2014 in New Delhi. 40 The Citizens Report on Governance assessed 545 members of the house, based on their performances within the house, under the categories of participation in debates, number of supplementary questions asked, number of private members’ bill (PMB) proposed, and attendance. For details See: Bhaskar Rao Gorantala, Research Brief on Performance of MPs of 15th Lok Sabha, National Social Watch, http://socialwatchindia.net/images/ documents/418/Performance%20of%20MPs%20of%2015th%20 Lok%20Sabha.pdf; Citizens Report on Governance and Development, National Social Watch, New Delhi: Sage, 2010 (Accessed on 16 July 2016). 41 www.dnaindia.com/bangalore/report-re-election-of-mps-is-not-subjectto-parliamentary-performance-1497199 (Accessed on 16 July 2016). 42 Interview with Basudev Acharya, MP, on 2 April, 2005. Manavendra Singh, MP, on 21 March, in New Delhi, Suresh Bhardwaj, Former MP on 11 March 2003, Sushma Swaraj on 17 March 2012, Rajnath Singh, 21 March 2012, New Delhi. 43 See Balveer Arora, ‘Indian Parliament and Democracy’, in Ajay K. Mehra and Gert W. Keuck (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Comparative Perspective, New Delhi: Konark, 2004.

Part III

Making the system accountable

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Parliamentary accountability in India Contestations and performance Ajay Kumar Singh

Discourses on Parliament The word ‘Parliament’ at once generates different images, imagery and narratives of democracy, contextually determined by local history, society and genealogies of power. Parliament represents a ‘public space’ from where legitimacy emanates for government, governance and governmentality. It indeed represents a critical mass of ‘public’, represented by ‘moral good’ parties, à la John Stuart Mill. Perceptively, Parliament is viewed as ‘moral good’, a ‘moral agency’ or ‘conscience keeper’ of the nation by dint of being the apex representative body of the nation. It is precisely the reason that we find two epistemological traditions – one represented by Kantian ‘moral will’, treating assembly as representing ‘autonomy and difference’, and acting as moral agent of public good; and the other by ‘Bentham’s villainy’ or diffidence, measured in terms of enactment made, speeches delivered and resolutions passed. Two extremes suffer from inbuilt methodological fallacies. In the former, ethical questions predominate parliamentary jurisprudence seeking to assign the highest moral authority to Parliament; the latter perceives the Parliament as a system, treating a legislator as ‘hubristic enlightenment social engineer’.1 To put it differently, we find a ‘head counting’ view of Parliament. It is in this context that the advocates of deliberative democracy offer a discursive view of Parliament, or Parliament as a discursive institution, or to use J.S. Mill’s phrase as a ‘congress of opinion’. It significantly places deliberation at the core of parliamentary functionality. It is much more concerned with ‘deliberative capacity’, ‘structural efficacy and procedural efficiency’ of Parliament than Parliament as a managerial-administrative institution delivering some public services. A system can be said to possess deliberative capacity to the degree it has structures to accommodate deliberation that is authentic,

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Ajay Kumar Singh inclusive and consequential. To be authentic, deliberation ought to be able to induce reflection upon preferences in non coercive fashion . . ., and involve communicating in terms that those who do not share one’s point of view can find meaningful and accept . . . “reciprocity” . . . To be inclusive, deliberation requires the opportunity and ability of all affected actors (or their representatives) to participate. To be consequential, deliberation must somehow make a difference when it comes to determining or influencing collective outcomes. Such outcomes might include laws and other explicit and codified public policy decisions, international treaties, the more informal outcomes reached by governance networks, or even cultural change.2

What the theorists of deliberative democracy emphasize is the necessity of informed debate and to organize Parliament into multiple ‘chambers of discourses’, or ‘parliaments within parliament’. Structurally, Parliament represents and symbolizes ‘empowered space’, accountable to a ‘public space’, represented by social media to opinionated activists. Discursive parliamentarianism as a theory represents a lopsided view of ‘consensus’, however, accepting consensus as the internal telos of deliberation is not the same as insisting upon it as the appropriate political outcome. This is where deliberative theorists go wrong. They assume that dissensus is necessarily a sign of the incompleteness or politically unsatisfactory character of deliberation. Their approach implies that there must be something wrong with the politics of deliberation if reason fails, if consensus eludes . . . and if there is nothing to do but count heads.3 One would possibly argue that Parliament broadly represents a complex web of spaces occupied by ruling and opposition parties, where head rolling and corridor trade off may be approved, surely not as a ‘good’ option, but as a ‘mechanical’ necessity to deliver an outcome. Parliament as a chamber of discourses has the tendency to vacate its value and decisional space in favor of specialist organizations, technocrats and others. What is at loss is the politics of democracy, which Parliament is expected to represent. Committees may add specialization, but surely at the cost of marginalizing the significance of the ‘floor’, which ensures accountability and helps electors to assess their representatives.

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Job specifications What are the specific jobs that Parliament is expected to perform? John M. Carey4 maps out five such important jobs for Parliament. They include the following: i) Representation: ‘Legislatures are plural bodies with larger membership than executives, and so offer the possibility both to represent more accurately the range of diversity in the polity, and to foster closer connections between representatives and voters’; ii) Deliberation: This refers to open-ended, transparent and reasoned debate on matters of public importance. Characteristically, reasoned debate depends on the range of information, transparency and accommodation of diverse opinion. Consensus is dialectically produced; iii) Information: relevant for specialized activities undertaken by parliamentary committees; iv) Decisiveness, i.e., to avoid indeterminacy. ‘At any rate, legislatures are supposed to boil down the potentially infinite number of policy options available to a manageable and coherent set of alternatives, among which a meaningful collective decision can be reached’; v). Checks: This is also referred to as ‘security or oversight’ function, a term probably coined by Woodrow Wilson when he says, ‘it is the proper duty of a representative body to look diligently into every affair of government and to talk much about what it sees. It is meant to be eyes and voice, and to embody the wisdom and will of the constituent’.5 From an accountability perspective, most of the literature on Parliament emphasizes on procedural right, i.e. the right to censure the government through floor and committee’s devices ranging from questions to urgent mention on public issues, and through detailed technolegal review of governmental policies and legislative proposals. Ultimately what matters most is the members’ expertise. And expertise is mechanically counted upon information provision and scaling to be usually done by house desks. Is it a fool-proof device? The answer probably would be ‘no’. Do members have their own independent political space to perform the accountability function especially when political parties have the authority to issue whips? An exploration may possibly find that members’ initiatives and their political autonomy often conflict to reduce the scale of parliamentary accountability. It is certainly true of the Indian Parliament. What is being emphasized here is that accountability sometimes becomes the victim of party democracy and leadership monopolies. It is a strange paradox that parties constitute Parliament, yet parliamentary accountability becomes a victim of party mobilization in the Parliament. Conventionally, Parliament depends more on individual members than on the

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institutionalized externalities of the party system. Floor convergence or divergence are from the collective individual sum of members than essentially of the parties. Research and literature seem to conclude that the prevailing discourse on democracy emphasizes two important roles for Parliament: (1) Parliament as the respectful source of law; and (2) Parliament as a dignified instrument of governance, in terms of policy formulation, adoption and execution, besides articulating and ventilating peoples’ wishes and aspirations. We find two significant dimensions of ‘policy power’ of Parliament – (1) legislative efficiency, and (2) legislative autonomy. David Arter elaborates the two as the following: in seeking to define and measure the strength and weaknesses of legislatures and gauge their ‘policy power’ – at least two criteria are discernible in the literature. First, there is the degree of legislative efficiency and on this basis a strong legislature would be one that is able to act efficiently and decisively to make informed policy decisions. Collective efficiency is the core variable. Second, there is extent of legislative autonomy . . . the extent to which ‘the legislature is an institution of countervailing power’.6 What is emphasized here is the relative independence of the legislature from the executive. In this context, we find two distinct aspects of the problem – one relates to legislative capacity and other to legislative performance. For legislative capacity, emphasis is generally placed on the procedural signification of rules and on the organizational-institutional innovations such as subject-based committees or subcommittees. In this context, it is important to caution that the procedural signification and organizational innovation have tendency to generate a ‘technical trap’, which may result in the dislocation of generic role performance by Parliament. Policy may undergo authorization failure. On the basis of the criterion of legislative performance, Nelson Polsby in ‘Legislatures’ classifies them ranging from ‘“arena legislatures” or “legitimizing assemblies”, which are merely debating or ratifying bodies, to “transformative legislatures” or “policy-making legislatures”, which possess the independent capacity to mould proposals into law’.7 This brings us to the question of the constitutive right of the members, i.e. the unqualified right of a legislator, to legislative initiative. It may take many forms ranging from introduction of motion or resolution to tabling of private members’ bill. Motions and resolutions across Parliament

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are turning out to be either a constituency-catch, or a customary ritual to score some political mileage. This form of legislative initiative hardly addresses to the question of parliamentary accountability. Similarly, private members’ bill has become a dead letter word in parliamentary parlance. It lost its relevance due to the lack of ‘political cosponsors’. It is a strange paradox; Parliament is ‘political’ and still a victim of ‘politics’. It has an unsettling impact on the members’ right to legislative initiative. We find a steep decline in the role performance by parliamentarians and hence by Parliament. The craft of floor management by treasury managers often tends to restrict the scope of parliamentary devices such as ‘censor motion’, ‘cut motion’ and the like that ensure accountability and scrutiny. One finds a gradual deficit in the agenda-setting role of legislatures. The situation is much worse in the Westminster model than in the presidential systems. In the former, agenda setting is normally done by the executives. In ensuring parliamentary oversight, excessive reliance is placed on the elaborate system of committees. But in developing democracies, the working of the committees is marred by party competitions, clerical system of decisions and evidence taking. One may call it a ‘bureaucratic trap’. Once committees submit their reports, the house rarely debates their recommendations threadbare. The report is tabled in the dust and din of floor noises, or on ceremonial assurances of concerned minister, the report passes the ‘Ayes’ call of the Chair. Is this not a failure of Parliament?

Structuring accountability Probably the simplest possible definition of accountability may be put as actionable responsibility of the executive and representatives to the people. There are two broad levels of accountability – (1) systemic accountability of the government to Parliament and through it to the people, and (2) representative responsibility of Parliament to the electors. Existing structure of Parliament is more concerned with the first one than developing a mechanism of self-censorship or self-punishment for failure and non-performance. Self-punishment is superficially provided in certain ordeals of presiding officers including the rarely used power of expulsion. We generally have a tendency to overlook the basic fact that accountability has to be understood in terms of ‘directives’, ensuring performance, reward and punishment. What Parliament does do when a minister evades a parliamentary question? Accountability cannot be restricted to select lip services or procedural ordeal. We often

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fail to acknowledge the fundamental fact of representative democracy, as Bellamy and Palumbo write: [p]olitical accountability is a cornerstone of representative democracy. It represents the umbilical cord that connects citizens to their representatives. Its relevance is manifold. First, it establishes the channels of communication needed to legitimate the decision – making process and its outcomes. Second, it sets the side-constraints necessary for making representative institutions responsive to citizens’ wishes. Third, it also ensures the transmission of legitimate authority to the executive and administrative branches of government and helps maintain under scrutiny the activities of unelected officials and civil servants. In short, political accountability is responsible for directing the political system towards the public interest and engendering the principles of social autonomy and political self-determination at the core of democratic politics.8 What is underlined here is the basic fact that at the core of the accountability debate is the question of authorization, sanction and punishment. Contemporary developments and the fast-changing notion of governance have greatly impacted structural accountability. Some of the significant changes affecting accountability include (1) over salience on techno-managerial mode of governance, relatively autonomous from legislative control; (2) shift of developmental discourse from Parliament to market and recurrent demand for state de-regulation; (3) growing preference for board room decisions by political elite; (4) neo-public management preferring departmental fragmentation or growth of subdepartmentalism ‘free from ministerial control and parliamentary supervision’; (5) gradual shift of legislative initiative from Parliament to cabinet, and within cabinet to select group of ministers, a phenomenon more common to India than to other democracies and (6) coalitional compromises rendering oppositional space nearly ineffective, or effective nominally to the extent of lodging selective protest within and outside Parliament. ‘The notion of accountability that survives the changes is a formalistic and ineffectual form of auditing carried out by a number of agencies and NGOs whose accountability is also a moot point’.9 Eventually, what is lacking is a dialogical process establishing a normative framework of relationships between people, polity and representatives. The problem is further compounded due to a slow pace of change in parliamentary procedures and practices.

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As stated earlier, accountability in the context of parliamentary democracy must be understood as actionable responsibility of the executive and the legislature. Diana Woodhouse identifies four distinct forms of responsibility: (1) informatory responsibility, an effective channel of communication between executive, Parliament and the people, where each is duly informed of reasons and rationality of decisions; (2) explanatory responsibility where choices are explained; (3) amendatory responsibility, allowing space for public apology, revision and redress of damage caused by faulty decisions; (4) sacrificial responsibility, a provision for voting out, or ‘a call for the resignation of the individuals deemed responsible for policy failure’.10 Responsibility without ascription of sanction does not have any consequential impact on ensuring accountability. Also, responsibility is structurally related, jurisdictionally molded and legally scripted. Hence, the notion of responsibility in the context of parliamentary democracy is significantly different from those found in agency-agent blame model of corporations. It is not merely a moral accounting of failure, but also a redress and react on the structure of justice, which a constitutional-political order seeks to achieve. Mere answerability, individual or collective, does not ensure political responsibility. We also need to distinguish between responsibility as liability and responsibility as performance. Responsibility as liability is backward looking whereas responsibility as performance is positive and forward-looking. Viewed from this perspective, responsibility is notionally relatable to capacity or performative abilities of the system. Iris Marion Young, while referring to Robert Goodin’s construction of responsibility, rightly argues, ‘It is very possible to act in accord with rules of morality and yet not have discharged one’s responsibilities, because one has not achieved the required outcomes even though it is feasible to do so’.11

Accountability and delegation Another problem of parliamentary accountability is associated with the principles of delegation on which a federal-parliamentary system generally operates. Delegation by nature dilutes the locus of parliamentary accountability. Kaare Storm brilliantly captures the glitch in the following words: The idea of parliamentary supremacy implies, in the language of agency theory, that, in its relationship with the cabinet and the rest of the executive branch, parliament is the principal, the holder of original authority. The prime minister and his or her cabinet are

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Ajay Kumar Singh correspondingly the legislature’s agent. Similar agency relationships exist at other links in the chain of delegation. Democracy as popular sovereignty means that ordinary citizens are the ultimate principal. This view of representative democracy as delegation and accountability is, of course, a simplification in more ways than one. First, note that political agents may be individual or collective, as may principals. Collective principals and/or agents complicate the issues of delegation and accountability. As the ultimate principals, voters face enormous problems of coordination. In most large-scale societies, they cannot possibly actively deliberate over the selection and supervision of their agents. Instead, simple ways have to be found to aggregate their preferences, typically in periodic elections. But as for any large collective, the problems of preference aggregation can make a mockery out of any notion of a popular will expressed through elections. . . . Finally, in federal or confederal democracies, representatives may be considered to be agents of the states that make up the union, rather than of the people itself. . . . When we nonetheless consider the incumbents of political office as agents of the citizens, we have to acknowledge that they are constrained and frequently common agents, whose responsibilities and accountabilities may thus be manifold.12

He further points out that parliamentary democracy generally follows single chain with multiple links model of delegation where we encounter agency problem due to incompatibility between representation, delegation of authority and parliamentary oversight. Multiplicity of links displaces accountability. The fact that parliamentary democracies make use of more indirect, multistage, delegation schemes increases the likelihood of overall agency loss. . . . If legislators, for example, are poor agents of their voters, then it may not at all be desirable to make civil servants maximally accountable to such elected officials. This is true at least as long as agents do not compete for the favor of their principals. In other words, if principals can bypass a particular link in the chain of delegation, then agency losses in that link are less critical.13

Accountability device How to secure accountability – both horizontal and vertical? The social science literature relies on two types of devices – parliamentary or internal devices, and external agency devices. Parliamentary devices include

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procedural-rule specification, organizational innovations, reshaping of oppositional space as to secure maximum parliamentary surveillance and re-crafting the roles of the individual member as a parliamentary watchdog. In other words, it means critical engagements of members in parliamentary works. On the other, external agency devices specifically include independent and autonomous audit agencies, judicial scrutiny, media and social watch, networked communications, etc. Here, we need to reflect upon some of these mechanisms. It is needless to mention that parliamentary rules and procedures require periodic revision or revisiting as to extract maximized decisions. This may require reworking on accommodative space and a legal load of house rules. Political responsibility cannot be simply done away by party villainy or the chair’s ‘ayes–nays’. Also, there is a growing tendency on the part of the executive to sideline or bypass parliamentary scrutiny. Similarly, the role of the opposition is gradually reduced to that of an impeder, or blocker, not because of the relative merit or demerit of executive’s proposal, but because of the electoral and constituency compulsions. It is precisely the reason that parliamentary scholars recommend reworking on the role of opposition. Reworking may follow critical engagements in the house oversight activities, or reserving important parliamentary roles for parties occupying the opposition benches, particularly those which have consistently shown electoral stability. Conventionally, the relative sizes of the political parties have been taken into account while assigning house functions: hence the larger the size, the greater the role assignment. Forms of critical engagement may range from committee membership to allotment of time to raise matters and spacious participation in the debate. After all, ‘Parliamentary procedure is all about the power of political parties’.14 Guillermo O’Donnell recommends charging of opposition parties with inquiry and investigation role. He writes, ‘Give opposition parties that have reached some reasonable level of electoral support an important role in directing the agencies . . . charged with preventing and investigating corruption’.15 In this context, one may also like to contest the notion of parliamentary party as a ‘share holder’ of parliamentary space. Party discipline and fear of disqualification under defection laws has constraining impact on legislative initiative and legislative behavior of the members. We seek to secure democratic stability, better-read governmental stability generally affecting the life of Parliament, at the cost of parliamentary accountability. Among the external devices, independent, autonomous and highly specialized system of auditing having constitutional and legal propriety is being preferred most across established democracies. Another dimension of auditing is the ‘social watch’ or ‘social auditing’ by civil

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society organizations. A logical extension of auditing is the provision for an anti-corruption investigative agency, probing and initiating penal action. On the other hand, some of the parliamentary polities have shown considerable preference for judicial processes of constitutional auditing of governmental policies. In fact, we do not find any straightjacketed solution to the accountability failure of Parliament. ‘Demos’ wait for its turn in the next election when they re-invent representation in the hope that the new Parliament will be a moral agency serving their larger interests with utmost sincerity, dedication and responsibility. But moral agents are a rare bird; fault lies in the ideological setting and social choices. Yet, society has critical agency of change to reorder political processes and make assembly accountable to them.

Mirror image of accountability In recent decades, Indian democracy has also been reinventing and restructuring its political space over issues of justice and identity, ultimately causing the formation of a coalitional Parliament expectedly serving the interests of constituency blocks than aggregating the conflicting interests into a common national policy, surely with the significant exception of economic liberalization, a choice more of corporate groups and political lobbyist than of ‘demos’, most of whom have not yet actualized the ‘right to life’ in letter and spirit. Recent Parliaments generate different images and imagery of democracy. The reservation of seats for women in Parliament strikes strange gender unity among the male members of Parliament across the political spectrum. The issue of creating the institution of the Lok Pal (an anti-corruption Ombudsman) too has united political opponents in order to subject such an important instrument of accountability ensuring probity in public life to a ‘gallery wait’, a new invention and a strange parliamentary practice of denial. Other known methods include ‘desk veto’ or ‘table-death’, particularly with those bills whose life, as per rules and procedures of conducting business, is limited to a session. ‘Let not house work’ is gradually becoming accepted political norm of legislative behavior. Absenting from voting, or not to show political decisiveness or to take sides, is being cherished as coalitional merit. Individual conscience is rarely resorted to by the elected members for fear of membership loss due to the provisions of anti-defection law. This is in sharp contrast to the Lok Sabha Rule Book which writes, ‘Voicing the constituents’ concerns on the floor of the house is the primary parliamentary duty of an elected representative’. The Speaker or the chair

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is expected to be politically neutral, but given the Indian experience, the chair often presides over more politics than accountability. Yet, we cherish and do not shy away from claiming that the Indian Parliament is the temple of democracy reflecting the hopes and aspirations of the people. It is here that the laws, policies and programmes of the government are formulated to fulfill people’s expectations from their elected representatives. In our democratic set up, the executive emanates from the parliament and it is incumbent upon the parliament to ensure that it functions in conformity with the broad policy guidelines as enunciated by the legislative and that the government of the day remains accountable to it all the time.16 Contrary to this, Jessica S. Wallack writes: India’s parliament is not functioning well as a representative institution. It is failing as a platform for aggregating citizen preferences into public policy: deliberations are shorter and more sparsely attended than ever and disruptions seem to be more frequent. Public ire is on the rise and institutional ‘shortcuts’ to achieve policy change without legislation or legislative oversight seem to be increasingly accepted.17 ‘Remains accountable’ is practically a myth, a doubtful claim of the presiding officers. Abysmally low public image seriously casts doubts on the effectiveness of Parliament as a public institution. So far as the public perception (of intellectuals) of Indian Parliament is concerned, Shankar and Rodrigues opine: A vast majority of our respondents felt that the Lok Sabha as an institution has displayed little creativity over time. . . . Many of them felt that the debates . . . have been shallow and superficial and only a small stratum of the members took an active interest in the chores and deliberations of parliament. The parliament, above all, is an association of equal and free members but our respondents felt that values of deference to seniors/leaders, hierarchy and ranking based on caste/class/status, patriarchy and the likes, have dominated the disposition of the parliamentarians. Except one, all our respondents felt that a majority of the members do not make a close study on the bills and other business transactions of the house.18

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Though substantive research is not available on this subject, several plausible explanations emerging out of a complex web of power and political relationships between party(ies) in power, opposition parties, speaker and house procedures can be offered. The relationship between parliamentary and opposition parties has consistently declined resulting into high frequency of ‘floor locks’, and ‘proceedings paralysis’. These two phrases phenomenologically represent a wide range of (un) parliamentary behavior such as the boycott of house proceedings, disruptions and interruptions leading to adjournments, floor disorders and well rushing/storming, tearing and throwing of papers, slogans and placards waving, and other violent conducts and marshalling out of members. Present Speaker of Lok Sabha Sumitra Mahajan holds the view that the ‘opposition must have its say, but the government also must have a way’.19 Between ‘way’ and ‘say’ lies the contestations over the conduct of the office of the Speaker, ideally an impartial and independent authority whose power ‘arise from the fact that his powers are the powers of the house which the house has committed to him for convenience and practical purposes’.20 About the constitutional position of the Speaker, M.P. Jain further writes: The office of the speaker enjoys great prestige, position, and authority within the house. He has extensive powers to regulate the proceedings of the house under its rules of procedure. The ordinary interpretation of the procedural laws, rules and customs of the house is his function and he allows no debate or criticism of his rulings except on a formal resolution. He is responsible for the orderly conduct of its proceedings and maintains discipline and order in the house.21 Impartiality of his position is minimally secured through tenure security, charging of his salary without parliamentary scrutiny from the consolidated fund of India, and rare or no resolution on his rulings on the proceedings of the house. It appears that the founding fathers largely pinned their hopes on the morally plausible conduct of the Speaker, and attendant dissociation from his political lineage. Speaker’s impartiality is an individual moral position. It requires, as the Rule Book of the Lok Sabha provides, that on assumption of office he should sever all his political associations, and he should, while in office, not accept chairmanship of any committee having political overtones. However, ‘B R Bhagat, K.S. Hegde, Bali Ram Jakhar, Rabi Ray, Shivraj V. Patil, P.A. Sangma, G.M.C Balayogi [and others], on being elected Speakers, did not formally resign from their respective

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parties’.22 Moral good position appears to be structurally weak to ensure neutrality and impartiality of the office of Speaker. ‘Way’ and ‘Say’ need not be always guided by rule neutrality. The rules may be ambiguous and weak. But interpretation of the rules must not involve political biases. What is being argued here is that it is extremely difficult to dissociate the Speaker from politics. He is a political agency before and after his office. His decision need not be always politically neutral. During last four decades, the Speaker was offered or sought political office such as that of Governor or of a Union Minister after leaving the office. Over the years, Parliament appears to have emerged as a political space rather than a constitutional space due to the televised proceedings. Rather than securing and serving larger national and public interest parties and leaders appeal to their political constituencies and remain in election mode all the time. Traditionally, the parliamentary space was considered as a sum total of constituencies’ interests. Since the 1980s the very word ‘constituency’ has undergone a paradigmatic shift from a distinct territorial space to a fragmented socio-political space marked by multiple contestations along segmented divisions like caste, communities and others. As a consequence, Parliament becomes an arena of identity contestations, a deviance from original prescriptions. This is very much evident in debates over affirmative actions, secularism and politics of welfarism. Floor coordination may be defined as a process of seeking optimal convergence over an issue, or optimizing the curve of cooperation, and maximizing parliamentary support to policies and programs of the government. It would largely depend on the way the leader of the house and the leader of the opposition perceive and perform their roles. The responsibility of the leader of the house is not only to the government and its supporters in the house but to the opposition and the house as a whole. He maintains liaison between the government and the opposition groups in the house. He is the guardian of the legitimate rights of the opposition as well as those of the government. As such, he should be among the foremost champions of the rights of the house as a whole and see that the house is not denied, despite pressure from any quarter, its rightful opportunities.23 On the other hand, in the parliamentary parlance of the Westminster tradition, the leader of the opposition is dubbed as shadow prime

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minister, who holds the critical responsibility of striking consensus amidst multiple contestations. Ideally, if the leader of the opposition lets the prime minister govern, he, in turn, is permitted to oppose. On certain matters, such as foreign relations, defence policy, etc. the prime minister may at times consult the leader of opposition before making a commitment. And in times of grave national crisis, the leader of opposition usually underlines the unity of the nation on a particular issue by openly identifying himself with the government policy.24 The degree of liaison between the two and the Speaker determines the successful working of Parliament. However, during last two decades, floor coordination has been at its lowest ebb. Agenda is rarely, if ever, shared in advance. Personal rapport between leaders of the house and opposition is on a downhill. The Speaker’s office now suffers from a weak political legitimacy. These together has caused steep decline in parliamentary oversight. One can hardly overemphasize the axiom that a weak parliament invests the executive with arbitrary and unaccountable powers, which are often used not in the best public interest. And an arbitrary and unfair executive, which is a product of the failure of parliament, becomes a temptation for the judiciary to encroach into the domain of parliament.25

Measuring the decline Growing decline and accountability failure can be analyzed through certain statistical enumeration on the working of Indian parliament. Since 1956, there is a considerable decadal decline in the actual sitting hours of the Lok Sabha. It was at an all-time high of 1,026 hours in 1956; 699 hours in 1967; 568 hours in 1977; 646 hours in 1987; 447 hours in 1997; 283 hours in 2007; 258 hours in 2008 and 15 hours (out of 12 sittings) in 2014. Further, the number of sitting days sharply declined from 677 in the First Lok Sabha to 357 days in the fifteenth, a decline of 52.73 per cent. On an average, the last three Lok Sabhas accounted for 348 sitting days. What can be the possible reasons for the decline? If it was at an all-time high in 1956, it was perhaps because of the unquestionable commitment to and respect of the leaders for parliamentary institutions. They viewed Parliament as a moral agency working relentlessly towards the deepening of democracy and giving policy shapes to constitutional ideals and the core values of the

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Indian nation. In the subsequent decades, the political culture of India witnessed an excessive personalization of politics, high frequency of party fragmentation, growth of departmental oligarchies so as to subvert parliamentary processes, coalitional compromises and trade offs, rule by ordinances and executive instructions, and off-the-floor announcement of major policies; a criminalization of politics; high offices corruptions; an invention of party autocracy via anti-defection law, where members follow whips more religiously than their constitutional oath to serve nation and represent their respective parliamentary constituencies; a techno-scaling of policies to which educational background of the most of the members do not conform; and the state gradually vacating its space to market forces. All these factors have a pathological impact on parliamentary accountability. The situation further worsened during the Fifteenth Lok Sabha. The following table (Table 7.1), constructed on the basis of officially uploaded information on the Lok Sabha website, demonstrates the pathetic state of parliamentary accountability. What appears from this table is that since the Thirteenth Lok Sabha, there is a marked increase in the disruptions of parliamentary proceedings. The Fifteenth Lok Sabha lost 20 percent of its time in adjournments and interruptions of parliamentary proceedings. The tendency of interruptions and adjournment have been alarmingly high since the Fourteenth Lok Sabha. Table 7.1 Session wise summary of time spent and lost during Tenth–Fifteenth Lok Sabha Lok Sabha

Total time of actual sittings (in hours: minutes)

Time lost due to due to interruptions/ adjournment(in hours: minutes)

Tenth LS Eleventh LS Twelfth LS Thirteenth LS Fourteenth LS Fifteenth LS Sixteenth LS (first to fifth sessions)

2,527:52 813:38 574:55 1,945:39 2,159:55 2,236:28 604:59

279:25 45:20 68:37 454:38 423:00 891:51 58:03

Source: Computed from the LS Web Post ‘Time Spent on Various Kinds of Business In Lok Sabha – An Analysis’, Lok Sabha Secretariat, September 2014 and PR Post, September 2015 on Business Conducted by 16th LS

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Table 7.2 Number of notices of questions received and admitted Lok Sabha

Notices for questions received

Total question admitted Number (%)

First Second Third Fourth Fifth Sixth Seventh Eighth Ninth Tenth Eleventh Twelfth Thirteenth Fourteenth

92,134 143,651 162,334 264,742 252,700 137,045 269,221 250,098 75,228 330,325 98,863 72,934 313,157 311,728

43,725 (47.45) 63,252 (44.03) 42,725 (46.37) 63,607 (44.27) 58,355 (36.00) 93,538 (35.30) 102,959 (38.24) 98,390 (39.34) 21,550 (28.64) 90,695(27.45) 23,681(24.44) 15,579 (21.36) 77,982 (25.00) 66,677 (21.38)

Source: Lok Sabha http://164.100.47.132/estudy/questions.pdf (accessed on 08–04–2013)

It is needless to mention that parliamentary questions are probably the most important instrument of parliamentary accountability. Web Post of Lok Sabha writes, Parliamentary Questions are one of the important procedural devices that empower Members of Parliament to elicit factual information from the Government on a matter of public interest. Parliamentary Question is a unique mechanism . . . to exercise surveillance over the administration; it is an important instrument in the hands of the members to ensure answerability or accountability of the administration for its acts of omission or commission to the Parliament and the people. The entire range of governmental activities comes under the scrutiny of Parliament by this procedure. Very often, members are able to pinpoint the administrative lapses and extract certain information and assurances or even commitments from the Government.26 Record of total number of questions admitted during different Lok Sabhas shows a perceptible decline, almost by three-fourth percentage (see Table 7.1).

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Table 7.3 Percentage of total time spent on the questions Lok Sabha

% of total time spent

First Second Third Fourth Fifth Sixth Seventh Eighth Ninth Tenth Eleventh Twelfth Thirteenth Fourteenth Fifteenth

14.60 15.00 15.00 15.94 12.61 13.70 12.20 12.80 10.14 11.80 9.58 8.96 11.07 11.42 09.05

Source: Culled out from the information available on Lok Sabha website http://164.100.47.132/estudy/questions.pdf (accessed on 08–04–2013)

On average only five questions are orally answered and, for the remaining, either lapses or written replies are provided. Approximately, over 10 per cent of the time of the house is spent on the disposal of questions. This is evident from Table 7.3. There is a steep decline visible in the conduct of legislative business (government and private members’ bill) in the Parliament. Table 7.4 shows the time spent by the Lok Sabha on its legislative business. As is evident from Table 7.4, Lok Sabha spends less than 25 per cent of its total time on legislative activities. During the Fifteenth Lok Sabha, 216 government bills were introduced, out of which 185 bills were passed. Each bill took less than 75 minutes to pass though different legislative steps. Can we expect any reasoned discussion on important bills in about 75 minutes? Many of them were passed with only ‘ayes and nays’. It is needless to mention here that legislative bills undergo several procedural steps of scrutiny such as committee wait, other house readings, approval/disapproval, session closures, house dissolution, etc., causing sometimes their death during the passage. So far as Private Members’ Bills are concerned, ‘only fourteen private members bill have been passed by both Houses and become law in the

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Table 7.4 Percentage of total time spent on legislation and bills passed by Lok Sabha Lok Sabha

% of total time spent on legislation

Total no. of bills passed by Lok Sabha

First Second Third Fourth Fifth Sixth Seventh Eighth Ninth Tenth Eleventh Twelfth Thirteenth Fourteenth Fifteenth

49 28 23 22 28 24 24 25 16 22 16 17 25 22 23.79

333 327 272 216 482 130 329 334 63 277 61 56 297 248 185

Note: Table has been computed from the web data of Lok Sabha under the ‘Annexture III: Time Spent on Various Kinds of Business in Lok Sabha-An Analysis’, Lok Sabha Secretariat, September 2014; and PRS Blog: Status of Legislation in the 15th Lok Sabha, www.prsindia.org/theprsblog/?p=2890 (accessed on 08–04–2013)

history of Indian Parliament. The last such bill, the Supreme Court (Enlargement of Criminal Appellate Jurisdiction) Bill, was passed in 1970’.27 Much against the principle of parliamentary accountability, only 4–5 percent of private members’ bills are discussed in the house. During the Thirteenth Lok Sabha, 343 bills were introduced, but only seventeen were discussed. Data from the Fourteenth and the Fifteenth Lok Sabhas too are equally uninspiring – 328/14; and 372/11. On the other hand, less than quarter of the total time is spent on the discussion of budgets. Lok Sabha computes the same as the following: The time involved in the discussion on Budgets was 352 hours 52 minutes or 20.32 per cent of the total in the Fourteenth Lok Sabha as against 212 hours 55 minutes or 10.9 per cent of the Thirteenth Lok Sabha; 82 hrs 26 minutes or 14.68 per cent of the total time spent in the Twelfth Lok Sabha; 17.60 per cent in the Eleventh Lok Sabha;

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17.38 per cent in the Tenth; 16 per cent in the Ninth; 21.74 per cent in the Eighth; 20.84 per cent in the Seventh; 23.26 per cent in the Sixth;21.64 per cent in the Fifth; 19.13 per cent in the Fourth; 25 per cent in the Third; 20.9 per cent in the Second; and 18.50 per cent in the First Lok Sabha.28 Also, on an average only 50 per cent of the total members of the parliamentary committees regularly attend the committees’ meetings, including of the Departmentally Related Standing Committees, whose membership has been reduced from 45 to 31 in 2004. Any randomized sampling of Action Taken Reports of the DRCS would reveal that on an average not more than two to three recommendations of the committees are implemented by the respective ministries. This is in gross violation of the parliamentary intent for which these committees have been constituted. Besides, routine examination of ministerial proposals, committee is also expected to provide policy input to the framing of long-term national policies.

Conclusion What is argued in this chapter is that the notion of parliamentary accountability is gradually becoming a misnomer. One of the structural reasons is that existing rules allow considerable scope for governmental control of parliamentary proceedings, allowing little scope for individual legislative initiative and surveillance. Wallack rightly comments that the ‘rules are the means by which the government can limit debate . . . the government exercises substantial control over what issues get discussed, when, and for how long. It also has the power to circumscribe committee deliberations.’29 Existing provisions and political practices discourage private members’ initiative. A reading of the parliamentary rules as to what may not be raised in Parliament will surely convince that ambit of parliamentary surveillance is severely limited. To illustrate, questions seeking to obtain factual or statistical information are not admitted. But can anyone deny that statistics is a revealing source of examining authorization failure, policy deficits and pinning down corruption. Parliamentary machination referred to as floor management may otherwise strike political compromises, but surely it narrows down opposition space. On the other hand, there is a growing tendency to rule by ordinances and executive instructions. Departmental oligarchies lead to the failure of the collective responsibility of the cabinet to Parliament. Foreign policies are rarely discussed in the house. Asymmetrical placement of two houses

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particularly in terms of their respective legal-constitutional weightage to division and voting is also partly responsible for redundancy of the notion of parliamentary accountability. Indian democracy, particularly during the last two decades, is witnessing the growth of unconstitutional mechanisms of decisions by private advisory bodies and rule by regulatory institutions, which hardly come within the direct purview of parliamentary. We witness decline both in terms of horizontal and vertical accountability, which require a serious revisit of the representation system, including a review of parliamentary rules, practices and procedures.

Notes 1 Jeremy Waldron, The Dignity of Legislation, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999, p. 23. 2 John S. Dryzek and Simon Niemeyer, Foundations and Frontiers of Deliberative Governance, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010, p. 10. 3 Waldron, op. cit., pp. 151–152. 4 John M. Carey, ‘Legislative Organization’, in R.A.W. Rhodes, Sarah A. Binder and Bert A. Rockman (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Political Institutions, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006, pp. 431–454. 5 William McKay and Charles W. Johnson, Parliament and Congress: Representation and Scrutiny in the Twenty-First Century, New York: Oxford University Press, p. 307. 6 David Arter (ed.), Comparing and Classifying Legislatures, London: Routledge, 2007, p. xviii. 7 Ibid., pp. xix–xx. 8 Richard Bellamy and Antonino Palumbo (eds.), Political Accountability, Surrey: Ashgate, 2010, p. xi. 9 Ibid., pp. xi–xii. 10 Diana Woodhouse, cited in Richard Bellamy and Antonino Palumbo (eds.), Political Accountability, Surrey: Ashgate, 2010, p. xvii. 11 Iris Marion Young, ‘Responsibility and Global Labor Justice’, in Richard Bellamy and Antonino Palumbo (eds.), Political Accountability, Surrey: Ashgate, 2010, pp. 101–102. 12 Kaare Strom, ‘Delegation and Accountability in Parliamentary Democracies’, in Richard Bellamy and Antonino Palumbo (eds.), Political Accountability, Surrey: Ashgate, 2010, pp. 119–120. 13 Ibid., p. 129. 14 Eric M. Uslanner and Thomas Zittel, ‘Comparative Legislative Behavior’, in Robert E. Goodin (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Political Science, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009, p. 392. 15 Guillermo O’Donnell, ‘Horizontal Accountability in New Democracies’, in Richard Bellamy and Antonino Palumbo (eds.), Political Accountability, Surrey: Ashgate, 2010, p. 153. 16 Address by the Speaker of Lok Sabha to IAS probationers on 25 April 2011, published in The Journal of Parliamentary Information, 3, September 2011, p. 268.

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17 Jessica S. Wallack, ‘India’s Parliament as a Representative Institution’, India Review, 7(2), 2008, pp. 91–114, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/ 14736480802055422 (Accessed on 12 March 2013). 18 B.L. Shankar and Valerian Rodrigues, The Indian Parliament: A Democracy at Work, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2011, p. 164. 19 The Indian Express (web version), 4 August 2015, ‘Parliament Logjam: Suspended 25 MPs for Greater Good’, says Sumitra Mahajan. 20 M.P. Jain, Indian Constitutional Law, 7th edition, Gurgaon: LexisNexis, 2014, p. 55. 21 Ibid., p. 56. 22 G.C. Malhotra, M.N. Kaul and S.L. Shakdhar (eds.), Practice and Procedure of Parliament, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat & Metropolitan Book Co. Pvt. Ltd., 2001, p. 97. 23 Ibid., p. 141. 24 Ibid., p. 142. 25 Editorial, ‘Decline or Death of Parliament’, Economic & Political Weekly, 10 January 2009, p. 6. 26 Lok Sabha, http://164.100.47.132/estudy/questions.pdf (Accessed on 8 April 2013). 27 The Times of India, 25 April 2015, http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/ india/Just-14-private-members-bills-passed-by-Parliament-till-date-thelast-was-in-1970/articleshow/47046338.cms (Accessed on 8 April 2013). 28 Lok Sabha, Duration and Sittings of Lok Sabha, http://164.100.47.132/ estudy/duration.pdf (Accessed on 6 April 2013). 29 Wallack, 2008, op. cit.

8

Parliament and accountability Enforcing responsibility Rekha Saxena

Broadly speaking, there are three major models of constitutional governments in the universe of federal governments: (a) presidential-federal, e.g. USA, Switzerland; (b) Commonwealth parliamentary-federal, e.g. Canada, India; and (c) European parliamentary-federal, e.g. Germany, Belgium. The hallmarks of the first model are a sustained separation of powers among the legislature, executive, and judiciary combined with a strict division of powers between the federal and regional governments with a large quantum of regional autonomy and strong federal second chambers. The second model is marked by attenuated separation of powers (as the powers of the Parliament and the Cabinet are largely fused) and a centralized federal division of powers with weaker federal second chambers. The third model is characterized by strong traditions of parliamentary supremacy with constitutional courts elected by Parliaments. The classical British model of strongest tradition of parliamentary supremacy is kept out of the comparative framework outlined above as the United Kingdom is not federal. The accountability of the government to the legislature is strongest in the continental European model of parliamentary federalism and weakest in the separation of powers and checks and balances system in the US presidential-federal model. The Commonwealth parliamentary federations lie somewhere in the middle as the practice of judicial review (innovated by the US Supreme Court in 1803) is a part and parcel of Canadian and Indian constitutionalism as well. It is necessitated by federal division of powers and charter of constitutionally entrenched citizens’ rights. The practice is not entirely alien to the European parliamentary federations but the elective nature of the judiciary there makes them different from more autonomous judicial institutions in the Commonwealth. While comparing the presidential form of democracy to that of parliamentary in his address to the Constituent Assembly, Ambedkar

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stated, ‘you can have a system which can give you more stability but less responsibility. The British system on the other hand gives you more responsibility but less stability’.1 He emphasized the necessity of both daily and periodic assessment in a parliamentary system whereas in presidential system, such as the USA, there is only periodic assessment. The framers of the Constitution opted for a more responsible government over a stable one. A responsible government means that the executive is responsible to Parliament and more specifically to House of People. Thus the government’s authority in a parliamentary system depends upon its having the confidence of the elected House. India began its constitutional odyssey as a classic Commonwealth parliamentary federation. However, after the end of the Nehru era and more particularly since the turbulent politics of the 1970s, the judiciary has moved into more activist trajectory and has reinvented its role within its domain of judicial review. Interpretation of constitutional amendments since the ‘basic structure doctrine’ has transformed Indian constitutionalism, and the judiciary’s role in it, from ‘procedure established by law’ (Article 21) ‘due process of law’ as recommended by the committee of the Constituent Assembly and essence of the US constitutionalism.2 This has also been at the root of many a frictious jostling between the Supreme Court and the Parliament and the expanding domain of the apex judiciary with the interpretations that are within the gamut of the ‘due process’ have been interpreted as a challenge to Indian federalism.3 The expanding scope of public interest litigation and social interest judicial interventions in governance has also extended the role of an active judiciary, overlapping on the role of Parliament. Thus the amending power of the Parliament in India as originally conceived in the Constitution has been considerably expanded and it has come to be a shared power with the judiciary. Nevertheless, in the structure of the government in India, the Parliament remains the repository of the will of the people. Its pressing claim to representativeness and legitimacy flows from this fact. Indeed, the functions of Parliament revolve around the relationships between the people and the government and between the government and the opposition. Synoptically, the Parliament is thus the most crucial institution of government performing the cardinal functions of representation, creating the government, making the government responsive and accountable; making the laws and legitimizing the government and the process of governance. Making peace and war or treaty-making power in the British Commonwealth Parliaments is an executive act but since cabinet government is ultimately parliamentary government,

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here again the ultimate accountability amounts to be parliamentary and/or popular.4 Parliamentary control of the executive is exercised through a series of weapons in the armoury of the Parliament, e.g. obligation of the government to keep the Parliament informed by making ministerial statements and, placing documents on the floor or the library of the Parliament, the Question Hour, passing of a calling attention or adjournment motion, and defeating the government on a major issue of public policy which may result in the fall of the government. The ultimate instrument of parliamentary control is, of course, refusing to vote supplies or defeating the government on a financial measure or passing a substantive motion of no-confidence in the Council of Ministers. In the last two instances the fall of the government is certain. But these are measures of last recourse. According to time series data, there has been a trend of lower frequency of trust votes over the years in the Indian Parliament. In the entire decade of 2000s there were only two trust votes as against seven in the 1960s, and 1980s–90s.5 Given the patterns of the evolution of Indian administration and economy since independence, the task of parliamentary control of government and administration in India is complex. It is notable in this context that, since the 1950s and until his demise in 1964, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru launched a massive drive for planned economic development led by the public sector as a part of his goal of ‘socialistic pattern of society’ in India, a trend that continued until at least the mid-1970s under Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. Rob Jenkins (1999) argues that we should not ignore the autonomous political logic behind the economic adjustment reforms introduced by the P.V. Narasimha Rao government. He traces the roots of this logic, which can be traced back to the populist policies introduced by Indira Gandhi.6 Since the paradigm shift from state socialism to business liberalism in 1991 under Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao and Finance Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh, a series of autonomous regulatory authorities have come to be established under various Acts of Parliament in different sectors of the national economy, e.g. electricity, telecom, insurance, company’s affairs and so on. These regulatory agencies replaced the direct ministerial or bureaucratic control of these sectors. Thus, parliamentary control is more immediate and direct in case of ministries and departments than the public sector undertakings and in regulating the corporate business sector. Because, in the sectors of the national economy, the executive has been obliged to set up autonomous regulatory commissions, it must consider their recommendations in framing its policies and actions. The point is that while the executive is directly

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accountable to the Parliament, the autonomous regulatory agencies’ accountability is indirect – through the executive. Devesh Kapur and Pratap Bhanu Mehta argue that over the years a decline can be noticed in the effectiveness of Parliament as an institution of accountability and oversight. After evaluating the four different mechanisms employed by Parliament for accountability – motions on the floor, oversight powers, the committee system – they point out that all these mechanisms are gradually being rendered dysfunctional. Their analysis of the impact of the globalization of the Indian economy on the powers of Parliament points out negative impacts. First, the world, as also India, is in an era when economic decision making is increasingly governed by international treaties; the Indian Parliament is one of the few Parliaments in the world that lacks a framework for effective treaty oversight in place, weakening its role in enforcing accountability of the executive in economic governance. Second, like many other countries, the tendency to delegate responsibilities to nonelected institutions can be discerned in India as well. This may lead to increase in transparency and accountability, but parliamentary supervision of these institutions remains very feeble.7 Parliamentary control over public sector undertakings is exercised through the Committee on Public Undertakings. However, when it comes to parliamentary control over planning – which ended with its abolition in August 2014 and establishment of the NITI Aayog – and the new regulatory regime following economic liberalization, privatization, and globalization, it is either tenuous or non-existent. There is no parliamentary scrutiny of five-year plans prepared by the Planning Commission (which itself is an extra-constitutional and extra-parliamentary body set up by a cabinet resolution of the Nehru government on 15 March 1950). Appropriations for the plans are of course made by the Parliament, but the plans prepared by the Planning Commission were a fait accompli so far as the Parliament was concerned. The plans were approved by the NDC, a forum of ‘executive federalism’ representing the executive heads of the union and state governments. But the Parliament was kept out of the loop, which does not have a committee to consider the decisions of the intergovernmental bodies like the NDC and the ISC.8 As Partha Chatterjee points out, the very assertion of technical nature of planning makes it an instrument of politics. Both Chatterjee and Kaviraj have argued that Nehru established the Planning Commission in order to keep economic decisions outside the squabbles of politics.9 The newly established independent regulatory authorities are kept totally out of parliamentary scrutiny and control. Telecom licenses,

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are, for example, issued by the minister in light of TRAI which operates outside the purview of the PAC or even the CAG.10 Therefore, it can be argued that the parliamentary scrutiny of institutions responsible for economic policies is absent in the Indian context. The replacement of the Planning Commission by NITI Aayog may be seen as a step forward to remove all constraints from economic decision making. However, it will be essential for the NITI Aayog to coordinate with different departments and ministries in order to emerge as an effective institution in Indian federal set-up. Prabhat Patnaik is critical of the replacement of the Planning Commission with the NITI Aayog and argues that it will further lead to centralization of power in the Union government. The functioning of the Parliament in India can be analytically reviewed in three stages (a) one-party majority governments, (b) a Congress minority government led by P.V. Narasimha Rao, and (c) coalition/minority governments. The role of the Parliament has differed in these periods. In the one-party dominant phase, parliamentary control of the executive was accustomed to larger party discipline, giving the executive a better control over the Parliament’s working. This phase could be divided between the design in the Nehru era and that in the Indira Gandhi era, in the heyday of her power. The Parliament worked with greater role and effectiveness during the Nehru era when the decline of the Parliament was less frequently heard. The committee system worked with greater attentiveness and efficacy. Even though the Congress had an easy majority, Nehru took the Parliament seriously and habitually attended its sessions. The parliamentary debates were quite impressive and the Parliament also had longer sessions. However, in the 1970s and 1980s, during the Indira Gandhi–Rajiv Gandhi period, there was a noticeable decay in the role and significance of the Parliament in governance. Though during the Janata Party interlude (1977–79), there was an obvious restoration of the role and relevance of the Parliament when important constitutional amendments, such as the Forty-Third and FortyFourth Constitution Amendment Acts, were passed to undo some of the changes brought by the Forty-Second Amendment legislated by the Parliament during the Emergency. A number of legislations and policy reforms were also passionately debated before the legislation concluded in the Parliament. Due to a hasty coalition of five parties on the eve of 1977 elections and even hastier merger under the surprise compulsion of power, the Janata Party remained a de facto coalition, as the constituents continued to work as autonomous components within the party

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and the leadership issue continued to remain a thorn in the party’s flesh. The distribution of Council of Ministers berths and portfolios was, therefore, also on the basis of a ‘fair’ allocation of quota to each of the constituents that satisfied none. Consequently the working of the government too was like that of an opportunistic coalition. Further, the Shiromani Akali Dal from Punjab, a state party, was also an inter-party coalition partner. It was under the Congress minority government headed by P.V. Narasimha Rao that the autonomy of the Parliament reached its pinnacle (though Rao succeeded in constructing a majority by getting the support of the JMM MPs) as the government had to work under the control of an opposition-in-majority. During this period, actions of the government were decided by consensus within the Parliament and the government did not possess the control of the party whip to line up the party loyalists behind the policy of the government. The era of coalition politics at the centre started in 1989 with the formation of the National Front Government headed by V.P. Singh. Excepting the years between 1991 and 1996 when Congress was in power (first as minority government and then as majority government), all other governments at the centre have been coalition governments. The National Front and the United Front were both a combination of ‘third-force’ parties that held the middle ground between the Congress, on one hand and the BJP on the other hand. These were last of the attempted a secular alternative to the Congress. The National Front comprised the Janata Dal (143 seats), Telugu Desam Party (24), DMK (0), Asom Gana Parishad (0) and Congress Socialist Party (1). Further, these parties were part of the executive coalition, its legislative coalition involved CPI(M) and BJP. In 1996, the United Front government was formed with Janata Dal (46 seats), Samajwadi Party (17), Telugu Desam (16), DMK (17), AGP (5) and Autonomous State Demand Committee (1). The 1998 Lok Sabha election was a breakthrough that saw a political realignment which shifted coalition power from the left of centre to the right of centre led by BJP and subsequently called the National Democratic Alliance (NDA). The NDA coalition contained thirteen parties: BJP (182 seats), AIADMK (18), Samata Party (12), Biju Janata Dal (9), Akali Dal (8), Trinamool Congress (7), Shiv Sena (6), Pattali Makkal Katchi (4), M.G. Ramachandran Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhgam (3), Lok Shakti Party (3), Haryana Vikas Party (1), Janata Party (1) and Tamizhaga Rajiv Congress (1). The coalition failed because the AIADMK withdrew support. In the 1999 midterm poll, the NDA returned to power with an expanded sixteen party coalition: BJP (182 SEATS), TDP (29), Janta Dal (United) (21), Shiv

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Sena (15), DMK (12), BJD (10), AITMC (8), Indian Union Lok Dal (5), PMK (5), MDMK (4), Shiromani Akali Dal (2), National Conference (4), Himachal Vikas Congress (1), Manipur State Congress Party (1), Loktantrik Congress Party (2).11 The UPA government formed in 2004 was a coalition of fourteen parties. Interestingly, there was difference of just seven seats between the Congress and the BJP, but the Congress managed to form a coalition government with the support of its allies; a coalition that was named UPA. The constituent parties of UPA were as follows: Congress (145 seats), Samajwadi Party (21), DMK (16), NCP (9), Kerala Congress (2), PMK (6), TRS (5), JMM (5), MDMK(4), LJSP (3), JKPDP (1), Republican Party of India (1), Muslim League (1). Congress was able to improve its seat share in 2009 elections but not enough to form a government on its own. The UPA II, which formed the government in 2009, was a coalition of ten parties: Congress (206 seats), AITMC (19), NCP (9), National Conference (3), JMM (2), Indian Union Muslim League (2), Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (1), Kerala Congress (Mani) (1), and All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (1). In 2014 elections, BJP not only emerged as the single largest party but received majority of its own. Despite this, the BJP decided to retain its coalition NDA. However, the NDA as a coalition has been changing; the current NDA consists of: BJP (282 seats), Shiv Sena (18), Swabhimani Palsha (1), PMK (1), All India NR Congress (1), TDP (16), LJSP (6), Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (3), Shiromani Akali Dal (4), Apna Dal (2), National People’s Party (India) (1), Naga People’s Front (1), All India United Democratic Front (3). There are many other parties that continued to be in the NDA though they have not won a seat in the Lok Sabha; viz., Republican Party of India (Athavale) – Rashtriya Samaj Paksha, Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam, MDMK, Kongunadu Makkal Desia Katchi, Indhiya Jananayaga Katchi, Kerala Congress (Nationalist), Revolutionary Socialist Party (Bolshevik), Haryana Janhit Congress, Manipur People’s Party, Gorkha Janmukti Morcha, Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party, Jana Sena Party, New Justice Party. Singh and Saxena have argued that the three political formations in the coalition phase faced grave misfortunes in both electoral and policy spheres. In the electoral arena, the Janata version faced severe trouble in settling caste divisions. Likewise, the BJP-led coalitions had to tackle the glitches of religious nationalism. The Congress-led coalition have had to synchronize the minority-majority cleavage of enormous religious, linguistic, and regional diversities. In the policy arena, the important trials related to balancing the cultural and economic

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claims of different sections of society on state’s developmental agenda and regulatory role. Academic writings on coalition politics and government in India have generally theorized that the positive changes that were not possible in the one-party majority governments in the past are greater representativeness and responsiveness to a massive display of social, cultural, and regional demands. A broader federal power sharing has encouraged a greater degree of national integration. However, the negative influences relate to governmental instability, especially in the first decade, and indecisiveness and delay in decision making in the government, affecting the process of governance. With the beginning of multi-party coalition governments since the 1989 Lok Sabha election, the autonomy of the Parliament has supposedly enlarged to a large extent. Nonetheless, unlike one-party majority governments, the multiparty coalition governments have dispersal rather than concentration of the executive power. Therefore, the function of consensus making is not merely limited to the Council of Ministers, the executive power gets more dispersed and exercised through coordination committee of the inter-party coalition consisting also of powerful Chief Ministers, whose parties are sharing power in a federal coalition government.12 However, this does not automatically increase the autonomy and efficacy of the multi-party parliamentary committees. There is some evidence that lesser number of Bills are being referred to committees in the era of coalition governments than earlier.13 Rajesh Jha substantiates this by pointing out that the highest number of Bills were referred to Select Committees and Joint Select Committees the First Lok Sabha and the number has gradually declined afterwards. During the tenure of the First Lok Sabha (1952–57), forty-six Bills were referred to the committees, which reduced to thirty-five Bills in the Second Lok Sabha (1957–62), twenty-one Bills in the Third Lok Sabha (1962–67) and twenty-five in the Fourth Lok Sabha (1967–71). Thus, the practice of referring significant Bills to the Select Committees or Joint Select Committees, which was common in the former years, has over the years fallen into disuse. Notably, during the first Four Lok Sabhas, around thirteen percent of the total Bills introduced undergo the Select Committees’ examination and the number gets roughly halved during the tenure of the Fifth Lok Sabha. The use of the Select Committees in the Rajya Sabha has also waned. In the 1980s, approximately one percent of the total bills were referred to the Select Committees (1.4 percent in the Seventh Lok Sabha [1980–84] and 0.7 percent in the Eighth Lok Sabha [1984–89]) and the result was that the Parliament pushed and rushed often ill-conceived and detrimental legislations too in the

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shortest possible time, entirely bypassing the process of a serious consideration of the Lok Sabha.14 In spite of a sharp reduction in the number of Bills being referred to the Select Committees, it is interesting to note that the on the whole, proportion of Bills being referred to the committees has been rising considerably, particularly from the Tenth Lok Sabha onwards (from 1.4 percent in the Seventh Lok Sabha to 25.3 percent in the Twelfth Lok Sabha [1998–99] to 64.84 in the Fourteenth Lok Sabha [2004–09]). The majority of the Bills are referred to the Standing Committees and the gap has increasingly become very huge. This can be observed from the fact that in the Fourteenth Lok Sabha, only one bill was scrutinized by the Joint Select Committee, whereas 142 Bills were referred to the Standing Committees. The varied factors that can be attributed to this rising use of the committees are the following: demise of the single-party governments, emergence of the coalition/minority governments and the opposition gaining strength. The real parliamentary work can actually be done fruitfully in the committees where fewer members intensively consider the implication of a legislative proposal clause by clause. This naturally gives greater opening to parliamentary interventions in the process of governance.15 Rajesh Jha has argued that though the Parliamentary Committees assist in effective legislation and policy making and multilateral consultation in the coalition era, they have also become a complex site for political bargaining. It is observed that in coalition governments, committee chairs are also dispersed in a manner that makes it feasible for parties to watch their coalition partners in the executive. The leading associate in the ruling coalition might employ the position of committee chair as part of the monitoring apparatus so that it can keep a check on the ministers from the coalition allies. Thus, Jha asserts that party considerations remain in the committee arena as well. This point is echoed in Ajay K. Mehra’s observation that parliamentary committees have become a ‘battle-ground for partisan politics’ which can be gauged from various scandals that have been exposed recently and it has observed that the ruling party has often tried to use its members in the committees to pull it out of the crisis.16 While assessing the significance of parliamentary committees Subhash Kashyap notes, the concept or departmentally related standing select committees provide to parliament sharper and more effective surveillance tools, restore the balance between parliament’s legislative and

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deliberative functions and its role as a representative body, and above all, save valuable parliamentary time to the mutual advantage of both parliament and government.17 The National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution (Chair: Justice M.N. Venkatachaliah) in its Report submitted in 2002 highlighted the shortcomings in the functioning of the DRSCs; viz, their cumbersome size, absenteeism, lack of specialists and focused work, etc. The most significant recommendation of the Commission was that besides the existing standing committees, three new nodal committees should be set up one each on National Economy (subsuming the existing committees on estimates and public undertakings), Constitutional Amendments, and Legislation (subsuming the existing committee on subordinate legislation). The rationale for this is provided in terms of the fact that legislation is Parliament’s primary responsibility; executive power of the Union is co-extensive with legislative power but the constituent power is entirely parliamentary realm; and need for consideration of major macroeconomic issues of fiscal, monetary, financial, industrial, and trade policies in an integrated approach. The setting up of these committees would provide the Parliament with an alternative stand point to mull over instead of relying exclusively on the viewpoint of the executive. These recommendations have not yet been implemented so far.18 Highlighting the importance of the Parliamentary Committees, B.D. Dua describes them as ‘“democracy in action”, the alpha though not the omega of Parliament’. He argues that the three scrutinizing committees – Committee on Government Assurances, Committee on Papers Laid on the Table, and the Committee on Subordinate Legislation – maintain the Ministers and their bureaucrats on toes, establishing thereby an ‘accountability regime’ that complements the ‘oversight’ functions of Parliament. The ad hoc committees, mainly those allocated investigative functions, accomplish solemn, somewhat ‘quasi-judicial’, tasks to a great extent to the respite of Parliament.19 Evaluating the role of DRSCs Dua points out that these committees can listen to bureaucrats, expert witnesses, and representative of special interests. This makes the DRSCs receptive to ample consultation and advice mainly when a Committee(s) is asked to reflect on some controversial Bill(s). The Committee on Human Resource Development as well as the Committee on Health and Family Welfare were in vigorous discussion with a good number of the stakeholders while scrutinizing the National Commission for Higher Education and Research Bill. With regard to the amended Protection of Children from Sexual

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Offences Bill introduced in the Rajya Sabha in 2011, the Committee on Human Resource Development vigorously sought inputs from women organizations and from other stakeholders like the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights. After a prolonged course, some of the Committee’s recommendations were accepted by the government resulting in key changes in the draft legislation as approved by the Ministry of Women and Child Development. Likewise, the Marriage Laws (Amendment) Bill introduced in the Rajya Sabha in 2010 was a great deal enhanced after the Standing Committee of the Rajya Sabha received a response from non-governmental organizations working on women’s issues. Moreover, the Standing Committee on Personnel, Public Grievances and Law and Justice is engaged in serious extensive work on the Lok Pal and Lokayukta Bill, introduced in August 2011, though many of its recommendations were not heeded to by the government when the Bill was reintroduced in December 2011. On the whole, it seems that the DRSCs vet the Bills referred to them effectively, though it is contentious whether these Committees should be over-utilized, as it may have an unfavourable effect on their mandated general overseeing of the working of a ministry/department while the better equipped bill-specific Select or Joint Select Committees remain under-utilized for this function.20 Dua has argued that the Committees, chiefly the legislative-cum-financial committees, need to be a well-resourced equivalent to the tasks placed on them. Moreover, it is vital that the Committees are provided adequate time to perform their functions whether it has to do with scrutinizing legislative proposals or demands for grants. The Parliament’s oversight functions under pressure of rushing through their work would be compromised without this.21 Another important issue is the Parliament scrutiny of delegated legislations, which means subordinate or subsidiary laws framed by administrative bodies to which the Parliament has delegated the lawmaking authority. Kakkar and Bedi argue that there are four mechanisms through which Parliament in India can scrutinize the delegated legislation framed by the executive. These are as follows: debates on the act, statutory motions, Question Hour, and committees on subordinate legislation.22 Parliamentary oversight on this aspect of law making is often weakened on account of pressures on the Parliament’s time and lack of interest and skills among the members. Another significant issue for the autonomy of the Parliament is the privileges and immunities of MPs. M.P. Singh has argued that in majority of the judgements concerning parliamentary privileges have pitted the legislatures against fundamental freedoms of individuals and

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the press. He further asserts that as a consequence of paradigm shifts in politics and economy and with the resurgence of the civil society, revival of class and mass movements, and privatization and globalization, the more intricate conflicts between ‘privileges’ and ‘rights’ may surface and occur rather frequently across the country. Therefore, he suggests a reexamination of the question of parliamentary privileges in the present democratic context rather than relying on the archaic conventions of the British constitutional practice.23 However, this increase in the autonomy of the Parliament during the multi-party system has coincided with some other developments that have contributed to the decline of the Parliament as well. There has been an alarming increase in recent decades in criminalization of politics, a euphemism for the emergence of criminally tainted politicians who get elected to all the representative bodies, including to the Parliament of India. No party is immune from this phenomenon. The Prime Ministers in recent times have been under pressure from a coalescing party to include even such MPs in the Council of Ministers who have criminal case(s) against them as their nominee. The UPA Government in its early days filed an affidavit in the Supreme Court saying that the Constitution does not disqualify persons with criminal charges from being elected to the Parliament and from being included in the Council of Ministers unless proved guilty by the highest court. In the Fifteenth Lok Sabha (2009–14), 59.29 percent of MPs in the two major national parties – Congress and BJP – were chargesheeted. Other parties have had from 18.75 percent to 100 percent such tainted MPs. Further, 29.72 percent of MPs had criminal cases pending against them in courts. The break-up of percentage of tainted members among the two main national parties is here: Congress and the BJP were 21.36 percent and 37.93 percent, respectively. The data for other parties were as follows: CPM 18.75 percent, BSP 28.5 percent, JD-U 40 percent, BJD 28.57 percent, AIADMK 44.44 percent, DMK 22.22 percent, and so on.24 This very seriously restricts the oversight functions of the Parliament both in terms of its accountability to the electors and its capacity to enforce accountability and responsibility of the executive. The onset of coalition politics at the national level has impacted collective responsibility of the Cabinet to the Parliament; which gets diluted as a coalition ally – TDP, DMK, AIADMK, AITMC, etc. – as such one-leader (family) party dictate terms in nominating their second rung leaders to the Union Council of Ministers, who wait for the ‘leader’s’ nod before making a decision. This practice compromises the principle of collective responsibility of the government which the

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Constitution reposes in the Lok Sabha. Also, such parties have time and again pushed their party and state agenda over larger, national issues. In addition, there has also been an increasing extension of judicial intervention pertaining to the matters happening on the floor of the Houses, which was normally supposed to be a sovereign, at least exclusive, parliamentary domain. The controversial rulings of the Speaker under the anti-defection law enshrined in the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution have become subject to judicial review. In Raja Ram Pal,25 the Court constrained the power of the Parliament by arguing that it could not expel a member of the House under Article 105 of the Constitution as it did not provide ‘expulsion’ as a category whereby a person could cease to be a member of the Parliament among several other bases for cessation of membership. The appropriate course of action in charges of corruption against an MP outside the House would be to prosecute one in accordance with the law of the land wherein, depending on circumstances, parliamentary immunity under Article 105(2) may not be available as per the decision in P.V. Narasimha Rao v. State, 1998(4)SCC:626. In Keshav Singh,26 the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court sustained the action of the UP Legislative Assembly to punish the offender for violating the privileges of the House. In Raja Ram Pal the action of the Parliament to expel the members for alleged violation of the parliamentary code of conduct and advised recourse to the appropriate procedures under the criminal law of the land. Chaube observes that in both the judgements, the Court did not give up its claim of power to examine the action taken by the legislatures over their non-legislative proceedings, in case such proceedings were in contravention of constitutionally guaranteed fundamental rights or were stained with ‘substantive or gross illegality’. The concluding remarks of the Court in the Raja Ram case, makes it is clear that the Court will not falter to examine or review legislatures’ use of immunities and privileges on the yardstick of constitutionality or even natural justice.27 Moreover, unruly behaviour on the floor of the Parliament and disruption of the entire parliamentary proceeding for months by the opposition, which includes all the parties national and state at different points of time, have tended to increase. Due to the resulting perpetual pandemonium, the quality and quantity of debate on any issue and most Bills has declined sharply. As the research by PRS Legislative suggests that there are a number of Bills that pass with less than twenty minutes of debate. In a number of cases, the Bills have been passed amidst noisy interruptions in Parliament. For example, on the last day

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of 2008, eight Bills were passed in the Lok Sabha within seventeen minutes without any debate. It needs to be noted that the Parliament met for just forty-six days that year – the lowest ever in a calendar year, which severely constricted the time available to eloquently examine the proposals of the executive.28 Kaushiki Sanyal and C.V. Madhukar in an effort to measure the efficiency of the Indian Parliament point out that while during 1952–72 the Lok Sabha worked for an average of 120 days in a year, it worked only for an average of 70 working days in the first decade of the twenty-first century. The National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution (Chair: Justice M.N. Venkatachalaiah) recommended that a minimum number of working days for Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha should be fixed at 120 and 100 days respectively, a suggestion that has been ignored so far. Moreover, while inaugurating the Whips Conference in 2008 Vice President (and ex-officio Chairman of the Rajya Sabha) Hamid Ansari suggested an increase in the number of sittings of Parliament to 130 days per annum. Some of the Legislative Assemblies have resolved this predicament by specifying a minimum number of working days in their rules of procedure. The Odisha Legislative Assembly has a binding provision specifying the number of days that it would meet. Similarly, the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly has a provision which states that best efforts would be made to work for a specified number of days. Obviously, the executive has consolidated its powers over time, the Parliament seems to have lost sight of any strategy to effectively hold the government accountable.29 In fact, the boundary between the politics of the street and political behaviour on the floor of the Parliament has got blurred. The NinetyFirst amendment of the Constitution of India has made defection more difficult by limiting the size of the ministry at fifteen percent of the membership of the Lok Sabha. In 2010, Manish Tewari, a Congress MP, moved a Private Member’s Bill (now lapsed) to amend the anti-defection law in order to provide freedom of expression to parliamentarians and legislators by freeing them from the fear of loss of membership for toeing a line independent of their respective party positions in all instances other than no-confidence motions, money Bills besides financial matters enumerated in Articles 112 to 117 and Articles 202 to 207. He argued that in the absence of freedom, members become disinterested in ‘constructively contributing to law making, which is the principal function of Parliament and instead focus their energies on other

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procedural instrumentalities’ like questions, zero hour mentions and calling attentions.30 Expectedly, most parties on either side of the aisle were not interested in such a measure. Analyses also show that the Ninety-First amendment did not address the issue of unstable coalitions because the law does not take cognizance of coalitions and pre-poll electoral adjustments among political parties.31 Hence, the Second Administrative Reforms Commission (Chair: M. Veerappa Moily) recommended an amendment to the Constitution to safeguard the integrity of coalitions and to forbid the opportunistic coalitions between elections. It says that if one or more parties in a coalition with a common programme mandated by the electorate either explicitly before the elections or implicitly while forming the government, realign midstream with one or more parties outside the coalition, then members of that party or parties shall have to seek a fresh mandate from the electorate.32 Further, the patterns of political recruitment have become overly influenced in recent decades by money and muscle power and what may be called ‘celluloid politics’ (the term refers to celebrities entering the politics). It is often alleged that the Presidential nominations to the Rajya Sabha, which the Constitution expects to be on considerations of achievements attained by the nominee in the fields of social service, arts, and science, have lately been made on partisan considerations by the ruling party. Rajya Sabha seats have allegedly lately been purchased by certain industrialists by making hefty donations to the parties that nominated them.33 An MP gets paid more than ₹100,000 per month by way of salary, allowances, and perks. Yet, absenteeism from parliamentary work on the part of the members has reached alarming proportions. This often results in proceedings of a House of Parliament held in empty Chambers and without a quorum. It is also alleged often that some of the MPs make money by selling public utilities which they are supposed to distribute in their constituency under their supervision, e.g. petrol pumps, telephone connections, and gas connections (before the telecom boom following the 1991 economic liberalization), and several other allotments still under governmental discretion. The P.V. Narasimha Rao Government (1991–96) introduced the MPLADS so that MPs could develop their constituencies in collaboration with the respective district administration from a list of approved items of public works. A sum of ₹ten million, subsequently

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enhanced and the current grant is ₹fifty million, is annually granted to each MP under this scheme. In principle, this kind of scheme is ideally administered under the executive rather than under a legislator. Somanath Chatterjee, Speaker of the Fourteenth Lok Sabha (4 June 2004–16 May 2009), had suggested abolition of the scheme as he considered it ill-conceived in theory and problematic in practice. On the model of the MPLADS, the MLALAD Scheme has been introduced in several states. The Scheme was criticized as several cases of corruption and misuse were reported in the execution of the scheme.34 The Nitish Kumar government in Bihar abolished the MLALADS in 2010, though the scheme continues to exist in many states. Surveys indicate that these schemes are porous; public money is often syphoned off for the personal gratification of a legislator or for party funding. Arun Agarwal’s research has revealed that in several cases, involving even a former Prime Minister, the allocation remained less than fully utilized.35 Unlike the accountability of the Union Executive to the Lok Sabha, the accountability of the mechanisms of executive federalism such as the Inter-State Council (or the National Development Council informally set up outside the framework of the Constitution), to the Parliament is not provided for. M.P. Singh has rightly drawn attention to this major missing link in the chain of parliamentary control of the intergovernmental mechanisms. This anomaly is being increasingly felt both in India and in Canada. The two constitutions are conjoined twins as they have drawn inspirations from the same constitutional tradition due to the legacy of British colonialism. This lacuna deserves attention in analysis as well as in constitutional discourse.36

Conclusion The Parliament’s accountability to the people is the source which entitles it to hold the Parliament accountable and responsible continually, the fact referred to by Dr. Ambedkar in his Constituent Assembly speech. Hence, when people or political groups protest, parliamentary and political reforms become imperative, but the real question is of make them lasting. For example, the JP movement of 1974, named so after its septuagenarian Gandhian and socialist leader Jaya Prakash Narayan, compelled a change in the party system, underlined the systemic corruption across the country, facilitated constitutional correction of the wrongs of the emergency and engendered a new crop of leadership, but it remained ephemeral, having dissipated within a couple of years due to the lust for power. Similarly, the anti-corruption

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movement with social worker Anna Hazare as its face, but motivated by a loose political movement orchestrated by Arvind Kejriwal and a host of other social activists, was also sacrificed at the altar of power politics within a couple of years. Moreover, there have also been new social movements centred on ecology, gender justice, dalit rights, and sheer livelihood of sections of the people driven to deprivation and destitution by industrialization and globalization. Most of these movements invoke method of satyagraha and also draw inspiration from the opening lines of the Preamble to the Constitution which declares ‘We the people. . .’ as the source of all power and asserts popular sovereignty. This is the challenge of participatory democracy which the government and the Parliament has often tried to meet by involving the civil society in policy making and preparing legislative drafts through institutions like the NAC and laws like the RTI. A more coherent and sustained institutionalization of these devices would level greater popular accountability and legitimacy to the Parliament as the supreme representative institution under the Constitution of India.

Notes 1 Statement by B.R. Ambedkar, Constituent Assembly Debates, vol. VII, 27 November 1948, http://parliamentofindia.nic.in/ls/debates/vol7p1b. htm (Accessed on 15 April 2016). 2 The Constituent Assembly’s debate on the issue of the ‘Procedure Established by Law’ and the ‘Due Process of Law’ and its implication has been analysed in detail by Ajay K. Mehra, ‘“Due Process” or “Procedure Established by Law?”’, in Pran Chopra (ed.), The Supreme Court vs. the Constitution: A Challenge to Federalism, New Delhi: Sage, 2006, pp. 115–130. 3 See Pran Chopra (ed.), The Supreme Court vs. the Constitution: A Challenge to Federalism, New Delhi: Sage, 2006. 4 K.C. Wheare, Legislatures, London: Oxford University Press, 1968, chapters 3–6. 5 Rekha Saxena, Situating Federalism: Mechanisms of Intergovernmental Relations in Canada and India, New Delhi: Manohar, 2006. 6 Rob Jenkins, Democratic Politics and Economic Reforms in India, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999. 7 Devesh Kapur and Pratap Bhanu Mehta, The Indian Parliament as an Institution of Accountability, Democracy, Governance and Human Rights Programme, Paper No. 23, January 2006, United Nations Research Institute for Social Development. 8 N.K. Singh, a former IAS officer and a member of the Planning Commission and currently a Rajya Sabha member, in a conference on Effective Legislatures organized by PRS Legislative Research in New Delhi, 9 December 2009.

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9 Partha Chatterjee, ‘Development Planning and the Indian State’, in Zoya Hasan (ed.), Politics and the State in India, New Delhi: Sage Publications, 2000, pp. 115–141 and Sudipta Kaviraj, ‘Dilemmas of Democratic Development in India’, in Adrian Leftwich (ed.), Democracy and Development: Theory and Practice, Cambridge: Polity Press (in association with Blackwell), 1996, pp. 114–138. 10 Bidyut Chakrabarty, Forging Power: Coalition Politics in India, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2006, Ch. 1. 11 M.P. Singh and Rekha Saxena, India at the Polls: Parliamentary Elections in the Federal Phase, New Delhi: Orient Longman Private Limited, 2003, pp. 8–13. 12 M.P. Singh and Rekha Saxena, ‘Parliament: Gulliver in the Land of Lilliputs’, in Indian Politics: Constitutional Foundations and Institutional Functioning, New Delhi: PHI Learning Pvt. Ltd., 2013. 13 Rajesh Jha, Legislation Under Coalition Governments, Doctoral Dissertation submitted to the Department of Political Science, University of Delhi, 2007. 14 Rajesh Jha, ‘Evaluating Parliamentary Committees and Committee System: Changing Contours of Governance and Policy’, in Social Watch Perspective Series, vol. 2, New Delhi: National Social Watch Coalition. 15 Ibid. 16 Ajay K. Mehra, ‘The Indian Parliament and Cost to the Country’, in Citizens’ Report on Governance and Development 2013, National Social Watch, Delhi: Danish Books, 2013. 17 B.D. Dua, M.P. Singh and Rekha Saxena, ‘Introduction’, in Indian Parliament: The Changing Landscape, New Delhi: Manohar, 2014, p. 16. 18 Ibid. 19 B.D. Dua, ‘Parliamentary Committees: An Analysis’, in Dua, Singh and Saxena (eds.), op. cit., 2014. 20 Ibid. 21 Ibid. 22 Jhalak Kakkar and Pallavi Bedi, ‘Parliamentary Scrutiny of Executive Rule Making’, in Dua, Singh and Saxena (eds.), op. cit., 2014, pp. 471–481. 23 M.P. Singh, ‘Parlaimentary Privileges and Immunities in India: An Argument for Codification’, in Dua, Singh and Saxena (eds.), op. cit., pp. 425–435. 24 Association of Democratic Rights, Pending Criminal Cases on MPs of Fifteenth Lok Sabha elected in 2009. http://adrindia.org/content/analysispending-criminal-cases-lok-sabha-mps-2009 and http://eci.nic.in (Both Accessed on 24 July 2016). 25 Raja Ram Pal v. Speaker, Lok Sabha, Supreme Court, 10 January 2007, PDF document of the typescript made available by the Court. 26 Keshav Singhv v. Speaker, Legislative Assembly of U.P.AIR 1965 Allahabad/Lucknow; 349. 27 S.K. Chaube, ‘Judicial Review and Limits of the Privileges and Powers of the Indian Parliament’, in Dua, Singh and Saxena (eds.), op. cit., 2014, pp. 197–230. The former case pertains to the breach of privileges in the UP Legislative Assembly and the latter case relates to a sting operation telecast by a TV channel showing ten MPs accepting bribes for raising questions on some issues in the Parliament.

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28 Kaushiki Sanyal and C.V. Madhukar, ‘Measuring Effectiveness of India’s Parliament’, in Dua, Singh and Saxena (eds.), op. cit., 2014, pp. 439–470. 29 Ibid. 30 Private Members Bill presented by Manish Tewari in Lok Sabha in 2010. 31 A. Surya Prakash, ‘Parliament in India: Time for Reform’, Dua, Singh and Saxena (eds.), op. cit., 2014, pp. 367–380. 32 Fourth Report on ‘Ethics in Governance’, Second Administrative Reforms Commission, 2006, p. 15. 33 Media reports and analyses by voluntary institutions such Association for Democratic Reforms and Social Watch India have shown that for over a decade and a half the rich and powerful hobnobbing with political parties and a few leaders have attempted to usurp the Rajya Sabha seat using their money power and some have been successful. See, for example, Sanjay Singh, Rajya Sabha Polls: A High-stakes Game and a Helpless Election Commission, www.firstpost.com/politics/rajya-sabha-polls-a-high-stakesgame-and-a-helpless-election-commission-2820346.html (Accessed on 8 July 2016) and Rajya Sabha Polls: A High-stakes Game and a Helpless Election Commission, http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politicsand-nation/55-crorepati-newly-elected-rajya-sabha-mps-13-with-criminalcases-adr/articleshow/52974424.cms (Accessed on 8 July 2016). 34 www.frontline.in/static/html/fl2122/stories/20041105005802400.htm (Accessed on 24 July 2016). 35 Arun Agarwal, ‘The Indian Parliament’, in Devesh Kapur and Pratap Bhanu Mehta (eds.), Public Institutions in India: Performance and Design, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2005, Ch. 2. 36 M.P. Singh, ‘Accountability in Intergovernmental Polity’, Management in Government, XLIII(1), April–June 2011, pp. 79–87.

9

Opposition and parliamentary accountability Who sets the agenda?1 Sandeep Shastri

I was in the opposition for 40 years but I never hesitated to congratulate the government of the day when the situation warranted. But, Congress behaved irresponsibly during the Kargil war Atal Bihari Vajpayee as Prime Minister 7 April 2004 The government does not want our cooperation or wants it on its own terms. We are the Opposition. But if the Government does not allow the Opposition to play the part then there would be difficulty and democracy would not work well Atal Bihari Vajpayee as Leader of the NDA while in the Opposition 26 August 2004 The Government and the opposition both have a sacred obligation. We do incalculable damage to the reputation of India’s Parliament if we resort to disruption of Parliament to make a political point. Those who prevent Parliament from functioning, disable the voice of the people Manmohan Singh as Prime Minister in address to nation on 2 September 2012 The NDA government is pushing forward a discussion with not even a formal consultation with the Opposition. The Congress partly strongly opposes the move of the Government and will do so on the floor of the House Manmohan Singh as Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha on 21 December 2002

Approaching the theme The opening four statements made by two very important leaders, who held the positions of both the Prime Minister as well as Leader of the Opposition,2 succinctly highlight the difference in perspective

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when one is the ruling and the opposition. All four statements draw attention to a clear difference in perception. Vajpayee rightly pointed out to the role of a constructive opposition when he was Prime Minister and highlighted the need for the opposition to be given its legitimate space when he was the Leader of the Opposition. Manmohan Singh as Prime Minister drew attention to the responsibilities of the opposition in allowing Parliament to function and bemoaned the lack of consultation between the ruling and the opposition when he was the Leader of the Opposition. In the working of India’s parliamentary democracy, the role of the opposition is clearly now occupying the spotlight of attention. In the last quarter century with the formation of coalition governments at the national level and the clear emergence of a competitive party system, the role of the opposition has assumed added significance and relevance. There is of course, an element of ambiguity and lack of consensus (especially between the ruling and the opposition) on the legitimate role of the opposition in a parliamentary system. More often than not, for those in politics, where they ‘stand’ depends on which side of the aisle they ‘sit’! This chapter makes an attempt to assess the position of the Opposition within the framework of Parliamentary democracy and analyze the multiple roles it has come to play within the boundaries of Parliamentary accountability. If one were to look at the broader context there has been an interesting debate on the emerging role of the Parliament in India. While many commentators have drawn attention to the decline of Parliament and the strong public sentiment against Parliament3 others have focused on the progressive democratization of the legislative chambers.4 Scholars have also drawn attention to the changing characteristics of political parties in India as being the principal factor contributing to the decline of Parliament.5 While exclusively focusing on the Opposition in the lower house of the Indian Parliament, we would make the argument in this chapter that the political context in which the opposition operates on the one hand and the redefining of the role that elected representatives themselves seem to be increasingly believing in needs to be budgeted into any assessment.6

A framework for analysis Robert Dahl referred to polyarchal democracies as offering meaningful choices among different alternatives in his seminal work on democratic theory as early as in 1956, asserting that the alternative with the maximum support gains prominence even as others enjoy an element of legitimacy.7 A few decades later, expanding on this theme, Dahl

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argued that in polyarchal democracies, citizens enjoyed the right to be critical of the conduct of government.8 Clearly, ‘opposition alongside participation’9 was seen as the mainstay of democracy. One of the key features of liberal democracies and which made them distinctly different from non-democratic regimes was the legitimacy and presence of the opposition. Shapiro has rightly asserted that democracy ‘is an ideology of opposition as much as it is one of government’.10 Thus within a democratic framework, the legitimate space of the opposition has always been recognized with varying degrees of assertiveness. Three dimensions need to be factored into this analysis. Firstly, the nature and structure of the democratic political system assumes significance. Does the system provide for institutional and political opportunities for the voice of the opposition to be heard? Is the opposition accommodated in the legitimate space available within the political institutions that exist or do they need to get themselves heard through more ingenious ways by accessing other available platforms in the democratic political process? These questions are critical to understanding the role of the Opposition in the Indian democratic context. A tangential aspect that merits focus is whether the constitutional arrangement provides for a presidential, semi-presidential or a parliamentary system of government. In a parliamentary system of government, the role and space for the opposition is often distinctly defined. Comparisons across established democratic political systems have found that in ‘institutional terms, the Westminster systems are still at the bottom of the league table when it comes to opposition influence on parliamentary decision-making’.11 In these parliamentary democracies, the opposition within the elected legislature many a time sees its legitimate role as being one of criticizing the ruling party and the government often with an eye on the next elections.12 Yet, when this criticism is within the larger framework of accountability, it is a ‘powerful reminder of the great capacity of parliamentary democracy (to balance) . . . competing public demands for political stability and change.’13 Helms identifies three tasks of the opposition, especially in a parliamentary democracy:14 a) criticizing the government; b) scrutinizing and checking government actions; and c) representing a credible alternative to the government. It has often been argued in western parliamentary democracies that, within the elected legislature, when the ruling party is strong, the opposition takes recourse to parliamentary debates and committees to assert its presence.15 We would argue that in parliamentary democracies like India, a strong ruling party presence in the legislature often forces the Opposition to establish its presence more outside elected Chambers than within it.

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Secondly, the nature of the party system plays a critical role in establishing the contours of the influence of the opposition. It has often been argued that where coalition governments are the norm, the blurring of the clear divide between what constitutes the ruling and the opposition impacts on the influence of the opposition. In a one-party dominant system, the opposition could often be pushed to the margins.16 The role of the opposition in traditional two-party systems is often more unambiguous whereas in a competitive multi-party system one could often witness bipolar or multi-polar contestations.17 A third dimension that assumes significance is the difference in the influence of the opposition in federal and unitary systems. The territorial distribution of powers coupled with the nature of the party system also influences the strength and status of the opposition within elected legislatures in both federal and unitary parliamentary systems.18 This facet is critical when the role of the opposition in India is assessed. While discussing the patterns of opposition in western democracies, Dahl referred to the ‘ends and means’ of the opposition. While regard to the means there was no single pattern and varied from one political system to another, the end invariably was coming to power or ushering in change, at times of a radical nature. The means varied according to their strategies, distinctiveness, choice of sites for encounter, nature of competitiveness in the system, and the focus of their concentration.19 Within the broader theoretical context outlined, this chapter will assess the role of the opposition in the Lower House of the Indian Parliament (Lok Sabha) over the last quarter century, especially after 1989. For many, the 1989 Parliamentary elections heralded the end of one-party domination and the ushering in of a competitive party system.20 This election also saw the commencement of a phase of coalition and minority governments on the one hand and a clear emergence of a formal and legitimate opposition in the Lok Sabha.

The opposition in the Lok Sabha: an overview As per the conventions and practices that have defined the working of the parliamentary system of government, the party that secures a majority of seats in the Lok Sabha becomes the ruling party and its leader, the Prime Minister. Those political parties which are opposed to the ruling party are in the opposition and the opposition party with the largest number of seats and has more than 10 per cent of the strength of the House is declared as the official Opposition and its leader as the Leader of the Opposition.21

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If one were to trace the history of the first fifteen Lok Sabhas (1952– 2014), in the first three Lok Sabhas (1952–1967) no opposition party was accorded the official status of the Opposition as none of them had 10 per cent of the members of the House. This was clearly the phase of one party-domination, when the Congress party was in power not merely at the Centre but in most of the states. The Opposition was not merely limited in its numerical strength but was also deeply divided. It has often been argued that the real opposition to the Congress party was not so much on the Opposition benches but within the ranks of the Congress party. Much before the first General Elections in 1952, when the Constitution was still being drafted, it was argued that the real Opposition leader to Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru was his own Deputy Prime Minister, Vallabhai Patel.22 Manor asserts that the first Prime Minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, was committed to liberal values and a dominant Congress saw very little threat from the opposition. Manor elaborates that Nehru ‘treated opposition parties generously, unlike many of his contemporaries elsewhere in the developing world’.23 It is interesting to record that the first time a party was formally recognized as the official opposition in the Lok Sabha, was when the Congress party split and the Congress(O) emerged as an opposition party against the Congress(R) and its leader Ram Subhag Singh became the first Leader of the Opposition. He had a tenure as Leader of the Opposition for just over a year as the Fourth Lok Sabha was dissolved. Once again the Fifth Lok Sabha (1971–1977) saw no opposition party securing the minimum required 10 per cent of the seats. This was also a phase when the relationship between the government often became tenuous especially on account of the central government misusing the provisions of the Constitution to destabilize the opposition-led state governments.24 The Sixth Lok Sabha saw the Janata Party emerging as the ruling party and the Congress being relegated (for the first time) to the benches of the opposition. The Congress emerged as the official opposition and Y.B. Chavan became the official Leader of the Opposition to be soon succeeded by C.M. Stephen when the Congress party split and saw a leadership change on the floor of the House. When the Janata government collapsed and Charan Singh formed the government with the outside support of the Congress, the Janata Party emerged as the official opposition and its leader Jagjivan Ram became the Leader of the Opposition. When the Congress returned to power in 1980, the Seventh and Eighth Lok Sabhas once again saw a situation for a decade, wherein

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no opposition party secured the minimum 10 per cent of the seats and thus there was no official opposition party or Leader of the Opposition. The 1989 polls that led to the constitution of the Ninth Lok Sabha was a watershed election in more than one way. This election heralded the end of one-party domination and the emergence of an authentic multi-party system.25 For the next quarter century the country saw coalition and minority governments at the national level with no single party being able to secure a majority on its own in the Lok Sabha. This development also saw an element of stability in the ranks of the opposition and during this two-decades-and-a-half period there has always been an official opposition and a Leader of the Opposition. The party which emerged as the official opposition was linked to the politics of coalition formation and support to minority governments. The 1989 elections saw a five party National Front coalition government to power with the outside support of the BJP and the left parties. The Congress, which was the single largest party in the House preferred to sit in the opposition and given its numerical strength its leader, Rajiv Gandhi became the Leader of the Opposition. When the National Front Government collapsed in December 1990 and a splinter group of the Janata Dal (S) led by Chandrashekar formed the government with outside support of the Congress, Rajiv Gandhi had to give up the position of the Leader of the Opposition as his party was supporting the new government and the BJP emerged as the official opposition and its leader L.K. Advani became Leader of Opposition. The 1991 elections saw the Congress forming a minority government and the BJP emerged as the official opposition party and first L.K. Advani and later Atal Bihari Vajpayee became the Leader of the Opposition. After the 1996 Lok Sabha elections when Vajpayee formed the thirteen-day BJP government, the Congress was accorded the status of the official opposition with its leader P.V. Narasimha Rao becoming Leader of the Opposition. When the thirteen-party United Front government came to power with the outside support of the Congress and the Left parties, the BJP once again became the principal opposition with Vajpayee being appointed Leader of the Opposition. The Twelfth Lok Sabha had one of the briefest terms of a little over a year. The BJP-led coalition government was in power with the Congress being the official opposition led by Sharad Pawar. The Thirteenth Lok Sabha saw the BJP-led NDA return to power and the Congress retaining its position as the official opposition though with Sonia Gandhi as the new leader. The Fourteenth and Fifteenth Lok Sabha saw the Congress-led UPA emerging as the ruling coalition with the BJP being

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the official opposition first under the leadership of L.K. Advani, who later handed over the leadership to Sushma Swaraj. Thus, clearly, the ninth general election in 1989 is the touchstone when the position of an official opposition and its recognized leader in the Lok Sabha got stabilized and the Lok Sabha has always had a Leader of the Opposition since then till the sixteenth general election in 2014 when the Congress returned with only forty-four seats in the Lok Sabha that less than 10 per cent of the strength of the House. In any case the development till then has a direct corollary to the emerging competitive multi-party system in the country and the fact of coalition governments at the national level. What have been its wider implications for the discharge of responsibilities by the party which occupied the status of the official opposition in the Lok Sabha will be the focus of the next section.

The opposition and parliamentary accountability When analyzing the role of the opposition as a party and as individual members in the Lok Sabha, in ensuring parliamentary accountability in particular and playing the role of a parliamentary opposition, the following six roles are often outlined: a) Representing their individual constituencies; b) Holding the government of the day to account; c) Seeking information from the government as and when required and warranted; d) (Re)Interpreting government actions from the perspective of the opposition and their perception of the public good; e) Supporting the government on matters that require a national consensus; and f) Providing the nation with a viable alternative to the existing ruling party. One could debate strategies to prioritize these roles. Further, each of these roles and their relative importance and impact needs to be viewed in the specific context of the wider developments of national politics. Different opposition parties and members could also privilege one role as against another in a specific context. Over time, a judicious combination of these roles would do justice to an opposition party/ member to the role assigned to it. In this section, an evaluation of the opposition in discharging these roles is dilated upon. While focusing on the role of the opposition in the lower house of the Indian Parliament, it is useful to provide a wider context in terms of both popular perception of the working of Parliament and more specifically the opposition on the one hand and the assessment contained in the body of literature on the working of the Lok Sabha and the opposition therein.

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Data from the National Election Studies, India Component of the World Values Survey26 and the State of Democracy in South Asia (SDSA) Studies would indicate that among common people, two important political institutions suffer from a serious trust deficit: Parliament and Political Parties. The comparative chart below succinctly illustrates the point. In the five surveys, highlighted, Parliament has remained in fourth or third position, in terms of trust. What would be heartening for those who support Parliament is that it is consistently ranked above the political parties, the police, and the bureaucracy (see Figure 9.1). The first SDSA report (2005) clearly indicates that public trust in non-elected institutions is much higher than elected institutions.27 However one also notices a silver lining in this regard. When it specifically comes to Parliament, the second round of the India segment of the SDSA study (2013) indicates that the trust in Parliament witnesses a dramatic increase by as much as thirteen percentage points.28 Further, the first round of the Tracker Poll conducted by Lokniti-CSDS in July 2013, in the run up to the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, specifically sought the response of people to their level of satisfaction with the main opposition party over the last four years (2009–2013).29 Close to half the respondents were either fully satisfied or somewhat satisfied with the way the main opposition party discharged its responsibilities. While around one-fourth of the respondents were dissatisfied, around three of every ten respondents preferred not to express an opinion. One would immediately need to add a caveat at this point. The public perception of the opposition in 2013 could be a direct corollary to the strong level of disenchantment with the government, a fact that was clearly expressed the very next year in the Lok Sabha elections. However, both the second round of the India segment of the State of Democracy study as well as the Tracker Poll seem to indicate that the intensity of distrust in the Parliament seems to have declined as well as there appears to be a vote of confidence in the way the main opposition has discharged its responsibilities in the recent past. Studies that have focused attention on the working of the Indian Parliament have drawn attention to the general decline in terms of the time spent by the Lok Sabha on deliberations as also the quality of those deliberations. Verma and Tripathi,30 in their analysis of the decline of the Indian Parliament amidst democratization, indicate that there has been the following: a) a steep fall in the number of days that the Lok Sabha has spent in deliberations;31 b) a progressive increase in the working hours lost in the Lok Sabha on account of disruptions;32 c) a sharp decline in the duration of the sitting hours

WVS 2001

WVS 2013

SDSA 2005

Source: NES and SDSA Data sets, Lokniti-CSDS, World Values Survey Data set

Figure 9.1 Citizen trust in select public institutions

SDSA 2013

WVS 2001, Political Parties, 7 WVS 2005, Political Parties, 7 WVS 2013, Political Parties, 7 SDSA 2005, Political Parties, 7 SDSA 2013, Political Parties, 7

WVS 2001, Police, 6 WVS 2005, Police, 6 WVS 2013, Police, 6 SDSA 2005, Police, 6 SDSA 2013, Police, 6

WVS 2001, Civil Service, 5 WVS 2005, Civil Service, 5 WVS 2013, Civil Service, 4 SDSA 2005, Civil Service, 5 SDSA 2013, Civil Service, 5

WVS 2001, Parliament, 4 WVS 2005, Parliament, 3 WVS 2013, Parliament, 3 SDSA 2005, Parliament, 4 SDSA 2013, Parliament, 4

WVS 2001, Central Executive, 3 WVS 2005, Central Executive, 4 WVS 2013, Central Executive, 5 SDSA 2005, Central Executive, 3 SDSA 2013, Central Executive, 3

WVS 2005

Citizen Trust in Select Public Institutions

WVS 2001, Courts, 2 WVS 2005, Courts, 2 WVS 2013, Courts, 2 SDSA 2005, Courts, 2 SDSA 2013, Courts, 2

WVS 2001, Army, 1 WVS 2005, Army, 1 WVS 2013, Army, 1 SDSA 2005, Army, 1 SDSA 2013, Army, 1

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of the House;33 and d) a progressive reduction in the number of bills passed and time devoted to discussion of the budget and passing of legislation. The study also indicates that this decline has been especially steep over the last two decades, ever since one saw the rise of a competitive multi-party system, a series of coalition or minority governments. Much of the analysis on the decline of the Indian Parliament has focused attention on the perceptible deterioration in both the quality of the debate on the floor of the Lok Sabha as well as the time and effort devoted to conduct its deliberations. After every forced adjournment of the House on account of disruptions, there is an animated debate on the huge waste of both fiscal and human resources on account of the elected chamber not being allowed deliberate and function. A game of mutual blame is unleashed by both the ruling party and the opposition. On the other hand, it has also been argued that the regular interruptions and deviations in the Lok Sabha proceedings and ever-so-frequent disruption of the House are a ‘consequence of its progressive democratization’34 and a reflection of the larger developments and fundamental changes in the Indian political process.35 Reflecting on the role of the opposition in the Indian Parliament in general and the Lok Sabha in particular, Manor makes the argument that ever since the phase of coalition politics and multi-party democracy, parties which have sat in the Opposition have often believed that at they stood a good chance of winning the mandate at the next elections.36 This may have often decided and defined their strategy both on the floor of the House and in their approach to Lok Sabha proceedings. He also makes the point that much of the deliberations of the Lok Sabha are not so much through the formal proceedings on the floor of the House but through Parliamentary Committees at which both members of the ruling and opposition participate actively and often shed their political colours.37 However, studies have also argued that the committee system and its functioning often leave much to be desired.38 The other dimension that Manor highlights is that the reduced misuse of constitutional provisions in the phase of coalition politics could have contributed to less combativeness on the part of the opposition.39 Attention must also be focused on the argument that the Lok Sabha (both ruling and opposition benches) is witness to a change in the social profile of its members and the widening of the social base of representation.40 It is also argued that the increasing presence of regional political parties in the Lok Sabha could also be a contributing factor to the changing contours of the relationship between the government and the opposition.41 However, there is very little empirical evidence to

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prove that the changing social profile of membership and the increasing presence of state-based parties could truly explain the reduced time that the Lok Sabha spends on its deliberations. This chapter makes the argument that the changing quality and content of debates on the floor of the Lok Sabha and the opposition’s participation in the same, coupled with the frequent disruptions on the floor of the House, need to be viewed from the prism of perception of members of the Lok Sabha as individuals and political parties as groups in how they have redefined their roles as elected representatives. The present phase of competitive party democracy and the nature of our electoral system may have contributed to a searching second look by both parties and especially those elected to the Lok Sabha on their tickets, to re-define the role of an elected member. Discussions with members of elected bodies across political parties indicates that, elected representatives are increasingly redefining their role as both people’s representatives and members of a deliberative chamber.42 Elected representatives from both the ruling party and the opposition benches often see their role on the floor of the Lok Sabha as being just one (and not necessarily the most critical and important) platform they can employ to discharge their responsibilities. While it is true that the time spent by the Lok Sabha for its sittings and in debate and discussions is steadily declining, do member of the House see the chamber as an arena for debate, dialogue, and discussion, or do they see their roles as members (including those from the ranks of the opposition) as being more critical outside the House and believe that informal networks are more critical in fulfilling their roles as elected representatives? This would also help explain the increased recourse to disruptions of proceedings and the need to adjourn the House without the conduct of regular business. Given the presence of a 24/7 media, the visibility that members (and parties) gain by such actions could make them believe that the more effective way of holding the government of the day to account is by such visible and vocal means of protest. Today, prime time discussion on electronic media often involves representatives of both the ruling and opposition parties sparring on important and contentious issues of the day.43 This tends to be more in the limelight that the actual deliberations on the floor of the House. In the range of corruptions cases involving the UPA, the debate, in which opposition leaders and government ministers took an active part, was clearly much more outside Parliament that on the floor of the House. The India Against Corruption Movement, which focused on the need for an important legislation, occupied much of the spotlight of attention

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in 2011. This debate was however much more vibrant in the public domain rather than on the floor of the Lok Sabha. The key question that one needs to address is that for the opposition is the ‘real theatre’ of politics and political debate not on the floor of the Lok Sabha but in the public domain amongst the people. Is the floor of the House more seen as a space for protest,44 with the real action of holding the government accountable happening more on the streets and other public forums amongst the people?

In lieu of a conclusion If one were to view the role of the opposition in ensuring parliamentary accountability, keeping in mind the way elected representatives (from across the political spectrum) perceive their roles, the issues fall into a clear perspective. The floor of the Lok Sabha is no longer seen as the principal site for challenging the government or holding it accountable. The real scene of action is either outside the House in the public domain or what grabs media attention on the floor of the Lok Sabha. Why disruptions and stalling of proceedings becomes the order of the day is the visibility and attention it provides the opposition and the fact that it is often a more effective way of embarrassing the government of the day. More importantly, given the multiple roles that elected representatives see themselves playing, especially in order to win another election, the focus of attention gets dissipated among multi-track activities, of which one of them (often reduced to a lower order of preference) could be participation in formal parliamentary proceedings.

Notes 1 This chapter is a developed version of a paper presented at a conference on ‘The Indian Parliament and Democratic Transformation’ (New Delhi; 9–11 April 2013). I would like to thank all academicians, political leaders and social activists for their inputs with whom I discussed the theme at length. I especially benefitted in discussions with Dr. Ajay K. Mehra, Dr. Suhas Palshikar, Professor Yogendra Yadav, Mr. Rahul Verma, Mr. Srikantha Murthy, and Dr. M.K. Sridhar among others. I, of course, take full responsibility for the views expressed in the chapter. 2 One could have chosen statements on the role of the opposition by many other prominent leaders. The statements of these two leaders were specifically chosen because not only did both occupy the position of both Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition, they have done it in the phase of coalition politics/minority governments.

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3 Devesh Kapur and Pratap Bhanu Mehta, The Indian Parliament as an Institution of Accountability, Democracy: Governance and Human Rights Programme, Paper No. 23,2006, United Nations Institute for Social Development, Geneve; Ajay K. Mehra and Gert W. Kueck, The Indian Parliament: A Comparative Perspective, New Delhi: Konark, 2003; Arthur Rubinoff, ‘The Decline of India’s Parliament’, The Journal of Legislative Studies, 4(4), 1998, pp. 13–33; A. Surya Prakash, What Ails Indian Parliament, New Delhi: Harper Collins, 1995. 4 B.L. Shankar and Valerian Rodrigues, The Indian Parliament: A Democracy at Work, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2011; Balveer Arora, ‘The Indian Parliament and Democracy’, in Mehra and Kueck (eds.), op. cit., 2003, pp. 14–41; Sandeep Shastri, ‘Parliamentary Committees in India and Legislative Control Over Administration’, in Mehra and Kueck (eds.), op cit., 2003, pp. 206–232. 5 Rahul Verma and Vikas Tripathi, ‘Making Sense of the House: Explaining the Decline of the Indian Parliament Amidst Democratization’, Studies in Indian Politics, 1(2), 2013, pp. 153–177. 6 James Manor, ‘Government and Opposition in India’, Government and Opposition, 46(4), January 2011, pp. 436–463; Sandeep Shastri, ‘Department Related Standing Committees in Indian Parliament: An Assessment’, Indian Journal of Public Administration, 54(2), 1998, pp. 184–200. 7 Robert Dahl, A Preface to Democratic Theory, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1956. 8 Robert Dahl, Polyarchy: Participation and Opposition, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1971; Robert Dahl, Democracy and Its Critics, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989. 9 Ludger Helmes, ‘Studying Parliamentary Opposition in Old and New Democracies: Issues and Perceptions’, The Journal of Legislative Studies, 14(1–2), March–June 2008, pp. 6–19. 10 Ian Shapiro, ‘The Fallacies Concerning Minorities, Majorities and Democratic Politics’, in Ian Shapiro (ed.), Democracy’s Place, New York: Cornell University Press, 1996, p. 51. 11 Andre Kaiser, ‘Parliamentary Opposition in Westminster Democracies: Britain Canada, Australia and New Zealand’, The Journal of Legislative Studies, 14(1–2), March–June 2008, p. 36. 12 Ibid. 13 Ludger Helms, ‘Studying Parliamentary Opposition in Old and New Democracies: Issues and Perspectives’, The Journal of Legislative Studies, 14(1–2), March–June 2008, p. 8. 14 Ibid., p. 9. 15 A. King, ‘Modes of Executive-Legislative Relations: Great Britain, France, West Germany’, Legislative Studies Quarterly, 1, 1976, pp. 11–16; G. Powell, Elections as Instruments of Democracies: Majoritarian and Proportional Visions, New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000, pp. 102–109. 16 This point is elaborated on in detail in the Indian context in the next section. 17 M. Laver and N. Schofield, Multiparty Government: The Politics of Coalition in Europe, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1998; Peter Mair, ‘Political Opposition and the European Union’, Government and Opposition, 42(1), 2007, pp. 1–17; L.W. Martin and G. Vanberg, ‘Policing

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21 22 23 24

25

26

27 28 29

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the Bargain: Coalition Government and Parliamentary Scrutiny’, American Journal of Political Science, 48(1), 2004, pp. 13–27 and Vladimir Gel’man, ‘Political Opposition in Russia: A Dying Species?’, Post-Soviet Affairs, 21(3), 2005, pp. 226–246. Kaiser, 2008, op. cit.; King, 1976, op. cit. Robert Dahl, ‘Patterns of Opposition’, in Robert Dahl (ed.), Political Opposition in Western Democracies, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996, pp. 332–347. Sandeep Shastri, ‘Republic of India: Emergence of a Competitive Party System and Civil Society Space’, in Wolfgang Renszch, Klaus Detterberg and John Kincaid (eds.), Political Parties and Civil Society in Federal Countries, New York: Oxford University Press, 2015, pp. 121–146; Sandeep Shastri, ‘Party System and Democracy in India: Distinctive Features at the National, State and Local Level’, in Ajay K. Mehra (ed.), Party System in India: Emerging Trajectories, New Delhi: Lancer, 2013, pp. 159–179. Salary and Allowances of Leaders of Opposition in Parliament, Act 1977. Sandeep Shastri, ‘Nehru and the Congress Party: The Nurturing of a Nascent Democracy’, Journal of Karnatak University, 24, 1988–91, pp. 12–17. James Manor, ‘Government and Opposition in India’, Government and Opposition, 46(4), January 2011, p. 439. Ibid., pp. 440; Sandeep Shastri, ‘Article 356: Victim of Political Opportunism’, Mainstream, 2 January 1993, pp. 14–15; Sandeep Shastri, ‘Indian Federalism and National Integration’, Indian Journal of Political Science, 51(2), April–June 1990, pp. 125–136. James Manor argues that one could discern three phases in the party system in India: Phase 1 – 1947 to the late 1960s when the Congress was in power at the centre and in most of the states and the opposition was small and disunited; Phase II – late 1960s to 1989 when the Congress party largely governed but did not dominate the political process and once saw splits in the Congress and rise of regional parties; and Phase III – 1989 to present when one saw the emergence of a competitive party system with coalition governments at the centre. This analysis has important implications for the role and position of the opposition in the Lok Sabha. Manor, 2011, op. cit., pp. 436–463. Sandeep Shastri and Reetika Syal, ‘Understanding Popular Perceptions of Democracy: Findings From the State of Democracy in South Asia Study and World Values Survey’, Chanakya Journal of Political Science, 1–3(2–4), January 2016, pp. 3–25; Sandeep Shastri, ‘Citizen Confidence in Political Institutions and Processes’, Indian Journal of Political Science, 63(1), 2002, pp. 142–147. SDSA Report, State of Democracy in South Asia, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2008, pp. 57–58. Lokniti-CSDS, Democracy in India: A Citizens Perspective, New Delhi: Lokniti-CSDS, 2013. While fifteen per cent said they were fully satisfied, thirty-one per cent said that they were somewhat satisfied. Ten per cent expressed that they were somewhat dissatisfied and fourteen per cent stated that they were fully dissatisfied while thirty per cent had no opinion. The exact question asked was this: Are you satisfied with the performance of the BJP as the main opposition party at the centre over the last four years?

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30 Rahul Verma and Vikas Tripathi, ‘Making Sense of the House: Explaining the Decline of the Indian Parliament Amidst Democratization’, Studies in Indian Politics, 1(2), 2013, pp. 153–177. 31 Merely 76 days in 2012 as compared to a high of 156 days in 1956. 32 The Fourteenth Lok Sabha lost thirty-four per cent of its time for deliberation on account of disruptions. In the Fourteenth Lok Sabha, twenty-four per cent of the time was lost, in the Thirteenth Lok Sabha it was nineteen per cent, and in the Twelfth Lok Sabha, ten per cent. 33 In 2012, the Lok Sabha sat for less than 250 hours. 34 Arora, 2003, op. cit., p. 15. 35 Shankar and Rodrigues, 2011, op. cit. 36 Manor, 2011, op. cit., pp. 457–458. 37 This point is also made in the context of other parliamentary systems by scholars. See King, 1976, op. cit.; Powell, 2000, op. cit. 38 Arthur Rubinoff, ‘The Decline of India’s Parliament’, The Journal of Legislative Studies, 4(4), 1998, pp. 13–33; Shastri, 1998, op. cit. 39 Manor, 2011, op. cit., p. 459. 40 Shankar and Rodrigues, 2011, op. cit.; Arora, 2003, op. cit.; Verma and Tripathi, 2013, op. cit. 41 Manor, 2011, op. cit., p. 461. 42 Interviews conducted by the author with MPs across political parties were conducted as part of the ICSSR Project on ‘States as the New Centre of Indian Politics’. 43 James Manor makes a similar point in his article. See, Manor, 2011, op. cit., pp. 457–458. 44 One senior MP packed sarcasm in reflecting that a colleague from the opposition was often seen in the Lok Sabha only in the well of the House and possibly he had assumed that this was his real seat as he was hardly seen in the formal seat allotted to him by the Speaker.

10 An analysis of disruptions in Parliament Ronojoy Sen

Though it was not a given, the odds would have been stacked in favour of India adopting the British democratic model when it became independent in 1947. There is a nice little story about how deep rooted the notions of Westminster-style parliamentary democracy were in India. When a future British Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, was visiting India as part of a commission in the 1930s and argued for a presidential system, he found no response. Attlee later recalled, ‘It was as if I had offered them margarine instead of butter.’1 There were other voices, admittedly in the minority, who believed that India should look to indigenous models. One member called the Indian Constitution a ‘slavish surrender to the West’; another more eloquently proclaimed: ‘We wanted the music of Veena or Sitar, but here we have the music of an English band.’2 Eventually what the Constituent Assembly adopted was very much the British parliamentary system based on first-pastthe-post elections with two houses of Parliament: the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha. Indian Parliament has travelled a long way from when India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru gave his memorable ‘Freedom at midnight’ speech in 1947 to the scenes in 2008 when three members of Parliament waved wads of cash inside the House during a no-trust vote claiming that they had been bribed to vote for the government. In its early days, the Indian Parliament was held up as an example for the rest of the newly independent countries. In 1952, shortly after the first Indian general elections, the Manchester Guardian commented: ‘Parliamentary institutions have not had a very good time in Asia. . . . All that is happening in Asia throws a spotlight on the Parliament in Delhi as the one institution of the kind which is working in an exemplary way.’3 And while concluding his pioneering study on India’s Parliament, British political scientist W.H. Morris-Jones wrote, ‘The story here told is unmistakably a story of success.’4 Cut to the present and such views

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would be seen by many people as a poor joke. With disruption of proceedings fairly routine, the number of hours that Parliament sits and the volume of legislations passed have both seen a dramatic decline. Another disconcerting feature is the significant number of MPs with criminal charges against them.5 In the preface to his six-volume work on Indian Parliament, constitutional scholar and a former secretarygeneral of the Lok Sabha, Subhash Kashyap, lamented that the ‘constitutional edifice appears to be in shambles.’ In this chapter, I mainly analyze the transition of the Lok Sabha, or the Lower House, which is directly elected by the people, from its initial ‘glory’ years to its somewhat tarnished present. I do so by specifically examining one aspect that best reflects the changing nature of Parliament: the ever-increasing disruptions and agitations within the House. For some time now academics, journalists and even some politicians have bemoaned the decline of Indian Parliament.6 There is undoubtedly much that is wrong with Indian Parliament. However, I argue that Parliament, however low its reputation might have dipped, reflects the successive waves of deepening of democracy, which has had an impact on its functioning. This has also perhaps led to an unconscious re-imagining and recasting of the British parliamentary system and its procedures that India chose to follow after independence.

Evolution of Indian Parliament It would take up too much space to examine in detail changes in the composition of the Lok Sabha from 1952 to the present, which are important in understanding the increase in and nature of disruptions. However, a few trends are noticeable. The most obvious change has been the evolution of the Lok Sabha from one dominated by the Congress to the first non-Congress government in 1977, and from the late1980s the formation of minority and later coalition governments. In the First Lok Sabha (1952–57), the Congress had 364 of the 489 seats. In 1977, following the national Emergency imposed by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi for two years, the Congress could win only 154 of the 536 seats with the Janata Party getting a majority with 236 seats. Though the Congress had a huge majority in the Eighth Lok Sabha (1984–89), riding on a sympathy wave after Indira Gandhi’s assassination, it was never able to regain its dominance since. The shortlived Ninth Lok Sabha (1989–91) was the first one where no party could muster a majority, ushering in the era of coalitions. Though the Congress cobbled together a slender majority in the Tenth Lok Sabha (1991–96), from 1996 onward it’s been a battle between the Congress

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and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), both of whom have not been able to form until 2014, when the BJP won a single-party majority, governments on their own but have stitched together coalitions with regional parties. There has also been a marked change in the social composition of the Lok Sabha over the years. The First Lok Sabha had a disproportionate number of lawyers, many of whom had taken part in the nationalist movement, who made up 35.4 per cent of the House. By the Fourteenth Lok Sabha (2004–09), the percentage of lawyers had declined to a mere 11.4 per cent. At the same time, the percentage of MPs classified as ‘agriculturalists/horticulturalists’ had shot up from 22.5 in the First Lok Sabha to 40.8 in the fourteenth, making it the most popular occupation. As one study noted, Parliament had undergone a ‘basic transfer of power from the urban middle class as represented by the legal profession, to the rural agricultural class.’7 While this means that there is a bigger presence in the Lok Sabha of people who have some connection with agriculture or farming, it does not necessarily mean that these MPs are any less educated or less well off than those who are professionals since ‘agriculturalist’ could also mean large landowners as well as those living in cities but owning farm land. Another category that has shown a jump is the ‘political/social worker’ who, in the Fourteenth Lok Sabha, made up 19.4 per cent of the House. This category, which was not a significant one in the First and Second Lok Sabha (1957–62), became prominent from the Fourth Lok Sabha (1967–70) onwards signifying the presence of MPs for whom politics itself was a vocation. Another significant change is the caste composition of the Lok Sabha. Not surprisingly, in the first two Lok Sabhas upper castes constituted nearly 50 per cent of the MPs. By the time of the Fourteenth Lok Sabha, the percentage of upper caste MPs had dropped to below 40 per cent. At the same time the percentage of OBCs – a category that encompasses the lower castes but not untouchables – has progressively risen from a meagre 3.2 per cent in the First Lok Sabha to 25 per cent in the Fourteenth Lok Sabha. While the number of OBCs in Parliament is much less than what is believed to be their share of the entire population, their impact on Parliament has been significant. The percentage of SCs has, however, remained fairly steady at around 15 per cent due to the quotas in place for SCs. As literacy levels have climbed in India, the educational qualifications of MPs too have improved. In the First Lok Sabha the percentage of under-matriculates (those who had not studied beyond class X) was 23.5 per cent while graduates were 37.1 per cent. In the Fourteenth

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Lok Sabha we find the percentage of under-matriculates had dropped to 4 per cent and the number of graduates increased to 45.3 per cent. The level of education, and particularly the lack of English, was often a deterrent to participating in parliamentary debates in the initial years of Parliament. In the first two Lok Sabhas, English was very much the dominant language. It has been pointed out that ‘command over English informed the role that one could and in fact did play in the House.’8 This meant that those who were not comfortable in English often chose not to speak up. At the same time, there was a small but militant minority which insisted on speaking in Hindi. While Nehru himself almost always spoke in English, there were occasional demands for him to speak in Hindi. But the Speaker’s contention was that a member was free to speak in whatever language he or she chose to. The divide between English and Hindi became particularly acute during the debate on the Official Language Bill in 1963. The Bill provided for continuing the use of English, in addition to Hindi, for official business. Supporters of Hindi argued that the Bill was unconstitutional. On the other hand, there were members who demanded that English continue to be used in the House for another ten years; others wanted it for an indefinite period. The English versus Hindi debate wasn’t the only one roiling Parliament. During the 1950s and 1960s linguistic nationalism was at its peak, particularly in the southern states, and unsurprisingly it made an appearance in Parliament too. The Speaker was amenable to members speaking in their mother tongue, but he feared that the House would become a ‘Tower of Babel’ if MPs could not understand each other. There were MPs from other parts of India, such as West Bengal or Orissa, who also resorted to their mother tongue during debates. Usually the Speaker made special arrangements for simultaneous translation. The reorganization of the Indian states along linguistic lines beginning in the 1950s took some of the sting from the complaints of non-Hindi speaking members, but the Hindi versus English debate continued into the 1960s. From the 1990s facilities for simultaneous translation into regional languages was routinely made available. This has not, however, encouraged members to speak more in their native tongues. In fact, MPs from south India often prefer to speak in English and also in Hindi. Indeed, one of the most significant changes over the years is the increasing use of Hindi by MPs or what might be termed the ‘vernacularization’ of Indian Parliament. This is quite evident when one examines the debates on important legislations or issues. For instance, during the debate at the end of 2011 on the contentious Lok Pal Bill,

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which aimed to put in place an anti-corruption ombudsman, after the bill was introduced in English by the minister, V. Narayanaswamy, some 39 members participated of whom more than half spoke in Hindi. This included some members from non-Hindi speaking states, such as Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa and West Bengal. Indeed some of the best orators, or at least the ones that can hold the undivided attention of members of Parliament, in the Lok Pal discussion as in other debates were not those speaking in English but OBC MPs like Laloo Yadav from Bihar. Laloo Yadav speaks an idiomatic Hindi, which is often interspersed with English phrases and dollops of rustic humour, far removed from the Queen’s English of the Nehruvian era.

Disruptions in the early years of Parliament The most significant change in Parliament is possibly its sharp drop in productivity and the concomitant rise in disruptions and protests within the House. The statistics tell a grim story. The number of days that Parliament meets has steadily declined. The number of days that the Lok Sabha sat had come down from an average of 127 in the 1950s to 73 in 2011, the year Indian Parliament turned 60.9 In the same period, the annual average number of bills passed by Parliament had come down from 72 to 40. These figures can be explained by the amount of time lost due to disruptions, which has steadily risen from 5.28 per cent of working time in the Eleventh Lok Sabha to 39 per cent in the Fifteenth Lok Sabha (2009–14). The year 2011 was a particularly bad year, when 30 per cent of the available time was lost due to disruptions. The year before, an entire session, the winter session, was lost due to disruptions. That year 18 per cent of the Bills were passed in less than five minutes and only 11 per cent of the starred questions (those meant to be answered orally) were answered on the floor of the House.10 The Fifteenth Lok Sabha, whose tenure ended on February 21, 2014, was the least productive in the history of Parliament. From 1952 to 1967 each of the three Lok Sabhas sat for an average of 600 days and more than 3,700 hours. In contrast, the Fifteenth Lok Sabha met for 357 days and 1,338 hours, and 39 per cent of its time was wasted due to disruptions. In comparison, the Fourteenth Lok Sabha sat for 1,736 hours and 13 per cent of its time was lost to disruptions. While the cold statistics speak of a Parliament that has not been functioning very well or worse has been dysfunctional, what they don’t reveal is a fundamental change in parliamentary discourse in India. Of course, there are provisions – Rules 349 and 361 of the

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Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in Lok Sabha11 – which forbid disruptions and protests in the House. However transgressions of the rules have a long history and the idea of a golden age – which ‘insists that that the great age of parliament is one we just fail to remember’12 – is a tempting but somewhat misleading one. For instance, during the debate on the Preventive Detention Bill in 1950, a section of the opposition walked out when the Bill was introduced. In 1952, the Preventive Detention Amendment Bill brought about ‘an unprecedented hullaballoo,’ as veteran journalist B.G. Verghese put it.13 There were occasions in the Second Lok Sabha when disorderly scenes took place. Again in the Third Lok Sabha in 1963, when the Official Languages Bill was introduced, there were strong protests by some opposition members, which the Times of India described as the first time that such ‘disorderly scenes’ were witnessed in the House.14 Two members, including Swami Rameshwaranand of the Bharatiya Jan Sangh, had to be forcibly ejected by the watch and ward staff. Nehru took strong exception to this behaviour, acerbically noting: ‘I do not know if that gentleman has the least conception of what parliament is, what democracy is, and how one is supposed to behave or ought to behave.’15 Swami Rameshwaranand later set fire to a copy of the Bill on the premises of Parliament.16 Earlier that year, some members had tried to disrupt the President’s address to the two Houses. This too was strongly disapproved of by Nehru: The sole question before us is – it is a highly important one and vital one what rules and conventions we should establish for the carrying of the work of this Parliament with dignity and effectiveness . . . This Parliament is supposed not only to act correctly but lay down certain principles and conventions of decorous behavior.17 A committee was formed to investigate the incident and in its report laid down norms for conduct of members during the President’s address. The 1960s was when the real change happened with regard to disruptions. After Nehru’s death in 1964, it seems his warnings about parliamentary decorum too were forgotten. From the Fourth Lok Sabha – the first without Nehru present in the House – walkouts and disruptive behaviour became increasingly common. During the discussion of the Official Languages (Amendment) Bill, which intended to make Hindi the official language of the country as well as continue the

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use of English for official purposes for another 15 years, saw uproarious scenes inside the House. The next year when the Essential Services Maintenance Bill was put to vote, a majority of the opposition members walked out. Kashyap points out, ‘The fourth Lok Sabha period may be remembered for the fundamental changes in the idiom, the style and culture of parliamentary politics. Hereafter, it was politics in the raw with much of masks and gloves off.’18 In a repeat of 1963, the President’s address to both Houses in 1971 was interrupted by a Lok Sabha MP who demanded that the President give his address in Hindi. Once again a committee was formed to enquire into the MP’s conduct. The MP was let off, but even as the committee was deliberating, there was yet another incident in 1972 when several members interrupted the President’s address and walked out. The committee recommended that the Constitution be amended to make rules for ‘maintenance of order, dignity and decorum’ during the President’s address.19 The hall of the Lok Sabha wasn’t the only site of protests. Members wanted permission to hold protests, and even hunger strikes, within the premises of Parliament. An MP from the CPM, A.K. Gopalan, in 1964 sought permission to hold a one-day hunger strike in the lobby of Parliament to protest food shortage in his home state of Kerala. However, the Speaker of the House ruled: ‘The Lobbies or any parts of this Parliament are not intended for any such demonstrations, strikes or fasts. Earlier also, I had not allowed it at any time, and this time also I cannot permit that.’20 Gopalan did go on a day-long fast in the lobby which he ended by the evening.21 Again in 1972, another member from Bihar wanted to hold a 48-hour hunger strike inside the Parliament House. Though permission was refused he persisted and had to be physically removed from the Parliament premises by the security staff.

When disruptions took centre stage Such disruptions have increasingly become frequent since the 1970s. In 1980, Inder Malhotra wrote in The Times of India: ‘Bedlam in both Houses has by now become a daily routine, rather than an exception to the rule.’ A decade or so later the pessimism had become more marked with S. Nihal Singh asking in his column: ‘Aren’t we in danger of reaching the end of the road as far as parliamentary proceedings are concerned?’ During the Eighth Lok Sabha (1984–89), despite the Congress having a brute majority, Parliament was repeatedly disrupted during the discussion on the purchase of military equipment supplied by the Swedish company, Bofors, and allegations of kickbacks. The

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debates were spread over 64 hours and a ‘record of sorts was created when the House was adjourned eight times on single day on July 20, 1989.’22 Subsequently 124 opposition members resigned from Parliament. Again, in December 1995, during the tenure of the Tenth Lok Sabha, the House was stalled for 13 days over a telecom scam. And more recently, as mentioned earlier, an entire session was lost in 2010 due to the opposition demands for a joint parliamentary committee to probe yet another telecom scandal. Now disruptions and frequent adjournments during the course of a parliamentary day are routine. The Question Hour, with which the parliamentary day begins at 11 AM and when MPs are usually present in full strength, bears the brunt of disruptions. The period that immediately follows Question Hour and the laying of papers is popularly known as the Zero Hour23 – though officially the term is not recognized in parliamentary parlance – since it begins at around 12 noon. Here members can raise issues of national and international importance. The Zero Hour is also a favoured time for members to protest at the well of the House – the space between the members’ seats and the area where the Speaker sits surrounded by parliamentary staff – and force an adjournment. The normal procedure is to begin shouting slogans, followed by a ‘lemming-like rush to the well of the House’ which eventually brings proceedings to a halt.24 This led the Speaker of the Fourteenth Lok Sabha, Somnath Chatterjee, to remark that it had become the ‘hour of disorder.’25 Chatterjee, one of the most vocal and respected Speakers of recent times, went on to label disruptions a ‘disease.’26 The issues that cause such excitement can range from topics of national importance to very local or particular party-centric events. For instance, in the 2010 Budget session of the Fifteenth Lok Sabha, where 36 per cent of time was lost due to disruptions, the causes of disruptions were price rise of essential items, women’s reservation in Parliament, the garlanding of the then Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mayawati with currency notes, irregularities in the allocation of 2G spectrum and a controversy over cricket’s Indian Premier League. And it’s not just the members of the opposition who protested. During protests inside Parliament in 2011 over the issue of carving out a separate state of Telangana from Andhra Pradesh, members of the ruling Congress from Andhra too joined in. The Speaker of the House has usually been powerless to stop disruptions though there are rules to discourage and penalize disruptions. Rule 373 of the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in Lok Sabha permits the Speaker to withdraw from the House a member for ‘disorderly’ conduct. Rule 374 allows the Speaker to suspend for up to

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five sittings a member for disregarding the ‘authority of the Chair’ or for abusing the rules of the House. However, in reality the Speaker has rarely used his prerogative to eject members. Various Speakers have tried cajoling, threatening, calling all-party meetings and even proposing to resign in the face of disruptive behaviour, but to no avail. More often than not they have opted for the easier option under Rule 375 which permits the Speaker to adjourn the House in case of ‘grave disorder.’ In a rare instance, Speaker Somnath Chatterjee in 2008 referred 32 MPs to the Privileges Committee for ‘disorderly conduct,’27 but five days later he decided to withdraw the notice.28 The MPs, too, have publicly proclaimed their desire to preserve order in the House. In 1997, at a special golden jubilee commemorative session of Parliament, the members unanimously adopted a resolution to maintain the ‘prestige of the Parliament’ by maintaining the ‘inviolability of the Question Hour,’ refraining from ‘shouting slogans’ and desisting from interrupting the President’s address. But as is evident, such pious intentions have routinely been ignored. A Committee of Privileges study group had also recommended that a code of conduct for MPs be drawn up, but that is yet to see the light of day.

Why disruptions? A few tentative reasons can be conjectured for the progressive rise in disruptions and protests inside Parliament. In the first decade of the Lok Sabha’s existence there was a fair degree of homogeneity in the composition of the House with many of the more prominent MPs having been schooled in the traditions of British parliamentary practice. As Shashi Tharoor, a sitting MP and former minister, points out: Many of India’s new MPs – several of whom had been educated in England and observed British parliamentary traditions with admiration – reveled in the authenticity of their ways. . . . An Anglophile Communist MP, Hiren Mukherjee, boasted in the 1950s that British Prime Minister Anthony Eden had commented to him that the Indian parliament was in every respect like the British one. Even to a Communist, it was a proud moment.29 Besides, the Congress commanded a formidable majority which meant that the opposition never really had the numbers to seriously challenge the government. Hence, an opposition legislator once ended a debate with the words, ‘We have the arguments. You have the votes.’ This changed in the 1970s with the Congress losing majority from the

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first time in 1977. By the late 1980s Congress dominance was history and there were many more claimants to political power. This meant a more vocal opposition irrespective of who was in government with the Congress too indulging in disruptive tactics while in the opposition benches. More importantly, the composition of the House was much more heterogeneous – in terms of both caste and class – completely transforming the tenor and idiom of debates. As Ashutosh Varshney has argued about the transformation in the 1990s, ‘Democracy has been substantially indegenised, and the shadow of Oxbridge has left India’s political centre-stage.’30 Similarly, Yogendra Yadav has suggested that the period 1989–99, which he calls the ‘third electoral system,’ represented a ‘downward spread of democracy’ which disturbed the ‘the inherited ritual social hierarchy’ and the ‘established elite.’31 This naturally enough had an impact on the composition of Indian Parliament and parliamentary discourse. Another innovation that possibly helped fuel disruptive behaviour and theatrics has been the live telecast of proceedings inside the House. Though the Union Budget and the Railway Budget were telecast live for the first time in 1992, it was only from 2006 that the entire proceedings of the Lok Sabha were telecast live by the state-owned broadcaster. While it is true that the phenomenon of disruptions predate live telecast of proceedings, it also true that live images and the explosion of television channels have changed the rules of the game. As an analysis points out, In part, the overt tumult witnessed in parliament is a rational response by MPs to the incentives created by the media, which gives greater coverage to MPs who engage in this behavior than those who busy themselves in parliamentary debates – the latter get rarely mentioned. The introduction of television has undoubtedly made matters worse, especially since many MPs believe that publicity, even bad publicity, especially if it makes it to the evening news is better than no publicity.32 This argument probably makes too simple a connection between televised proceedings and ‘grandstanding’ since disruptive behaviour shown live could have the opposite effect as hoped for by Somnath Chatterjee, who was responsible for the innovation: shaming MPs when their actions are seen by the larger public.33 But the evidence suggests that television has not had the kind of effect that Chatterjee had hoped it would. A look at some of the statistics cited earlier would suggest that Parliament is not fulfilling its legislative and deliberative functions very

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well. There are of course features of Parliament, such as the working of the parliamentary committees, which are not adequately captured by what happens on the floor of the House. However, the constant hand-wringing over the decline of Parliament misses out the point that disruptions are now as much part of Indian Parliament as the elaborate rules and rituals borrowed from the British. Disruptions have become part of the political theatre that characterizes much of Indian Parliament and the wider politics. As one analyst observes, Disruptions are an important aspect of the parliamentary performance of deliberation and political representation, and should not be dismissed simply as an aberration but given due attention for the symbolic significance they hold for representative democracy and the reproduction of parliamentary legitimacy.34 There are others who believe that protests and disruptive behaviour ‘complemented and did not eclipse parliamentary institutions.’35 The MPs themselves are somewhat divided on the utility of disruptions. But the necessity of disruptions was accepted even by Hiren Mukherjee, a Communist Party of India (CPI) MP from 1952–77, who was regarded as one of the best parliamentarians of his era. In a note included in the report by the Committee on the Conduct of a Member during President’s Address, Mukherjee wrote: Normally no one would like to disturb in any way an occasion like the President’s address to Parliament. If, however, circumstances happen to be somewhat abnormal in the country, it might conceivably be the duty of Opposition parties in Parliament to focus attention on the people’s discontents even on such an exceptional occasion.36 He went on to add, ‘Nowhere in the world, not even in reputedly phlegmatic and respectable Britain, are parliaments as well behaved as they supposedly were at one time.’ Several sitting MPs have in interviews said that disruptions should not paralyze Parliament, but many of them believe that protests are sometimes necessary if the government of the day is not responsive. For instance a young CPM MP from Kerala said, ‘Many of the protests are not legitimate. But I don’t believe there should be no protests. Parliament is not a nursery school.’37 Another Congress MP from West Bengal noted, ‘All disruptions are not malafide.’38 At the same time, many MPs admit that attending to the needs of their constituency and not legislative duties is uppermost in their

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minds. This is partly because of the voter’s expectations of a MP as well as the average population of a Lok Sabha constituency – over 20 million – which demand the constant attention of MPs. A study of Parliament points out, MPs are not often seen as lawmakers; most of their constituents are unaware of the bills they are associated with and they are seldom judged on policy accomplishments. . . . It also seems that most MPs and their constituents seem to look upon MPs primarily as distributors of patronage rather than as policy makers. This could explain the apparent contradiction that MPs spend a lot of time in their constituency and on their constituents, but not nearly enough time on policies.39

Conclusion The significant change in the way Indian Parliament and MPs conduct themselves could be analyzed by using Myron Weiner’s idea of the two ‘political cultures’40 of India: the mass, which operates in local and state politics but expands outwards, and the elite, which can be found among the national leadership, senior administrative cadre and the English-speaking intelligentsia. In Indian Parliament, as in Parliaments elsewhere in the developing world, the two political cultures or idioms have collided. In the 1950s and 60s, an elite or a Brahmanical political culture, that set much store by British parliamentary norms and rituals, held sway. But from the 1970s onward and particularly from the late 1980s there was a democratic upsurge and the language and idiom of mass political culture permeated Parliament. This undermined the earlier norms of parliamentary discourse and behaviour and brought in the politics of protest and demonstrations inside Parliament. It is important to note that a single-party majority, like what the Congress had till 1977, has not always been a deterrent to disruptions. As observed earlier, Parliament suffered severe disruptions during the latter stages of the Eighth Lok Sabha when the Congress had an overwhelming majority. However in the Sixteenth Lok Sabha, where the BJP enjoys a slim single-party majority, though disruptions have occurred frequently they have not significantly dented Parliament’s productivity. In the 2014 winter session, the Lok Sabha functioned for nearly 100 per cent of its scheduled time. Question Hour, the first casualty of disruptions, was the most productive since 2004.41 Again in the 2015 budget session, the Lok Sabha functioned for 123 per cent of its scheduled time. The high productivity was partly due to the small numerical strength of the main opposition party, the Congress,

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and the somewhat fragmented nature of the opposition posed by the regional parties. At the same time, the opposition against the government has crystalized in the Rajya Sabha, where the BJP was in a significant minority, giving the Upper House a prominence that it does not always have.42 While disruptions were at a low during the first year of the Narendra Modi government, the threat of disruptions was, however, never far away. The opposition ensured that both Houses of Parliament were badly disrupted during the short monsoon session of 2015 (July 21 – August 13) in protest against what it perceived as wrongdoing on the part of the BJP’s federal minister of external affairs and state chief ministers. A conservative and not-too-successful British Prime Minister, Anthony Eden, once wrote of Indian democracy: ‘The Indian venture is not a pale imitation of our practice at home, but a magnified and multiplied reproduction on a scale we have never dreamt of.’43 It is time that we recognize that Indian Parliament is not only a magnified and multiplied reproduction of its British forebear, but has also evolved into a different kind of institution, for better or worse, whilst keeping its Westminster-style trappings. The English band has not given way to the mellifluous notes of a veena or sitar, as some in the Constituent Assembly hoped but to the raucous music of Indian democracy.

Notes 1 www.shashitharoor.in/article-by-me-details.php?id=294 (Accessed on 1 June 2016). 2 Granville Austin, The Indian Constitution: Cornerstone of a Nation, Oxford: Clarendon, 1966, p. 325. 3 W.H. Morris-Jones, Parliament in India, London: Longmans Green, 1957, p. 327. 4 Ibid., 333. 5 Analysis of Criminal and Financial Details of MPs of 15th Lok Sabha (2009): A Report by National Election Watch and Association for Democratic Reforms, p. 3. 6 See, for example, Arthur G. Rubinoff, ‘The Decline of India’s Parliament’, in Philip Norton and Nizam Ahmed (eds.), Parliaments in Asia, London: Frank Cass, 1999; and ‘Decline or Death of Parliament?’ Economic and Political Weekly, 10 January 2009, p. 6. 7 V.A. Pai Panandikar and Arun Sud, Emerging Pattern of Representation in the Indian Parliament, New Delhi: Centre for Policy Research, 1981, p. 99. 8 B.L. Shankar and Valerian Rodrigues, The Indian Parliament: A Democracy at Work, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2011, p. 180. 9 www.prsindia.org/administrator/uploads/general/1336864627~~Sixty%20 years%20of%20Parliament%20v2.pdf (Accessed on 1 June 2016).

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10 www.prsindia.org/administrator/uploads/general/1325251952~~Vital%20 Stats%20-%20Parliament%20in%202011%20v5.pdf (Accessed on 1 June 2016). 11 http://parliamentofindia.nic.in/ls/rules/rulep27.html (Accessed on 1 June 2016). 12 Harold Laski, Parliamentary Government in England, London: George Allen & Unwin, 1938, p. 154. 13 The Times of India, 20 July 1952. 14 The Times of India, 14 April 1963. 15 Subhash Kashyap, History of the Parliament of India, vol. III, New Delhi: Shipra, 1996, pp. 131–132. 16 The Times of India, 24 April 1963. 17 Ibid. 18 Ibid., 378. 19 Report of the Committee on the Conduct of a Member During President’s Address, 1972, p. 12. 20 www.parliamentofindia.nic.in/ls/decision/decp55.htm (Accessed on 1 June 2016). 21 The Times of India, 27 November 1964. 22 Subhash Kashyap, History of the Parliament of India, vol. V, New Delhi: Shipra, 2000, p. 459. 23 http://164.100.47.132/LssNew/Others/FAQ.htm (Accessed on 1 June 2016). 24 http://archive.indianexpress.com/news/united-progressive–ugly/25651/ (Accessed on 1 June 2015). 25 Madhav Godbole, India’s Parliamentary Democracy on Trial, New Delhi: Rupa, 2011, p. 378. 26 The Times of India, 10 September 2007. 27 The Times of India, 2 May 2008. 28 The Times of India, 5 May 2008. 29 www.shashitharoor.in/article-by-me-details.php?id=294 (Accessed on 1 June 2016). 30 Ashutosh Varshney, ‘Is India Becoming More Democratic?’, The Journal of Asian Studies, 59(1), 2000, p. 7. 31 Yogendra Yadav, ‘Electoral Politics in the Times of Change: India’s Third Electoral System, 1989–99’, Economic and Political Weekly, 21 August 1999, p. 2393. 32 Devesh Kapur and Pratap Bhanu Mehta, The Indian Parliament as an Institution of Accountability, Democracy, Governance and Human Rights Programme, Paper No. 23, January 2006, pp. 18–19, United Nations Research Institute for Social Development. 33 Interview with Somnath Chatterjee, on 24 December 2011. 34 Carole Spary, ‘Disrupting Rituals of Debate in the Indian Parliament’, The Journal of Legislative Studies, 16(3), 2010, p. 348. 35 Vernon Hewitt and Shirin M. Rai, ‘Parliament’, in Niraja Gopal Jayal and Pratap Bhanu Mehta (eds.), The Oxford Companion to Politics in India, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, p. 35. 36 Report of the Committee on the Conduct of a Member During President’s Address, 1972, pp. 14–15. 37 Interview with M.B. Rajesh, Lok Sabha MP, on 8 March 2011.

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38 Interview with Adhir Chaudhuri, Lok Sabha MP, on 15 December 2011. 39 Kapur and Mehta, op. cit., pp. 19–20. 40 Myron Weiner, ‘India Two Political Cultures’, in Weiner (ed.), Political Change in South Asia, Calcutta: Firma K.L.M., 1963, p. 114. 41 www.prsindia.org/administrator/uploads/general/1419408577~~Vital%20 Stats%20Winter%20Session%202014.pdf (Accessed on 1 June 2016). 42 See Ronojoy Sen, ‘House Matters: The BJP, Modi and Parliament’, South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies, 38(4), 2015, pp. 776–790. 43 Anthony Eden, Full Circle, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1960, p. 246.

11 Parliamentary control of delegated legislation The hazards of erroneous delegation Jaivir Singh and Raghab P. Dash The extent and volume of delegated legislation in India is quite startling and is a concern that remains neglected in the discussions on Parliament and legislation in India. In a recent work one of the authors of this chapter has looked at the constitutional jurisprudence on delegated legislation in India.1 It was argued there that the Indian executive branch of the government fills in crucial details of legislations, sometimes merely amplifying the legislation, but often enough unilaterally influencing polices when writing out delegated or subordinate legislation. It was maintained that the expanse and nature of delegation was enabled by judicial interpretations, with much delegated legislation buttressed by judicial legitimacy of the practice. It was further argued that the manner in which the delegated legislation comes to be governed thereupon generates a complex relational politics between the various branches of government – the legislature, the executive and the judiciary, a politics that generates social costs. This chapter works to further develop on this theme by proposing to look more carefully at not just the enabling law through judicial pronouncements but also at the complementary procedures whereby delegated legislation is processed through the legislative machinery of the Indian Parliament. It is perhaps quite underappreciated that delegated legislation is a part of overall legislative continuum and needs to be understood from that perspective – if we are to look at it critically we need to understand how it is whetted through the parliamentary process. It is our overall contention that the nature of governance associated with the delegation of legislation in India is erroneous – and, given the degree of the problem, some reform is merited in both the associated legislative (as well as judicial) procedures. We begin by reviewing the constitutional jurisprudence that has characterized how courts deal with delegated legislation in India. This is followed by a listing of parliamentary procedure (in the form of

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parliamentary rules and parliamentary Committees on Subordinate Legislation) that has demarcated parliamentary control of delegated legislation. We find that the substance of parliamentary control on delegated legislation to be very weak, reinforcing suggestions of executive branch domination that have been highlighted in studies looking at judicial control of delegated legislation. In the final section of this chapter we aim to point to some implications of such weak control of delegated legislation and follow this up ideas on both the nature as well as location of reforms. Given the difficulty of decreeing greater judicial control of delegated legislation, some procedural change of parliamentary rules pertaining to delegated legislation would probably be the most expeditious course of action. However, in light of our findings and analysis, we proceed a step further by suggesting that the legislature (as well as the judiciary) should take steps to follow certain principles in relation to delegated legislation.

Constitutional law and judicial control of delegated legislation2 Upon Indian independence, the newly constituted Supreme Court was obliged to confront the issue of delegated legislation when the government approached the court under article 143 of the Indian Constitution for a juridical clarification on the degree of permitted legislative delegation. The resulting case In Re: The Delhi Laws Act 19123 addressed the questions as to whether the executive could extend laws made for one jurisdiction to another and whether the executive could restrict and modify laws as it saw fit. The advisory consisted of the opinions of the seven judges. These opinions can be classified into three categories – one set of judges favored an English orientation to resolve the problem, while another set drew on American jurisprudence and yet another set took on a less polar in-between position, which could perhaps be labelled an Indian position. The two judges who took the American perspective said that the executive could not make or repeal laws – at the best the administration could only frame rules and regulations following principles put down by the legislature – the broad stance being that legislation should not be delegated. The judges supporting the English position felt that the sovereign nature of the legislature enabled it to delegate any legislation it sees fit, as long as it did not efface itself. A couple of judges who took a position in between the two extremes felt that the legislature does not have unconstrained right to delegate – it cannot give up its essential legislative function, saying, ‘The legislature must retain in its own hands the essential legislative functions which consist in declaring the legislative policy and

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laying down the standard which is to be enacted into a rule of law, and what can be delegated in task of subordinate legislation which by its very nature is ancillary to the statute which delegates the power to make it.’4 The variety of opinion in the judgment forces the weak inference that while delegation is permissible, there is no clear stance within the judgment regarding the limits of delegation. However later judgments tried to make up for the dispersed articulation – a ‘majority view’ was ascribed to the Delhi Laws Act judgment, which came to be stated in the following terms in a definitive judgment: It was settled by the majority judgment in the Delhi Laws Act case that essential powers of legislation cannot be delegated. In other words, the legislature cannot delegate its function of laying down legislative policy in respect of a measure and its formulation as a rule of conduct. The Legislature must declare the policy of the law and the legal principles, which are to control any given cases and must provide a standard to guide the officials or the body in power to execute the law. The essential legislative function consists in the determination or choice of the legislative policy and of formally enacting that policy into a binding rule on conduct.5 This came to be converted into a legal test to look at instances of excessive delegated legislation by inquiring ‘whether the impugned delegation involves the delegation of an essential legislative function or power and whether the Legislature has enunciated its policy and principle and given guidance to the delegate or not.’6 Following this formulation when faced by a case of contested delegated legislation, the Supreme Court typically looks for a statement of policy, principle or standard that can guide the delegate in exercising its legislative power. In the absence of this, the delegated legislation is disallowed or else it is permitted. Remarkably it is widely suggested that on the whole the Indian Supreme Court endorses delegated legislation rather than restricts it – as stated in a well-read work on administrative law ‘not many cases occur in which courts declare delegated legislation invalid on grounds of substantive ultra vires.’7 Apart from the fact that courts read policy guidance for rules very broadly the onus of proof is strongly on the party who challenges the legislation.8 Additionally the Supreme Court has suggested that the fact that rules produced as delegated legislation have to be placed before Parliament is in itself an important and possibly sufficient control on delegated legislation.9 If juridical control on delegated legislation is labelled as being relatively weak, then it is important to check out whether the ostensible parliamentary checks on delegated legislation are more binding.

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Parliamentary control of delegated legislation Parliamentary control over delegated legislation is exercised in many ways.10 For one, when a Bill that involves proposals for delegation of legislative powers is tabled in Parliament, rules of procedure11 require that the Bill be accompanied with a memorandum, which explains the proposal, draws attention to the scope of the legislation and states whether the legislation is exceptional or normal.12 Presumably the purpose of the memorandum is to focus the attention of legislators on the provisions of the Bill relating to delegated legislation. The second stage of control flows from the fact that the executive is expected to frame the rules within a period of six months of the parent legislation having been passed and following it by the publication of the rules in the Gazette of India to draw public attention to the rules. The third control of delegated legislation is the laying requirement before Parliament – it is required that all delegated legislations including Rules, Regulations, Notifications, Orders, Bye-laws and Schemes should be placed on the Table of both Houses of Parliament.13 The period over which the delegated legislation remains tabled is specified in the relevant parent statue and has to be completed before both the Houses are adjourned sine die and later prorogued. If this specification is not met, then the delegated legislation needs to be re-laid in the succeeding session until the period is completed in one session. Apparently there is no general obligation to lay delegated legislation before the Houses of Parliament; rather the terms of the delegated statue determine whether the rules are to be laid before the legislature. In fact in the 1950s and 1960s most laws did not require the laying of delegated legislation before Parliament – it was only in 1971 that the Committee on Subordinate Legislation of both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha suggested a ‘laying formula’ for incorporation in all Bills so that all delegated legislation ended up being tabled before Parliament. Once the delegated legislation is tabled in Parliament, legislative members can modify or annul the delegated legislation through a motion. The fourth source of parliamentary control over delegated legislation comes from the aforementioned Committees – the Lok Sabha Committee on Subordinate Legislation (established in 1953) and its counterpart in the Rajya Sabha (established in 1964).14 The committees are composed of fifteen members of the respective House and are appointed by the Speaker/Chairman for a period of one year, usually chosen in proportion to the strength of political parties. The Chairman of the committees is drawn from the opposition. Apart from having played an important role in delineating the procedure pertaining

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to delegated legislation, these committees are meant to scrutinize and report to their respective House whether the rules, regulations, bylaws authorized by the Constitution or delegated by Parliament have been properly exercised. In spite of having these many layers of control, on the whole, only very weak legislative control is exercised over delegated legislation in India. Weak legislative control over delegated legislation While the Committees on Subordinate Legislation have had an impact by not only standardising procedure and expanding the category of delegated legislation to include rules, regulations, orders, schemes and guidelines, they have not been able to perform their task of scrutinizing delegated legislation sufficiently to report back to Parliament. This is clear from Table 11.1 (which lists the delegated legislation scrutinized in detail and reported upon by the Committee on Subordinate Legislation of each House over a five-year period) that only a fraction of the delegated legislation is scrutinized by the Committees – over 2008 to 2012 only 101 pieces of delegated legislation were scrutinized Table 11.1 Number of delegated legislations scrutinized by each house during 2008–2012 vis-à-vis the number of delegated legislations laid before Parliament Year

Delegated Legislations laid before Parliament

Scrutiny of Delegated Legislations by Lok Sabha CoSL and report presented to the House

Scrutiny of Delegated Legislations by Rajya Sabha CoSL and report presented to the House

Combined Scrutiny of Delegated Legislations by Both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha CoSL and report presented to the House

Percentage of combined scrutiny vis-à-vis the Delegated Legislations laid

2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 Total

1,211 1,285 1,905 1,199 1,385 6,985

10 12 14 10 22 68

05 05 02 08 13 30

15 17 16 18 35 101

1.23 1.32 0.83 1.50 2.52 1.44

Source: The Committee on Subordinate Legislation of both Houses and the Bulletin Part – I of the Lok Sabha

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out of total of 6,985 tabled before Parliament or only 1.44 per cent of the total. This is no doubt in part attributable to the sheer bulk of delegated legislation, making it impossible for a couple of committees to oversee so much material, as can be seen from the next table. The table shows that in the initial years (1950s) delegated legislation framed was comparatively limited though over the next two decades, it climbed up to over 1,000 in 1974. Some of the bulk can be attributed to the Emergency in the 1970s as well as the many instances of the imposition of President’s Rule in the States over 1984–1993 (over this period President’s Rule was imposed twenty-two times and 11,002 notifications were laid before Parliament). After the Supreme Court judgment of S.R Bommai vs. Union of India16 the incidence of imposing President’s Rule declined. While some of the bulk of delegated legislation can be attributed to the fact that instances of President’s Rule compel State level delegated legislation to be routinely passes through Parliament without much scrutiny – it is important to realize that that a good amount of very crucial legislation such as the MGNREGA Audit of Schemes Rules, 2011 framed under the MGNREGA 2005 and the Right to Information Rules 2012 framed under the Right to Information Act 2005 (to mention only a few instances) were implemented without any scrutiny of the Parliamentary Committees. As mentioned earlier in the first two decades of parliamentary functioning did not see too much ‘laying’ of delegated legislation because there was no statutory requirement to do so – it was largely the work of the both the Lok Sabha and Raya Sabha Committee on Subordinate Legislation that set up a ‘laying formula’ in 1971 requiring every rule to be laid for a period of 30 days before Parliament while in session. This also helps understand the upsurge noted in the 1970s and thereafter in the amount of delegated legislation laid before Parliament, evident in Table 11.2. Over the two decades spanning 1952 to 1971 a total of 11,094 delegated legislations were laid before Parliament (averaging to 554 per year) in contrast to 47,708 legislations over 1972–2013 (averaging to 1,136 per year). While there may be a good amount of delegated legislation placed before Parliament, it is apparent from both figures as well as reports of the Committees on Subordinate Legislation that the there is considerable delay in laying delegated legislation before the legislature. As can be seen from Table 11.3, over the period 2010 to 2013, an average number of 1,691 notifications containing delegated legislation were laid on the table of the Rajya Sabha out of which delay in laying beyond the stipulated period of fifteen days can be attributed to an average of 662 notifications or 39 per cent of the total delegated

Table 11.2 Number of delegated legislations framed and laid before Parliament (1952–2012)15 Year

No. of delegated legislations laid

Year

1952 1954 1956 1958 1960 1962 1964 1966 1968 1970 1972 1974 1976 1978 1980 1982 1984 1986 1988 1990 1992 1994 1996 1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 Total

42 169 194 654 546 638 638 968 958 696 628 1089 1608 724 1269 772 704 1447 1296 1086 998 726 560 868 1046 1395 1268 1455 1385 1905 1211

1953 1955 1957 1959 1961 1963 1965 1967 1969 1971 1973 1975 1977 1979 1981 1983 1985 1987 1989 1991 1993 1995 1997 1999 2001 2003 2005 2007 2009 2011

No. of delegated legislations laid 150 196 319 542 545 674 840 742 818 765 857 770 978 374 921 1131 1188 1448 1120 794 921 904 561 655 1107 1400 1217 1393 1199 1285 54,757

Source: Compiled from the Parliamentary Bulletin – Part I (Brief Record of Proceedings) of the Lok Sabha from May 1952 to December 2012

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Table 11.3 Delay in laying of the delegated legislations: position of the Rajya Sabha during 2010–2012 Year

Total no. of Delegated Legislations notified and laid

Total no. of Delay statements Delay statements Delegated appended appended Legislations (Yes) (No) delayed

2010 2011 2012 Average

2,092 1,264 1,234 1,530

513 (25)* 535 (42) 438 (35) 495 (32)

71 (14) 90 (17) 105 (24) 89 (18)

442 (86) 445 (83) 333 (76) 407 (82)

*Figures in parenthesis are in percentage. Fractions exceeding one half are counted as one. Source: Reports No. 189, 190, 192, 195, 197, 198, 199, 201 and 204 presented by the Committee on Subordinate Legislation, Rajya Sabha on Statutory Orders laid on the Table of the Rajya Sabha during 219–227 sessions of the Rajya Sabha

legislation tabled in Rajya Sabha. Table 11.3 also shows us that, on the average, of the 662 delayed notifications only 149 (or 23 per cent) had any delay statement appended, with the bulk (77 per cent) of the delayed notifications having no explanation. As a specific example one can take the case of the Madras High Court (Establishment of a Permanent Bench at Madurai) Order, 2004, framed and notified on 12 July 2004 was laid on the table of both the Houses on 13 December 2010 marking a delay of five and half years with no explanation.17 It is also the case that even when delay statements are included the reasons listed for the delay are trivial – for example excuses listed include the statement that printed copies of the notifications are not available. The Committees on Subordinate Legislation can only bemoan this delay18 and there is apparently no device within the system to ensure that delegated legislation is laid on time. The efficacy of laying delegated legislation is of course dependent on what happens to the delegated legislation when it is tabled in Parliament. As mentioned earlier MPs can give notice to move a motion to amend or annual delegated legislation within thirty days of the delegated legislation being tabled.19 If such a move is made, the Chairman, Rajya Sabha or Speaker, Lok Sabha has to fix a period for the consideration and passage of such a motion. This would mean that time has to be set aside for a debate and such time constraints demand consonance with the government and its parliamentary timetable. Apart from the fact that the government has an incentive to allow very little time for such motions, it appears that there is widespread ignorance among members in relation to their right to move

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for amendment/annulment of delegated legislation – Arun Jaitley, the current Finance Minister, in his capacity earlier as the Leader of the Opposition, Rajya Sabha congratulated P. Rajeeve (CPM Member of Rajya Sabha) in a discussion on a statutory motion for the annulment of the Information Technology (Intermediaries Guidelines) Rules 2011 for ‘educating us on this rule that Parliament has a supervisory control as far as subordinate legislations are concerned, and if need be, we can express our vote of disapproval to the subordinate legislations.’20 It is thus no surprise that modification/annulment motions related to delegated legislation have been few and far between. Since 2000 there have been only ten instances when notices of statutory motions for modification/annulment were moved, out of which the House discussed only three. It is thus the case that not a single annulment motion has so far been carried through by one House, transmitted to and concurred by the other House. As a result, it can be said that the bulk of delegated legislation gets to be routinely laid before Parliament, at the best, as an exercise in informing members of executive action, and after the stipulated thirty days the legislation comes into effect without much ado. Apart from this ‘negative’ procedure it is possible for Parliament to react in an ‘affirmative’ manner where the delegated legislation needs the approval of the legislature to come into effect. While common in other jurisdictions, such as the United Kingdom, this procedure is very rare in India and has some bearing only if the parent Act stipulates it. One Committee on Subordinate Legislation, Rajya Sabha has tried to encourage affirmative procedure but it has clearly found no favor from any government of the day.21 If there are problems with the procedures associated with delegated legislation once it is produced, there are procedural problems at the stage of inception as well. Once the parent legislation is in place, the concerned Ministry/Department has six months to frame the relevant delegated legislation. In this respect both committees on subordinate legislation have noted that the government has on many occasions taken far too long to frame the subordinate legislation – with delays having become an endemic feature.22 Some prominent examples include the Delhi Development Authority, an autonomous body set up under the Delhi Development Act 1957 that functioned for twenty-three years without the aid or legal sanction of rules, which were specified in the Act. Another set of examples are the case of Benami Transaction (Prohibition) Act that was passed in 1988 but the rules under this Act have still not been framed, nor have rules been framed so far under the Central Vigilance Commission Act, 2003. In yet other examples it appears that rules had not been framed as

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late as 2011 for a series of Acts, which include Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority Act 1999, the Energy Conservation Act 2001, the Electricity Act 2002, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005, the National Institute of Fashion Technology Act 2006, the Food and Standards Act 2006, and the National Investigation Agency 2008.23 It turns out that Parliamentary Committees on Subordinate Legislation have not only repeatedly tried to exhort the executive to stop delays in framing delegated legislation but also pointed out that whatever requests for time extensions that do show up ‘do not disclose full facts and advance reasons for seeking such extensions.’24 And, while these Committees have tried to follow up after the delays (in fact in many cases extensions are not even sought after the six-month period for framing delegated legislation is over), the Ministries/Departments of the Government of India have been endemically nonresponsive to such monitoring attempts. This pattern, unfortunately, is found to be persistent over the decades.25 Given this lackadaisical attitude of the executive in relation to delegated legislation it can be inferred that the chronic neglect of framing rules – unfettered by any obligation to even symbolically accede to parliamentary scrutiny – encourages a governance on the basis of administrative orders and circulars instead of uniformly framing detailed rules to implement statutes. More insidiously, government ministries and departments, at times, keep important sections of a Bill in abeyance without notifying these sections so that delegated legislation pertaining to these sections does not get framed. This fallout is sourced in the fact that an Act comes into force only after receiving assent from the President and thereafter being notified by the government – this gives the executive an incredible strategic tool to sometimes make only a part of law operational and to leave other non-notified parts without rules. Two particularly prominent pieces of legislation, the Competition Commission of India Act, 2003, and the Natural Gas Regulatory Board Act, 2006, were notified in parts. Furthermore, since assiduous care is not required to frame rules, it is the case often enough that rules are subjected to frequent in-house amendments, a point commented on in length by one of the Rajya Sabha Committees on Subordinate Legislation.26 In the Report of the Committee it was said the government sometimes needs to amend rules and that while it has the right to do so, nevertheless a critical note was struck on the fact that ‘instead of formally amending the rules’ this ‘was done through executive instructions and clarifications, which is not a proper thing to do.’27 The Committee went on to say that ‘while making rules the executive Ministries as well as

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also the Law Ministry should ensure the use of proper and precise language so that not many clarifications have to be issued.’28 It was further said that unlike primary legislation where intentions can be gathered from the ‘Statement of Objects and Reasons’ ‘[i]n the case of subordinate legislation, the intention of the makers of the rules should be clear from the language used as there is no other way for the courts and others to know about it.’29 It is also apparent that the endemic delays characterising the system of delegated legislation in India also extends to the publication of such legislation. There is no requirement to publish subordinate or delegated legislation once it comes into effect, but it is a very important matter for the information of those affected by such legislation. While some of the Committees on Subordinate Legislation have recommended that delegated legislation should invariably be published in the Gazette30 for public information, there is a general tendency to avoid this – particularly when they are in a draft form so that they are framed devoid of any input from concerned stakeholders. It also needs to be noted that to the extent that details of subordinate legislation are published, they are scattered and not easily available, causing the Rajya Sabha Committees on Subordinate Legislation to demand that all subordinate legislation should be put on websites and be provided by a searchable database linked to principal Acts.31

The implications of weak parliamentary (and judicial control) on delegated legislation If we pair the foregoing description of parliamentary control of delegated legislation with the suggestion that judicial control of delegated legislation is not particularly robust, it tells us that enormous power resides in the executive in India. To analyze this dominance of the executive branch of the government one needs to invoke an evaluating standard and the appropriate standard here is the doctrine of separation of powers. In a liberal polity the checks and balances associated with the doctrine keep power diffused, minimizing chances of tyranny.32 However, to follow this as a device of governance in India is difficult because the doctrine does not get any direct legitimacy from the Indian Constitution – the doctrine of separation of powers is placed explicitly in the Indian Constitution in a very weak manner. In one instance it is located in Part IV of the Constitution on Directive Principles of State Policy, which lists ‘principles’ that are not ‘enforceable by any court,’ but ‘nevertheless fundamental in the governance of the country and it shall be the duty of the State to apply these principles in making

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laws.’ In the Directive Principle under article 50, it is merely stated: ‘The State shall take steps to separate the judiciary from the executive in the public services of the State.’ It may, of course, not be correct to read article 50 as the decisive statement on separation of powers in the Indian Constitution – one could cite a number of articles that spell out the powers of the judiciary, legislatures and the executives; yet, this too remains unconstructive because these are listed in terms of functions, duties and powers, and not as expressions of checks and balances demanded by a more full-bodied version of the separation of powers doctrine. Given this frame of constitutional governance, the practice of everyday political life is structured to lead to situations where the listed powers regularly spill over from their locations in numerous acts of predominance by one branch of the government or another. As would be inevitable, in the absence of clear directions from the Constitution, some of the conflicts so generated have gone to the courts to define the degree of separation of powers. As described by one of us,33 in the context of delegated legislation, the diffuse parameters of judicial intervention, set initially by the Delhi Laws Act case, developed into the test – ‘The essential legislative function consists in the determination or choice of the legislative policy and of formally enacting that policy into a binding rule on conduct.’34 On the surface this is very similar to how the matter is approached in America (where the doctrine of separation of powers prevails more strongly) in that the delegate can work out the details of the legislation following the policy put out by the legislature but the act of legislation cannot be delegated. As demonstrated in the earlier work on judicial control of delegated legislation the problem in India is that the test is typically applied very loosely and what is an apparent judicial control of delegation is de facto a ‘judicial surrender’ – allowing the placement of excessive power in the executive. To add to this judicial failure, our description in Section II of this chapter demonstrates complementary legislative failure, showing a familiar schism between the de jure and de facto legislative control of delegated legislation. To recapitulate, while it is required that all delegated legislation is laid before Parliament, unfortunately this is done most tardily and the bulk of it is not (cannot) be subjected to scrutiny. It was further pointed out that Parliament does not (is unable to) exercise any control on delegated legislation given the strategic moves by the executive to make little or no time available for discussion on the tabled delegated legislation – the natural outcome of which is the fact that there is a virtual absence of any moves to modify or amend delegated legislation. It is also not the practice in India to

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write legislation in a manner that requires affirmative approval of the accompanying delegated legislation before it comes into effect. We have also observed that Parliamentary Committees try to valiantly not only ensure the required timely tabling of delegated legislation but also counter the belated framing of delegated legislation or worse still, point to the many cases where rules are found to be strategically absent. This failure to check the content of delegated legislation allows the executive to govern (often enough) by administrative orders, using devices such as ‘notification in parts’ or by amending existing rules, allowing law to be made without subjecting it to even the rigors of the little notional scrutiny of the legislature that is mandated. It needs to be appreciated that delegated legislation ends up as law and therefore possesses the force of law, and if it is made without being subject to checks and balances, it is bound to produce harm. Broadly two types of harms can be identified in relation to delegated legislation. For one, the natural rights of citizens can be taken away (such as those promised by Part III of the Indian Constitution). Apart from being sourced in oppression, harm can also be manufactured by producing low-quality legislation since requisite expertise and orientation to translate the intent of legislation into practice has not been put into effect. These harms have been listed as social costs of writing out delegated legislation in the face of weak separation of powers sourced in the indifferent judicial control of delegated legislation.35 The argument made in this regard invoked two complementary formulations of separation of powers – one in the standard sense as structural version of the doctrine where a mutual power of exercising a veto by any of the three branches of government mitigates the concentration of power and the other a more functional interpretation of the doctrine where each branch of the government specializes in processing information technologically unique to a particular branch.36 Often enough the violation of separation of powers is caused by failure in one branch of the government, leading to excessive power in some other branch of government, shutting down not only the system of checks and balances but also resulting in the wrong branch taking decisions that are rightfully the function of some other branch. In our case of delegated legislation the over-delegation to the executive branch of the government results in social costs generated by a violation of the separation of powers in a structural sense – tyrannical laws prevail and if we turn to a functional understanding of the doctrine, we have a social cost generated by poorly framed laws. While this has been suggested against a finding of judicial failure, our description of parliamentary control of delegated legislation clearly demonstrates additional legislative failure,

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which means that the social costs identified are even more strongly existent than suggested by earlier work on delegated legislation. The combined effects of both judicial and legislative failure make it very important for us to think of how best the situation can be remedied. While constitutional jurisprudence somewhat mitigates the absence of a strong separation of power requirement in the Indian Constitution, for instance the significant mention of the separation of powers doctrine as a feature of the basic structure in the Kesvananda Bharati case37 – it is hard to command judicial direction towards a more robust judicial review of delegated legislation. Inspired somewhat by the valiant work of some of the Committees on Subordinate Legislation noted earlier, it is possibly easier to think of reducing the listed social costs associated with delegated legislation by initiating some straightforward reforms in parliamentary procedure. Broadly speaking this demands an orientation that ensures that the legislative function is retained by the legislature. Making the existing parliamentary rules on delegated legislation more binding can ensure some easing of the problem – thus in addition to providing more resources to the Committees on Subordinate Legislation of both houses of Parliament to better scrutinize the tabled delegated legislation, more binding penalties can be designed to penalize the observed endemic tardiness in framing as well as laying the delegated legislation before Parliament. However, this in itself will not check the lack of non-present rules, which have been observed by both the Committees on Subordinate Legislation as well as the judiciary38 – it would probably be required that detailed framing of Rules should begin with the drafting of the Bill rather than wait for the enactment of the legislation. Since it is the government that largely initiates legislative proposals in India, a broad-based drafting of rules could surely begin much earlier with relevant stakeholders being identified and consulted well in time. This should be buttressed with a requirement for affirmative laying of the delegated legislation on the table of Parliament, demanding the legislature to affirm the delegated legislation rather than the current practice of expecting Parliament to react negatively if it wishes to amend or annul the delegated legislation. However we need to probably address change in this regard far more deeply, in the sense that the act of delegation needs to be governed by principles. Currently our sense is that the only real inhibition placed on an administrator framing rules in India is that the delegated legislation is not ultra vires the parent Act. There are very few principles other than this that are operational in India – it is not easy in this frame to check substantially for either the non-presence of rules, the non-presence of

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the voice of stakeholders affected by the delegated legislation and definitely not for the non-presence of international obligations. In this regard it is helpful to invoke some legal principles used in American constitutional law to govern delegated legislation. One such principle captured by the maxim delegate potestas non potest delegari (delegated authority cannot be delegated) forms a broad basis to discern whether the delegated legislation is outside the intention of the parent legislation. This control on delegated legislation is not entirely absent in India in the sense that delegated legislation is probably not too much outside the purview of the parent legislation. However a central problem not addressed with such circumscription is to discern how much power should go down to the executive from the legislature when the statues are vague or have open-ended discretion. The delegation issue is somewhat assuaged when the legislature and the judiciary work together to give meaning to legislation. However in the event when the legislature writes too broadly, not only is the legislature not doing its job but is making it hard for the executive to execute the law and for that matter gives the executive a free hand to resort to unlimited discretion. In the face of such problems the principle of least authority can be helpful in guiding the legislature to delegate appropriately, especially if the silences in delegated legislation originate in the complexity or novelty of the issues addressed by the law. This principle in general defines the least amount of privileges needed to perform a function and when applied to the design of statutes demands a clear definition of the function or ‘office’ to be performed and specific definitions of the authorities that govern remedies offered by the law. If a function delegated by a parent law is equivocal then the amount and nature of authority given to an official is also unclear. If the official is given too little authority, he/she might not be able to perform his/her function (or perform it poorly), and if given too much authority this can lead to abuse. Thus the sloppier the language of the statue, greater the possibility of generating the social costs (poor/tyrannical laws) identified by us over the course of this chapter. Thus the spirit of the reforms being suggested in relation to the legislature is to ensure a structure of legislative practices that privilege the purposes of the parent law by voicing them in specific language rather than in terms of excessive generality. It is very important to have this kind of orientation, ensuring that the executive has the least amount of power especially when there are limitations in knowledge on the matter being legislated that prevent the legislature and the judiciary from making a law: it should receive the correct inputs from a series of experts– i.e. those in the know, guarding against making poor or tyrannical laws.

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Notes 1 Jaivir Singh, ‘Delegation of Legislation in India: Constitutional Imperatives and the Economy of Politics’, in Sudha Pai and Avinash Kumar (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Critical Appraisal, New Delhi: Orient Blackswan, 2014, pp. 231–257. 2 Ibid., 2014. 3 1951 2 SCR 747. 4 Ibid., para. 328. 5 Harshankar Bagla and Anr. vs. The State of Madhya Pradesh, AIR 1954 SC 645. 6 Vasantlal Maganbhai Sanjanwala vs. State of Bombay and Ors., AIR 1961 SC 4, MANU/SC/0288/1960. 7 M.P. Jain and S.N. Jain, Principles of Administrative Law, Enlarged edition by Shakil Ahmad Khan, LexisNexis Butterworths Wadhwa Nagpur, 2011, p. 134. 8 For example see P.V. Mani vs. Union of India, AIR 1986 Ker. at 99. 9 For instance see Lohia Machines Ltd. vs. Union of India, AIR 1985 SC 512 or Quarry Owners Assn. vs. State of Bihar (2000), 8SCC 655 for a judicial discussion on laying requirements. 10 Raghab P. Dash, Law Making in a Democracy: The Contested Domain of Executive-Legislature Relations in India, Unpublished PhD thesis , Centre for the Study of Law and Governance, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, 2014. 11 Rule 70 of Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the Lok Sabha, http://164.100.47.194/loksabha/rules.aspx and Rule 65 of Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the Rajya Sabha, http://rajyasabha.nic.in/ rsnew/rs_rule/rules_pro.pdf. 12 This distinction supposes normal to be associated with legislation where the limits of the delegated legislation are defined, whereas the exceptional case covers instances where the executive is given wide discretion. 13 Rule 234 of the Rules and Procedure and Conduct of Business, Lok Sabha, http://164.100.47.194/loksabha/rules.aspx. Similar rules pertain to Rajya Sabha as well. 14 Rules 317–322 of the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in Lok Sabha, http://164.100.47.194/loksabha/rules.aspx. and Rules 204–212 of the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the Rajya Sabha, http:// rajyasabha.nic.in/rsnew/rs_rule/rules_pro.pdf. 15 The data in the table pertain to the Lok Sabha; since delegated legislations are required to be laid before both the Houses, the total number in respect of the Lok Sabha largely reflect the position for both the Houses. However, there are year-wise variations as the concerned administrative Ministry decides whether a notification is to be laid concurrently or separately at different points in time, thus spilling over to the succeeding year. 16 [1994] 2 SCR 644: AIR 1994 SC 1918: (1994)3 SCC1. 17 The Committee on Subordinate Legislation Rajya Sabha, 192nd Report, 2011, p. 69. 18 Ibid., pp. 11–12. 19 The Parliamentary Bulletin Part – II issued by both Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha Secretariats informing Members about laying of subordinate

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20 21 22

23 24 25

26 27 28 29 30 31 32

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legislation reads as follows: ‘The following statutory Rules and Orders made under the delegated power of legislation and published in the Gazette were laid on the Table of Rajya Sabha/Lok Sabha during. . . . The Orders will be laid for a period of 30 days, which may be comprised of one session or in two or more sessions. Members can move for a modification before the expiry of the session immediately following the session in which laying period of 30 days is completed.’ Rajya Sabha Debates, 17.05.2012. The Committee on Subordinate Legislation, Rajya Sabha, 45th Report, 1981, p. 17. The Committee on Subordinate Legislation Rajya Sabha, 45th Report, para 36; The Committee on Subordinate Legislation Lok Sabha, Fifth Report (Second Lok Saha); The Committee on Subordinate Legislation Rajya Sabha, Ninth Report, 1971 para 48; The Committee on Subordinate Legislation Rajya Sabha, 192nd Report, 2011. The Committee on Subordinate Legislation Rajya Sabha, 192nd Report, 2011. The Committee on Subordinate Legislation Rajya Sabha, 31st Report, 1979. The Committee on Subordinate Legislation Rajya Sabha, 47th Report, 1981 para 29, with a similar concern expressed Committee on Subordinate Legislation Second Lok Sabha para 34. More recently see The Committee on Subordinate Legislation Rajya Sabha, 192nd Report, 2011. The Committee on Subordinate Legislation Rajya Sabha, 86th Report, 1991, para 2.21. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid. The Committee on Subordinate Legislation Lok Sabha (Fourth Lok Sabha) Seventh Report, Para 10; The Committee on Subordinate Legislation Rajya Sabha, First report, 1966, para 22 and 23. The Committee on Subordinate Legislation Rajya Sabha, 135th Report, 2001 para 10. While one can hold forth on the separation of powers doctrine at length from various sources, Hannah Arendt has put one of the most perceptive statements on the doctrine out by saying that the key to understanding the significance of Montesquieu – the modern progenitor of the doctrine, is to appreciate his insight that ‘power arrests power.’ She tells us this phrase took on significance in the construction of American nation as it set itself up as an amalgam of multiple centers of power, which would have the ‘advantages of monarchy in foreign affairs’ and ‘republicanism in domestic policy.’ She goes on to tell us that this demanded an understanding of power that was quite different from a situation where power was located in a sovereign center and countered the ‘current notions of the indivisibility of power – that divided power is less power.’ The American nation put into practice a constitution that allowed the multiple centers of power to retain power while simultaneously controlling such power by the checks and balances imposed by one on the other. Thus, for Arendt: ‘In this respect, the great and, in the long run, perhaps the greatest American innovation in politics as such was the consistent abolition of

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33

34 35 36

37 38

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sovereignty within the body politic of the republic, the insight that in the realm of human affairs sovereignty and tyranny are the same.’ See Hannah Arendt, On Revolution, Middlesex: Penguin Books (1963 reprinted 2006), pp. 141–144. Jaivir Singh, ‘Delegation of Legislation in India: Constitutional Imperatives and the Economy of Politics’, in Sudha Pai and Avinash Kumar (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Critical Appraisal, New Delhi: Orient Blackswan, 2014, pp. 231–257. Harshankar Bagla and Anr. vs. The State of Madhya Pradesh, AIR 1954 SC 645. Singh, op. cit. Ibid. This analysis of separation of powers has been developed over a series of works, which include T.C.A. Anant and Jaivir Singh, ‘An Economic Analysis of Judicial Activism’, Economic and Political Weekly, 37(43), 2002, pp. 4433–4439; T.C.A. Anant and Jaivir Singh, ‘Structuring Regulation: Constitutional and Legal Frame in India’ Economic and Political Weekly,41(2), 14 January 2006, pp. 121–127; Jaivir Singh, ‘Separation of Powers and the Erosion of the ‘Right to Property’ in India’ Constitutional Political Economy, 17, 2006, pp. 303–324. His Holiness Kesavananda Bharati Sripadagalvaru and Ors. vs. State of Kerala and Anr. AIR 1973 SC 1461. See Singh, op. cit., pp. 247–248 quoting the observations of the Supreme Court in Daiichi Sankyo Company Ltd. vs. Jayaram Chigurupati and Ors. AIR 2010 SC 3089.

12 ‘Responsibility’ and ‘accountability’ Confidence and No Confidence Motions in the Indian Parliament Vikas Tripathi1 A consensus has emerged amongst scholars, researchers and analysts that the Parliament ought to be understood as a socially embedded institution, performing various mandated functions and the question of accountability and representation facing Parliament cannot remain oblivious to the democratic transformation that has taken place in India.2 Recent writings on Parliament in India, not only give due consideration to the rules, procedures, conventions and constitutional principles but also endeavour to establish link between internal characteristics and external environment of the Parliament to account for the emerging ‘weaknesses’ of the Indian Parliament.3 These analyses explore the nature, character and functioning of the Parliament as an institution of accountability and attempt to unfold the relationship between the legislature and executive in India. These writings, however, fall quite short of analysing government-Parliament relationship in a systemic and general manner, in part because it remains woven around specific themes like representation, accountability, separation of power and legitimacy and are self-limiting in presenting a perspective on the change as well as continuity marking the governmentParliament relationship during distinct moments in the history of parliamentary democracy. A serious attempt to explore the notion of ‘responsibility’ and ‘responsible government,’ linking it with an overall character and nature of government-Parliament relationship is yet to emerge.4 Kapur and Mehta present statistical evidence to assess the functioning of Parliament as an institution of accountability and there is an inseparability that marks the concept of ‘responsibility’ and ‘accountability’ in their writing.5 Considering ‘responsibility’ and ‘accountability’ as the conceptual distinctions this chapter seeks to look at Confidence and No Confidence Motions as instruments to ensure a responsible government. It intends to understand the efficacy and effectiveness of the Motions

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of ‘Confidence’ (henceforth, CMs) and the ‘No Confidence Motions’ (henceforth, NCMs) listed, discussed and voted from the First to the Fifteenth Lok Sabha to present an assessment of the Parliament-government relationship during different periods in parliamentary democracy. The Parliament in India has been pivotal to the unleashing of a social revolution in India and has been instrumental in the deepening of democracy in the country. Over past six decades, the representation in Parliament has witnessed a broadening of social base. In any parliamentary system of government, so also in India, the Parliament performs two opposing but crucial functions: first, it sustains the executive and, second, it holds the executive accountable for its actions and policies.6 The functioning of the Indian Parliament has not been consistently similar in its six and a half decades of history. However, lately the analyses of the Indian Parliament present a paradox. While its composition has become increasingly representative of various sections of society, parliamentary pandemonium is leading a section of analyst to conclude a decline in its performance and, hence, prestige. Quantitative assessments of sessions in terms of numbers and the hours they met for, the hours they wasted in pandemonium and ‘street politics’ and business transacted (number of bills presented, discussed and passed) over the years have normatively led to conclusions that parliamentary performance in India, hence Parliament as an institution is declining. This ‘decline’ thesis in the Indian context seems to offer certain specificities as is apparent through an assessment of the changing pattern of relationship between the government and the Parliament. A pertinent question in this context is whether the supposed ‘decline’ of Parliament in India is due to the strengthening of the executive, or is it due to the internal anomalies facing the Indian Parliament, or the new role assumption and performance of the Parliament willy-nilly provides greater space to the executive. This question assumes importance because the ‘decline of Parliament’ thesis assumes certain changes in the given pattern of relationship between the Parliament and the government at a particular historical juncture whereby the balance crafted in the constitutional design fades to give the executive pre-eminence. In this respect, it becomes imminent to study the specific pattern of relationship between the government and Parliament during different moments of parliamentary history of India. In analytically delineating the relationship between the Parliament and government in India from 1952 to 2014, this chapter uses the motions of ‘Confidence’7 and ‘No Confidence’8 listed, discussed and voted from the First to the Fifteenth Lok Sabha as indices. It is worth mentioning here that the survival and sustenance of a government is

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in principle a matter of ‘responsibility,’ while ensuring an accountable executive remains the basic objective of the parliamentary oversight. The two ‘Motions’ are key instruments meant to ensure the responsibility of a government to the Parliament, while other parliamentary mechanisms to conduct business such as Questions Hour are measures essentially to establish parliamentary primacy and its role as an institution of accountability.9 This study follows the idea that the decline of Parliament in India has not been monolithic in character, rather during different periods the relationship between the government and Parliament has been quite distinct. This distinctness during different moments of parliamentary democracy in India imparts a contextual specificity to the idea of decline in India. In this chapter, an analysis of CMs and NCMs has been provided over four distinctive periods which underlines a specific pattern of relationship between the government and the Parliament in India. The functioning of Parliament during these distinct periods can be easily explained as representing a distinct trend in keeping with the changing pattern of party system, political leadership and fragmentation/strengthening of opposition unity in the Indian Parliament during these periods. The four periods which depict specific pattern of relationship between the Parliament and government are these (see Table 12.1): Period of ‘Relative Equilibrium and Majority Governments (1950s and 1960s); Period of ‘Legislative Suppression and Majority Governments’ (1970s and 1980s); Period of ‘Fragmented Legislature and Instable Minority Governments’ (1990s); and ‘Emerging Loose Bipolar Legislature and Stable Minority Governments’ (1999 onwards) Table 12.1 Four periods of Parliament-government relations Decade

Lok Sabha

Parliament-government relations

1950s and 1960s

1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th

1970s and 1980s

5th, 6th, 7th,8th

1990s

9th, 10th, 11th, 12th,

1999 onwards

13th, 14th, 15th

Relative Equilibrium and Majority Governments Legislative Suppression and Majority Governments Fragmented Legislature and Instable Minority Governments Emerging Loose Bipolar Legislature and Stable Minority Governments

Source: This classification is author’s own. Data compiled from: Statistical Handbook 2014, Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs, Government of India.

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1950s and 1960s: period of relative equilibrium and majority governments The period from 1950s till the late 1960s essentially epitomises the working of what Rajni Kothari described as the Congress system in India,10 which imparted stability to the working of parliamentary democracy in India. The congress system based on the ‘one-party dominance’ derived its legitimacy from ‘historical consensus’ premised on the legacy of national movement. During this period, ‘political competition was internalised and carried on within the Congress. . . the system of mediation and arbitration as well as inter level coordination in the Congress ensured active involvement of the central leadership in the factional structure.’11 The opposition of this period remained divided and fragmented, and the government enjoyed comfortable majority. As Morris-Jones observed, the outstanding features of the party pattern of both Houses can be listed shortly: first, the overwhelming dominant position of Congress; second the very divided character of opposition groups; finally the comparatively large number of members returned as Independents and members of local parties of one kind or another.12 He presents an optimistic assessment of the Parliament and asserts that the one dominant party, rather than enfeebling, imparted strength and dynamism of its own to the Indian Parliament.13 The foremost reason remained the independence of the legislature in keeping with the separation that existed between the Office of the Speaker and the government of the day.14 He remarks, the Speaker ‘made his position – and through it that of parliament – one of substantial independence of government.’15 The views of Morris-Jones on the independence of the legislature seems to be a logical corollary to the distance that existed between the Congress Party and government during this period. The government-opposition relation displayed a balance and mostly opposition remained internal to the Congress. The relationship between the Parliament and government during the 1950s and the 1960s remained in equilibrium and it is during this period that the parliamentary system in India was consolidated.16 During the first (1952–1957), the second (1957–1962) and the third (1962–1967) Lok Sabhas, the successive governments had more than 70 per cent of the seats in the Parliament. The Fourth Lok Sabha (1967–1971) however was the watershed. The government was reduced to around 50 percent of the seats in the Legislature. The Congress won 279 out of 520 Lok Sabha seats; it was the lowest ever for the party in

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the fifteen-year history of the Lok Sabha. This political development has to be read taking into cognizance the developments which took place within the Congress party during the mid-1960s. The ‘Congress system’ which primarily established the dual equilibrium, first between the Congress Parliamentary Wing and the Congress Organisational wing, and the second between the centre and states in India could not hold for long in the post Nehru era, and its early signs of decadence started with the Indira Gandhi becoming the Prime Minister by in 1966.17 One of the unintended consequences of the increasing rivalries within the Congress among various factions, particularly becoming sharp in the second tenure of Indira Gandhi as Prime Minister, finally leading to the break-up of the Congress in 1969, was that the opposition became vigorous particularly during the Third and the Fourth Lok Sabha. It also owed to a certain extent, to the development of non-Congress governments in many states where Congress lost power particularly during the 1967 election.18 V. Krishna Ananth points out that apart from the lowest ever majority (till then) that Congress gained during this election, it also lost power in nine states. The coordination, on the basis of ‘antiCongressism’ among parties in different states, unseated the Congress from power in these states, SVDs claiming majority through opposition unity in these Legislative Assemblies (see Table 12.2). Table 12.2 Number of CMs and NCMs faced by the successive governments and their strength in the house during the 1950s and 1960s Lok Sabha Council of Ministers

Party/ Alliance

1st

Congress 364/489

74.44

00

00

Congress 371/491

75.25

00

00

Congress 361/494

73.08

00

01

Congress 361/494

73.08

00

03

Congress 361/494

73.08

00

02

Congress 279/520

53.65

00

06

2nd 3rd 3rd

3rd 4th

Jawaharlal Nehru Jawaharlal Nehru Jawaharlal Nehru Lal Bahadur Shastri Indira Gandhi Indira Gandhi

Seats % of No. of No. of won/Total seats won CMs NCMs

Compiled from: G.C. Malhotra, ‘Cabinet Responsibility to Legislature: Motions of Confidence and No Confidence in Lok Sabha and State Legislatures’, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat & Metropolitan Book Co. Pvt. Ltd, 2004.

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The loss of social base of the Congress in 1967 strengthened the socialist platform both at the centre and in the states. The two Socialist Parties (PSP and SSP) secured thirty-six Lok Sabha seats in the Fourth Lok Sabha. It was the highest ever seat gain for the socialist platform. Equally significant was the performance of BJS and the two communist parties. While the BJS won thirty-five seats, the two Communist parties secured forty-two seats. During the First and the Second Lok Sabha, NCMs remained a nonstarter. All the NCMs were discussed during the Third and Fourth Lok Sabha. The successive governments during 1960s had to face twelve NCMs in all, the first was discussed in 1963 and the last in 1970. Thus, in a span of seven years, twelve NCMs were faced by different governments (see Table 12.3). Of these, Jawaharlal Nehru faced one (Third Lok Sabha), Lal Bahadur Shastri faced three NCMs during his brief tenure (Third Lok Sabha) and Indira Gandhi faced eight NCMs. It is significant to note that the maximum number of NCMs was moved during the Prime Ministership of Indira Gandhi (that is, from 1966 to 1970). The only NCM that Nehru faced was over the state of India’s defence forces following the 1962 Chinese war. Nehru conceded many of the opposition’s criticisms and reluctantly accepted the resignation of Defence Minister V.K. Krishna Menon.19 The Members of Parliament debating NCMs frequently expressed their criticisms and complaints against the incumbent governments; Table 12.3 NCMs discussed in Lok Sabha during the 1950s and 1960s Lok Sabha

Year

Prime Minister

Result

3rd 3rd 3rd 3rd 3rd 3rd 4th 4th 4th 4th 4th 4th

1963 1964 1965 1965 1966 1966 1967 1967 1968 1968 1969 1970

Jawaharlal Nehru Lal Bahadur Shastri Lal Bahadur Shastri Lal Bahadur Shastri Indira Gandhi Indira Gandhi Indira Gandhi Indira Gandhi Indira Gandhi Indira Gandhi Indira Gandhi Indira Gandhi

Negative Negative Negative Negative Negative Negative Negative Negative Negative Negative Negative Negative

Source: Statistical Handbook 2014, Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs, Government of India

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also at times they did seek explanations against the governments’ conduct. The content, timing and the voting pattern of the NCMs reveal that the opposition didn’t aim to dislodge the government at any instance. Instead these were intended to seek government’s responsiveness on specific issues like food crisis, corruption, devaluation of the currency, federal tensions, the Rann of Kutch and labour disputes. It is to be noted that during 1950s NCM was not listed even once, which might reflect the weak and fragmented character of the opposition during this period. The national movement and the congress system also acted as the catalysts to generate a consensus on major issues in the Parliament. During 1950s the opposition remained internal to the Congress party structure, as the parties in opposition were relatively weak both within and without Parliament. It is only after 1963 that the opposition parties developed strength to take on the Congress. The Third and the Fourth Lok Sabha brought dynamism and floor coordination among the opposition parties to a certain extent. The ideology of ‘Non-Congressism’ triggered a more demanding opposition. The twelve NCMs during these years could be attributed to this emerging equilibrium, precisely because, despite government stability, during 1960s the opposition could assert itself and, despite fragmentation within, could attempt to ensure a responsive government. The intensity and frequency of NCMs increased particularly since 1965, every year between 1965 and 1968 at least two NCMs were discussed in the Lok Sabha. On one hand, it indicated weakening of the Congress’s internal structures and division within in the party, and on the other, the entry of leaders such as Ram Manohar Lohia in the Parliament since 1963 invigorated the opposition. As a result, equilibrium between the government and Parliament emerged during this period to ensure a more responsible and responsive government. Madhu Limaye has argued that the periods of the Third and the Fourth Lok Sabhas have been the best period in the history of the Lok Sabha. According to him, the Indian polity was in perfect equilibrium during the Fourth Lok Sabha in particular (because of the internal bickerings and a vertical split in the Congress), due to a fine balance among all its elements. The polity was characterised by a strong cabinet, with the Prime Minister forced to hold fast collective functioning and collective responsibility: a ruling party, stripped of its brute majority, and a commanding opposition.20 Debates, discussions and voting on NCMs during 1950s and 1960s explicitly reflects how different factions within the Congress negotiated with political parties of varied ideological persuasion, ‘these factions supported by opposition groups functioned as pressure groups

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to influence the decisions of the government.’21 One major consequence of this tactic remained that it primarily withheld the growth of alternatives to the Congress in Parliament. The personality and leadership of Nehru transcended the ‘intra-party’ and ‘inter-party’ differences and he could mould these factions for promotion of his policies. The coordination broke down with the ascendance of Indira Gandhi (post-1967) and the subsequent left turn of the Congress during her leadership.22The relationship between the government and Parliament since the late 1960s became more polarised and marked by a rising index of opposition unity, which is apparent through the increase in frequency and vote for the successive NCMs after 1966. In absolute terms, vote against NCM declined from 347 (against Nehru in 1963) to 243 (against Indira Gandhi in 1970).

1970s and 1980s: a period of legislative suppression and majority governments The political development since mid-1960s had a casting impact over the Parliament-government relationship during the 1970s and the 1980s. As the political events unfolded during the Fourth Lok Sabha, there was a split in the Congress Party and the proceedings in the House could not escape its brunt. The opposition lost its dynamism, getting divided and various parties aligned with the two Congress groups. The CPI-DMK-PSP overtly came into support of the Indira Gandhi faction and supported the government. She won a landslide victory in the general elections of 1971. The constitutional equilibrium got disturbed consequent to the victory and the country galloped towards a centralised and personalised rule. The period of parliamentary level playing gradually became extinct as the electoral competition became more intensive, and the emergency of 1975–1977 remains the most severe setback to the government-opposition relations during this period. Rudolph and Rudolph remarked in the context of Indian politics during 1970s and 1980s that ‘since the mid-1960s and the death of Nehru, there has been a failure by both to honour each other’s parliamentary roles. The Prime Minister and the cabinet colleagues have neglected the parliament.’23 They argued that the foremost reason for the emergence of unequal relationship between the Parliament and the executive remains the surfacing and consolidation of Prime Ministerial Government particularly since the Fifth Lok Sabha. The esteem and effect of the parliament has eroded.24 In support of their argument they quote A.B. Vajpayee, who argued in Parliament that the crucial reason for decline in the prestige of Parliament in India, ‘is PM Indira

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259

Gandhi’s unconcealed disdain for parliament. . . . Pt. Nehru stayed away from the House only when it was absolutely unavoidable. She attended parliament only when she must.’25 Nevertheless, the decades of 1970s and 1980s broadly represent the era of Congress dominance, barring a brief interlude of thirty-three months (during the Janata Party and the Janata Party-S Governments; see Table 12.4). The seventh (1980) and the eighth (1984) Lok Sabhas witnessed nearly 65 percent of the seats going to the Congress. In this period spanning two decades, CM was listed in the House only once during the Sixth Lok Sabha in 1979 (see Table 12.6). However, the motion could not be moved as Prime Minister Charan Singh tendered his resignation. In the same period, however, the opposition moved ten NCMs in the Parliament (see Table 12.5). Out of these ten NCMs, Indira Gandhi faced seven (four in Fifth Lok Sabha and three in Seventh Lok Sabha), while two were specifically targeted against the Janata Party Government in 1978 and 1979 (Sixth Lok Sabha). Rajiv Gandhi government faced one NCM towards the latter part of his tenure in 1987 (Eighth Lok Sabha). Except in case of the two NCMs against the Morarji Desai Government, the purpose was not to dislodge the government. The Morarji Government survived the first NCM, but it resigned before conclusion of the discussion in the second case. Table 12.4 Number of CMs and NCMs faced by the successive governments and their strength in the House during 1970s and 1980s Lok Sabha Council of Party/ Ministers alliance

Seats % of No. of No. of won/total seats won CMs NCMs

5th

350/515

6th 6th 7th 8th

Indira Gandhi Morarji Desai Charan Singh Indira Gandhi Rajiv Gandhi

Congress

67.69

00

04

Janata 297/540 Party Janata (S)* 76/540

55

00

02

14

01

00

Congress (I) Congress (I)

353/524

67.37

00

03

415/515

80.58

00

01

*Congress (75), Congress (I) (71), Socialist Group, CPI, Peasants and Worker Party and Muslim League assured support to the Charan Singh Government. Compiled from: G.C. Malhotra, Cabinet Responsibility to Legislature: Motions of Confidence and No Confidence in Lok Sabha and State Legislatures, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat & Metropolitan Book Co. Pvt. Ltd, 2004.

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Table 12.5 NCMs discussed in Lok Sabha during the 1970s and 1980s Lok Sabha

Year

Prime Minister

Result

5th 5th 5th 5th 6th 6th

1973 1974 1974 1975 1978 1979

Indira Gandhi Indira Gandhi Indira Gandhi Indira Gandhi Morarji Desai Morarji Desai

7th 7th 7th 8th

1981 1981 1982 1987

Indira Gandhi Indira Gandhi Indira Gandhi Rajiv Gandhi

Negative Negative Negative Negative Negative Prime Minister Resigned, Inconclusive Discussion Negative Negative Negative Negative

Source: Statistical Handbook 2014, Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs, Government of India

Table 12.6 CMs listed in Lok Sabha during the 1970s and 1980s Lok Sabha

Year

Result

6th

1979

Listed but not moved as PM tendered resignation

Source: Statistical Handbook 2014, Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs, Government of India

It is seen that more NCMs were proposed against the government of the time in the 1960s than in the 1970s and 1980s. This is partly due to the legislative majority that the successive governments enjoyed since the Fifth Lok Sabha. Moreover, lack of floor coordination and withering of the opposition unity reached in mid-1960s which was based on the ideology of ‘anti-Congressism’ also played a role. The failure of Janata Party experiment in 1979 and the successive consolidation of Congress governments in the 1980s, which completely tilted the balance between government and Parliament (in the government’s favour) actually eclipsed the intensity of NCMs in the Indian Parliament. Corruption, the deteriorating economic situation, federal tension and the emergence of strong a Prime Minister with a centralised mindset developed as the recurrent theme during the debates on NCMs in this period. The gradual weakening of opposition unity explains the preponderance of the government during this period as the NCMs were defeated either with voice vote or substantial strength during the Fifth Lok Sabha. Similarly, during the Seventh and Eighth Lok Sabha the NCMs could be negative with substantial support for the government. However, the government-opposition relation during 1980s in particular remained confrontationist and particularly from mid-1980s there appears to be a rising index of opposition unity, which becomes apparent as the Bofors issues came up for

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discussion in a NCM listed in 1987 against the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi who accused the opposition of ‘total bankruptcy’ of thinking and indulgence in ‘petty personal attacks.’ The opposition MP Madhav Reddy, retorted that the PM acts as a monarch and remarked, ‘we are loyal to the nation, not to Rajiv Gandhi who sees himself as the monarch.’26

The 1990s: period of fragmented legislature and unstable minority governments The 1990s brought in fundamental transformation in the political landscape in India. Electoral support for the national political parties declined at the cost of regional political parties since the mid-1980s, particularly during the 1990s. This was due to the proliferation of political parties and it led to the emergence of multiple power centres. As a result, the 1990s produced unstable minority governments in a quick succession. Between 1989 and 1999, India had seven Prime Ministers and Four Lok Sabhas, namely the Ninth, Tenth, Eleventh and Twelfth Lok Sabhas (for a survey of the CMs and NCMs during these tumultuous years, see Tables 12.7–12.9). Table 12.7 Number of CMs and NCMs faced by the successive governments and their strength in the house during the 1990s Lok Sabha Council of Party/ Ministers alliance 9th

V.P. Singh

9th

Chandra Shekhar P.V. Narasimha Rao A.B. Vajpayee H.D. Deve Gowda I.K. Gujral

10th

11th 11th 11th 12th

A.B. Vajpayee

Seats % of No. of No. of won/total seats won CMs NCMs

National 144/520 Front* Janata Dal 68/520 (S)** Congress (I) 231/520

27.22

02

00

13.08

01

00

44.42

01

03

BJP

161/543

26.95

01

00

United Front*** United Front**** BJP and Allies

179/543

32.97

02

00

179/543

32.97

01

00

264/539

48.97

02

00

Source: Compiled from G. C. Malhotra, Cabinet Responsibility to Legislature: Motions of Confidence and No Confidence in Lok Sabha and State Legislatures, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat & Metropolitan Book Co. Pvt. Ltd, 2004. *BJP (86) and Communist Parties (55) supported from outside. **Congress-I, AIADMK, BSP, Muslim League, National Conference, Kerala Congress (M), Akali Dal (Panthic) and a few independent members supported from outside. *** Congress (I) with a strength of 139 members supported from outside **** Congress (I) with a strength of 139 members supported from outside.

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Table 12.8 NCMs discussed in Lok Sabha during the 1990s Lok Sabha

Year

Prime Minister

Result

10th 10th 10th

1992 1992 1993

P.V. Narasimha Rao P.V. Narasimha Rao P.V. Narasimha Rao

Negative Negative Negative

Source: Statistical Handbook 2014, Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs, Government of India

Table 12.9 CMs discussed in Lok Sabha during 1990s Lok Sabha

Year

Prime Minister

Result

9th 9th 9th 10th 11th

1989 1990 1990 1991 1996

V.P. Singh V.P. Singh Chandra Shekhar P.V. Narasimha Rao A.B. Vajpayee

11th 11th 11th 12th 12th

1996 1997 1997 1998 1999

H.D. Deve Gowda H.D. Deve Gowda I.K. Gujral A.B. Vajpayee A.B. Vajpayee

Adopted Negative Adopted Adopted PM resigns, Motion not put to vote Adopted Negative Adopted Adopted Negative

Source: Statistical Handbook 2014, Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs, Government of India

The CM had been an exception before 1990s. Between 1989 and 1999, India elected four Lok Sabhas – Ninth, Tenth, Eleventh and Twelfth – and CM was moved in each of them: ten times in all. During this period of political instability, India witnessed seven Prime Ministers. The government could not survive the CMs thrice and Atal Bihari Vajpayee announced the resignation of his government even before the Motion was put to vote (the Eleventh Lok Sabha 1996). The CM was adopted by the House six times during the same period, though only P.V. Narasimha Rao Government (Tenth Lok Sabha) could complete its term. Unlike CMs, NCMs were moved only three times during the 1990s and were unsuccessful each time. S.K. Chaube argues that the coalition governments did not face NCMs because they were pre-empted by CMs during the 1990s and after.27 The intensity of CM during the 1990s may be attributed to the inadequate legislative majority that the successive governments enjoyed during this period. Coalition

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partners during the 1990s, mainly regional forces with interests and aspirations in constant flux, were perceived to be mostly interested in enhancing their bargaining capacity. The minority governments during this period largely remained dependent upon regional and numerically weak parties for its survival and policy approval. This dependence played as an incentive for perpetual instability in favour of numerically weak parties in Parliament. Thus, they opted for an alternative set of arrangements – essentially a different coalition – rather than face elections like a change in the composition of cabinet or even the Prime Minister.28 Devesh Kapur and Pratap B. Mehta put forward ‘thus, in principle, because of threat of No Confidence Motions, a government could respond to the pressure of particular groups within parliament, even as it became less accountable to the parliament as a whole.’29 The intensity of CMs in the Indian Parliament eclipsed the emergence of moral and political consensus among the opposition and the government parties, quite imminent for the stability of the polity. Unlike the prior periods, the NCMs and CMs during the 1990s intended to dislodge the incumbent government. It is worth recalling here that the intention behind NCMs in the decades prior to 1990s was largely to evoke responsiveness from the government as well as to censure it on those fronts where it had fared below expectations. But in the 1990s, NCMs became devices for bargaining. The trend during the 1990s clearly establishes that NCMs/CMs can be successful only in cases where a government has a thin majority, where allies see some incentive either in defection or dissolution and fresh election. Fragmentation of the party system in India amid a lack of consensus on major issues confronting contemporary politics, among major parties represented in the Parliament, impeded the emergence of either ‘ideological consensus’ or ‘programmatic consensuses.’ Both the government as well as the opposition remained fragmented and unsure of their strength. Three major issues dominated the debate during the CMs and NCMs listed and voted in the 1990s – the Ramjanmabhoomi movement and the question of secularism, economic reforms and social justice. The rise of BJP brought the Ramjanmabhoomi movement as an issue at the centre of parliamentary politics and it produced distinct political responses in the Parliament. It remained at the centre of most of the CM and NCM debates during the 1990s, and till 1998, the BJP remained an untouchable and marginalised entity for alliance-making, despite emerging as the second largest party since 1991 and the single largest party since 1996. The centrality of social justice and secularism as issues in parliamentary politics during the 1990s became evident during the second CM brought by V.P. Singh in 1990 (Ninth Lok Sabha) on the withdrawal of support

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to his National Front government by the BJP.30 The CM propelled the first major debate in the Lok Sabha on the issues of secularism and the Ramjanmabhoomi movement. Speaking during the debate he raised the question whether religious polarisation could be allowed in the country and whether the mixing of religion and politics was desirable.31 V.P. Singh asserted that L.K Advani’s Rathyatra was actually a ploy to stall the implementation of the Mandal Commission Report. During the debate, Somnath Chatterjee (CPI-M) argued that ‘a vote against the confidence motion is a vote against secularism and for disintegration on the basis of communalism.’32 George Fernandes and V.P. Singh charged during this debate that the withdrawal of support to the government was a reaction against the decision to implement the Mandal Commission Report on protective discrimination for the OBCs.33 It is worth noting that the CM moved by H.D. Deve Gowda in 1996 (Eleventh Lok Sabha) also put an emphasis on secularism. An examination of the CMs during the 1990s shows that secularism had become a salient ground for such motions, and the instability of that period (till the Twelfth Lok Sabha) can be attributed to the fact that a middle ground on the issue could not be found. While speaking at the same motion P.V. Narasimha Rao’s announcement that ‘Congress could not support BJP on ground of secularism’34 is illustrative of this non-resolution. In contrast to the Eleventh Lok Sabha, a change can be perceived in the tone and tenor of the debates from the Twelfth Lok Sabha onwards. E. Sridharan argues, ‘in 1998, the BJP shelved its overt Hindutva agenda to strike explicit or tacit alliances with a range of state based parties, both regional and others, many of which had earlier been with the UF, a strategy, that it consolidated after its victory.’35 Though Hindutva remained an issue, the BJP’s strategic moderation, mostly as a response to the compulsion of coalition politics, had a cooling effect on its primary positions on the issues Ramjanmabhoomi, Uniform Civil Code and Article 370. L.K. Advani’s assertion that ‘this government was bound by the National Agenda for Governance (NAG) and not the BJP Manifesto’36 made during the CM moved by Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 1998 (Twelfth Lok Sabha) was reflective of such a change.

1999 and beyond: period of loose bipolar legislature and stable minority governments Post–Twelfth Lok Sabha, political realignment due to moderation of the BJP’s Hindutva agenda led to the consolidation of two major blocs, the UPA and the NDA. The emergence and consolidation of this loose bipolar bloc determined the trajectory of the government-Parliament relationship in India in the ensuing period. Between 1999 and 2014,

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India had three Lok Sabha (Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Lok Sabhas) and three Prime Ministers. All the three governments successfully completed their tenure. The two loose poles – the UPA and NDA – coexist with the amorphous and unsteady Third Front which is constituted by the Left Parties, SP, BSP, TDP, BJD and AIADMK among others. The three consecutive stable coalition governments NDA, UPA-1 and UPA-2 are the evidence of the emerging political stability at the centre. The NDA and the UPA remained divided primarily along the lines of secularism. Political stability however brought an overlapping consensus on the issue of economic reforms, social justice and the centrality of Parliament as the foremost instrument of deepening democracy in India. This consensus seems to be instrumental in the forging and consolidation of the bipolar alliances in the form of NDA and UPA in the Indian Parliament. Between 1999 to 2014 (Thirteenth Lok Sabha to Fifteenth Lok Sabha), only one CM came up in the Fourteenth Lok Sabha and one NCM in the Thirteenth Lok Sabha (see Tables 12.10 and 12.11). The NCM moved by Sonia Gandhi, during the fag end of the Vajpayee Government’s tenure in 2003 was aimed at consolidation of opposition unity before the election. It remained predominantly an expression of discontent by the opposition as it accused the government of failure on social, economic and strategic fronts. Manmohan Singh offered to seek the confidence of the House in 2008 as sixty-one MPs of the Left Front withdrew their outside support to the government. This remains the sole moment of political instability during 1999 and beyond. However, the government survived and successfully completed its normal term (for a quick view of the length of governments from 1989 to beyond, see Table 12.12). Table 12.10 Number of CMs and NCMs faced by the successive governments and their strength in the house during 1999 and beyond Lok Sabha Council of Ministers 13th 14th 15th

Party/ Seats won/ alliance total

AB NDA Vajpayee Manmohan UPA-1 Singh Manmohan UPA-2 Singh

% of No. of No. of seats won CMs NCMs

274/537

51.02

00

01

222/54337

36.53

01

00

263/543

36.87

00

00

Source: Compiled from G.C. Malhotra, Cabinet Responsibility to Legislature: Motions of Confidence and No Confidence in Lok Sabha and State Legislatures, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat & Metropolitan Book Co. Pvt. Ltd, 2004 and E. Sridharan, ‘The Party System’ in Niraja Gopal Jayal and Pratap Bhanu Mehta (ed.), The Oxford Companion to Politics in India, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2010.

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Table 12.11 CMs discussed in Lok Sabha during 1999 and beyond Lok Sabha

Year

Prime Minister

Result

14th

2008

Manmohan Singh

Adopted

Source: Statistical Handbook 2014, Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs, Government of India

Table 12.12 Governments and their tenure from 1989 onwards Prime Minister

Lok Sabha

Length of tenure

V P Singh Chandra Shekhar Narasimha Rao A.B. Vajpayee H.D. Deve Gowda I.K. Gujral A.B. Vajpayee A.B. Vajpayee Manmohan Singh Manmohan Singh

9th 9th 10th 11th 11th 11th 12th 13th 14th 15th

11 months 8 days 6 months 11 days 58 months 26 days 16 days 10 months 21 days 10 months 27 days 18 months 24 days 54 months 9 days 60 months 60 months

Source: Statistical Handbook 2014, Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs, Government of India

Conclusion: the Indian Parliament amidst Confidence and No Confidence Motions An analysis of the CMs and NCMs along with an assessment of the working of the Indian Parliament indicates that though a vertical assessment of the functioning of Parliament in India establishes decline in parliamentary performance yet, the Parliament-government relationship has not been unilinear. This relationship has been different during different periods of parliamentary democracy in India. The decline during different periods has been embedded in the distinct patterns of relationship between the Parliament and government, the ‘decline’ does not necessarily owe to the strengthening of the executive in India. A study by Verma and Tripathi indicates that the 1990s was a phase of weak executive and weak Parliament and yet the decade established a definitive decline of the Indian Parliament.38 On the other hand, the 1980s was a decade of majority governments and the balance shifted to the executive. It has, in fact, been a phase of strong government and weak Parliament in India. The 1980s can be termed as the ‘typical phase of decline’ with respect to the Parliament-government

Confidence and No Confidence Motions

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relationship in India. However, an assessment of the Parliament as an institution of accountability, the decline is much sharper in the decade of 1990s and beyond than during the decade of 1980s.39 The emerging loose bipolar system since 1999 has imparted stability to the polity but has not contributed in enhancing the efficiency of public institutions, in general and the Parliament, in particular. The fragmentation and consensus on balance failed to avert the policy paralysis which plagues the government-Parliament relationship since 1999. Fragmentation of the party system and concomitant political instability during 1990s largely hampered the functioning of Parliament, while Parliament has been dysfunctional even during emergent loose bipolarity. Though, the system remains stable particularly since 1999, yet dysfunctional. The irony is that while the government has emerged as a unified voice, the opposition has remained weak and divided. It can be argued that the decline in the functioning of the Parliament during relatively stable political system and periods indicates how the institution remained sandwiched between the two mutually conflicting alliances – the UPA and the NDA. The way the CM and the NCM have been used as instruments to put the government on the defensive during these periods and their successes and failures, offer explanations and an understanding regarding the ‘peculiar’ weaknesses in the government-opposition relationship. While the NCMs have been the norm during stable and mostly strong governments, CMs were mostly used during the coalition era, particularly because the President decided to ascertain majority before inviting a political formation to form the government, as is seen in Figure 12.1.

Lok Sabha Confidence Motion

No confidence Motion

Figure 12.1 Frequency of Confidence Motions and No Confidence Motions from First Lok Sabha to Fifteenth Lok Sabha Source: Statistical Handbook 2014, Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs, Government of India

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Vikas Tripathi

The successive coalition government during 1990s radically transformed the idea of responsible government in India. In reality, the idea of responsible government became a misnomer in this period. The Fifteenth Lok Sabha remained the sole exception since the Second Lok Sabha which neither faced any CM nor NCM. The reason might be that emergent stability does not provide incentive to the parties, whether national or regional to seek instrumentality of CMs /NCMs in order to dislodge governments. Recent electoral politics hints at the consolidation of stable governments and positive predisposition to incumbent governments at state level. Stability at state level has contributed to reinforcing the bipolarity at the centre which in turn provides lesser incentive to smaller factions or parties to withdraw support from the government. However, on substantive ground, the conspicuous decline of the NCM being listed in the Parliament post1990s really reflects upon the marginalisation of Parliament in terms of the weakening of parliamentary opposition. While on the one hand, the opposition remains fragmented and divided; on the other hand, it is being further circumscribed by an assertive judiciary which has appropriated the normative domain of the Indian Parliament. As Rudolf and Rudolf argue with regard to political transformation in the 1990s and beyond, the balance of power between central institutions that was provided for in the formal constitution was reshaped by the practice of actors responding to historical challenges. The balance shifted in favour of the Supreme Court, the Election Commission and the President at the expense of Parliament, the Prime Minister and the Cabinet.40 Several recent writings also point towards an increasing trend towards the judicialisation of politics in India, in terms of the growing involvement of judges in assessing the executive’s prerogatives and performance and the reliance on courts for addressing core public policy questions and political controversies. These rulings point to an increasing judicialization of mega-politics in India. Judicialization occurs in parliamentary democracies when a high degree of party competition in legislature invites challenges from judiciary because these systems produce weak coalitions.41 With a weak and divided opposition, the adamant government remained an important factor for the judicialisation if one really looks into the cases which received judicial pronouncements. Noteworthy is

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the instance in which the Supreme Court intervened and set aside the appointment of P.J. Thomas as Chief Vigilance Commissioner in 2011, arguing that the recommendation made by the high-powered committee ‘does not exist in law.’ This judgement is to be seen as a sequel to other judgements like the one in which the Court demanded the government’s responses to irregularities in awarding Commonwealth Games contracts, licenses in the telecom sector and reluctance to pursue those with unaccounted income in bank deposits abroad.42 While the aforementioned judicial cases proceeded, the Parliament witnessed unprecedented disruptions. An assessment of the Fifteenth Lok Sabha (2009–2014) points out that in terms of productive time of the Lok Sabha, its performance had been the worst in the history of Lok Sabha. It worked for 61 percent of its scheduled time and passed 179 Bills, which remains the least number of Bills passed by any Lok Sabha that completed its full tenure.43 Despite phenomenal charges of corruption levelled against the government, the opposition rather than bringing NCM to seek responsible government relied on judicial pronouncements for its actions and made disruptions the essential attribute of the house. While the opposition as such maintained unanimity against corruption yet it remained fragmented on the nature and scope of the strategy to be adopted. The dwindling coordination among the opposition parties in ensuring dedicated and determined attack on the government to ensure responsibility through parliamentary procedures indeed reflects upon the marginalisation of Parliament and emergence of judiciary as the moral arbiter.

Notes 1 The author wishes to acknowledge contributions of Ajay K. Mehra for his valuable suggestions and comments, Gurpreet Mahajan for initial encouragement to engage with this theme, Pralay Kanungo for his consistent support and Rahul Verma and Poonam Kakoti Borah for going through the manuscript and making valuable suggestions. 2 See Balveer Arora, ‘The Indian Parliament and Democracy’, in Ajay K. Mehra and Gert W. Kueck (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Comparative Perspective, New Delhi: Konark Publishers, 2003; B.L. Shankar and Valerian Rodrigues, The Indian Parliament: A Democracy At Work, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2011. 3 Sudha Pai and Avinash Kumar (eds.), The Indian Parliament: A Critical Appraisal, New Delhi: Orient Blackswan, 2014. 4 S.K. Chaube’s work remains an exception but it remains more of a qualitative treatment and provides a glimpse to the debate on Confidence Motions and No Confidence Motions listed, discussed and voted in the Lok Sabha. See S.K. Chaube, Government and Opposition: Parliamentary Democracy in India, Kolkata: K.P. Bagchi Publication, 2006.

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5 See Devesh Kapur and Pratap Bhanu Mehta, The Indian Parliament as an Institution of Accountability, Democracy, Governance and Human Rights Programme, Paper No. 23, 2006, United Nations Research Institute for Social Development, Geneva. 6 Matthew Flinders, ‘Shifting the Balance? Parliament, the Executive and the British Constitution’, Political Studies, 50, 2002, pp. 23–42. 7 The Rules of Procedure does not have any provision relating to a ‘Motions of Confidence’ in the Council of Ministers. Chaube points out that it emerged in 1971 in the wake of some clamour over government formation in the states following the loss of the Congress majority in the 1967 state assembly elections. Frequent defections and gubernatorial manipulations led to the conference of state governors proposing this measure in a state where no political party secured the majority to form a government on its own. S.K. Chaube, The Making and Working of the Indian Constitution, New Delhi: National Book Trust, 2009, p. 120. When the rules of the Lok Sabha were framed, a possibility that the President of India would direct the Prime Minister to seek the confidence of the House in his Council of Ministers was not visualised. Such a necessity arose first in the Indian Parliament during Sixth Lok Sabha in 1979 consequent to the split in Janata Party and formation of Chaudhary Charan Singh Government. President Neelam Sanjeeva Reddy, while allowing Chaudhary Charan Singh to form the government, asked him to seek the confidence of the House. The notice of the first-ever Motion of Confidence was thus given by the Prime Minister Chaudhary Charan Singh and admitted for being moved on 20 August 1979. The motion could not be moved as Charan Singh tendered the resignation of his Council of Ministers that day and the House was adjourned sine die. Since then, the Presidents have followed the practice of asking every Prime Minister of a hung house or a coalition arrangement to seek a vote of confidence. In the absence of any specific rule in this regard, Motions of Confidence have been entertained under the category of Motions stipulated in Rule 184 which are meant for raising discussions on matters of public interest. Decision on such motions is taken under Rule 191 by putting before the House all the necessary questions. In case of Confidence Motion, there is no requirement for seeking leave of the House. The one-line notice of a Motion under Rule 184 that ‘this House expresses its confidence in the Council of Ministers’ is given on a Presidential, or Governor’s, direction. When admitted by the Speaker (of the Lok Sabha or a Legislative Assembly), it is bulletined. The date and time for its discussion is then fixed in consultation with the Business Advisory Committee. G.C. Malhotra, Cabinet Responsibility to Legislature: Motions of Confidence and No Confidence in Lok Sabha and State Legislatures, New Delhi: Lok Sabha Secretariat and Metropolitan Book Co. Pvt. Ltd, 2004, pp. 17 and 31. Also see, Subhash C. Kashyap, ‘Editorial’, South Asia Politics, 7(3), 2008, p. 5. 8 Rule 198 of the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the Lok Sabha lays down the procedure for moving a ‘Motion of No Confidence’ in the Council of Minister. The usual format of such a motion is that ‘this House expresses its want of Confidence in the Council of Ministers.’ If the Speaker holds the ‘No Confidence Motion’ to be in order, the Member who has tabled the Notice asks for Leave of the House to move the

Confidence and No Confidence Motions

9

10 11 12 13 14

15 16 17

18 19 20 21 22

271

Motion. The Speaker then calls upon Members who are in favour of leave being granted to rise in their seats. If not less than fifty members rise, the Speaker declares that leave is granted by the House. The Motion is then taken up for discussion within ten days from the date of the grant of leave. Malhotra, 2004, op. cit, p. 13. ‘The Cabinet form of Government in based on the idea of collective responsibility of the Government headed by the Prime Minister. According to Article 75(3) of the Constitution, the Union Council of Ministers is collectively responsible to the legislature. At all times it must enjoy the confidence of the Lower House. It must always have the support of the majority by winning a confidence vote or by defeating a No Confidence Motion. The collective responsibility of the Council of Ministers implies that a No Confidence Motion can be moved against the Council of Ministers as a whole and not against an individual minister.’ Ibid., p. 11. Rajni Kothari, ‘The Congress ‘System’ in India’, in Peter Ronald de Souza and E. Sridharan (ed.), India’s Political Parties, New Delhi: Sage, 2006. Ibid., p. 60. W.H. Morris-Jones, The Indian Parliament, London: Allen and Unwin, 1957, p. 103. W.H. Morris-Jones, ‘Parliament and the Dominant Party: Indian Experience’, Parliamentary Affairs, 17(3),1964, p. 297. Apart from this substantive achievement of the Indian Parliament, MorrisJones exhorts the procedural accomplishments of the Parliament in India during this period. In this regard, he shows how the Public Accounts Committee and the Estimates Committee had been instrumental in exercising control over government and the popularity that the Question Hour enjoyed in India. See ibid., pp. 286–307. Ibid., p. 302. Morris-Jones (op. cit., 1964, p. 306) argues that during 1950s and 1960s, ‘the one dominant party system has served not to destroy but to sustain parliamentary institutions.’ In fact, the opposition gained vigour with the entry of Ram Manohar Lohia, J.B. Kriplani and Minoo R. Masani through the Lok Sabha byelections held in 1963. Lohia sowed the seeds of an anti-Congress unity in Lok Sabha. See V. Krishna Ananth, India Since Independence: Making Sense of Indian Politics, New Delhi: Dorling Kindersley, 2011, p. 59. He remarks, ‘it may be recalled that all of them had entered parliament in the May 1963 by-elections and their arrival, in a sense, had unnerved even Nehru.’ Ibid., p. 71. Krishna Ananth, 2011, op. cit., p. 74. Vernon Hewitt, ‘The Prime Minister and the Parliament’, in James Manor (ed.), Nehru to the 90s: The Changing Office of Prime Minister in India, New Delhi: Viking, 1994, p. 54. Madhu Limaye, ‘Lok Sabha Then and Now’, The Hindu, 5 July 1992. Mahender Kumar Saini, ‘A Study of No Confidence Motions in The Indian Parliament (1952–70)’, The Indian Journal of Political Science, 32(3), 1971, pp. 297–318. The split of Congress party in 1969 rendered the Indira Gandhi Government into a minority, however it received support from CPI, CPI-M, DMK and Muslim League in addition to some independents. The Communist

272

23 24 25 26 27 28

29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40

41 42 43

Vikas Tripathi

parties interpreted the split as a part of conspiracy to withhold the government’s socialist project while Indira Gandhi herself intensified socialist rhetoric. Krishna Ananth, 2011, op. cit., p. 88. Lloyd I. Rudolph and Susanne Hoeber Rudolph, The Realm of Institutions: State Formation and Institutional Change, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2008, pp. 90–91. Limaye, 1992, op. cit. Rudolph and Hoeber Rudolph, 2008, op. cit., p. 90. Chaube, 2009, op. cit., p. 119. Ibid. This is what happened during the change of guard in the short-lived United Front Government, which came to power in 1996; it had two Prime Ministers in its two-year life – H.D. Deve Gowda (1/6/1996 to 21/4/1997) and I.K. Gujral (21/4/1997 to 18/03/1998). Thus the Eleventh Lok Sabha was dissolved on 4 December 1997. Kapur and Mehta, 2006, op. cit., p. 9. V.P. Singh moved the first CM in 1989 (Ninth Lok Sabha) and it was adopted by voice vote. S.K. Chaube, 2009, op. cit., p. 128. Ibid., p. 129. Ibid., p. 130. Ibid., p. 144. E. Sridharan, ‘The Party System’, in Niraja Gopal Jayal and Pratap Bhanu Mehta (eds.), The Oxford Companion to Politics in India, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2010, p. 124. Chaube, 2009, op. cit., p. 151. Sixty-one MPs of the Left Front (CPI-9, CPI(M)-43, JDS (Left)-1, KEC1, IND. (Left)-1, RSP-3, FBL-3) supported the government from outside. Malhotra, 2004, op.cit.; Sridharan, 2010, op. cit., pp. 126–127. Rahul Verma and Vikas Tripathi, ‘Making Sense of the House: Explaining the Decline of the Indian Parliament Amidst Democratization’, Studies in Indian Politics, 1(2), 2013, pp. 153–177. Ibid. Lloyd I. Rudolph and Susanne Hoeber Rudolph, ‘Redoing the Constitutional Design: From an Interventionist to a Regulatory State’, in Atul Kohli (ed.), The Success of India’s Democracy, New Delhi: Cambridge University Press, 2002, p. 128. Shylashri Shankar, ‘Winds of Change: Judicialization of Mega-politics in India’, The Times of India, 4 March 2011. Ibid. www.prsindia.org/parliamenttrack/vital-stats/performance-of-parliamentduring-the-15th-lok-sabha-3146/ (Accessed on 13 June 2016).

Part IV

Parliament and other institutions

13 From Panchayats to Parliament Exploring interfaces Kripa Ananthpur

Parliament is considered to be the cornerstone of democracy. The process through which this democracy is deepened and institutionalised at the grassroots is through local governments. In India these local governments, known as Panchayati Raj Institutions, were constitutionally mandated as part of democratic decentralisation through the Seventy-Third Amendment of the Constitution in 1993. Yet there is very little literature that explores the interface between these two institutions. In general it is assumed that, in a federal system, the interface between the highest policy making body in the country and the lowest self-governing units is minimal if it exists at all. This is an exploratory chapter aimed at understanding the interface between Parliament and local governments in India both from a theoretical perspective as well as from a practical stand point. In addition to looking at the discourse on the interface, I also carried out a quick opinion survey of a diverse group of people on their perception of Parliament and its interface with local governments. Hence this chapter attempts to explore both the extant literature on the subject as well as capture the thoughts and views of people who study, analyse and interact with the system both as citizens and elected representatives. The chapter is structured as follows. The first section traces the historical context of the interface starting from its Constitutional moorings; the second section analyses the interface as it currently exists; and in the final section people’s perceptions of the interface is discussed. The chapter concludes with reflections emerging out of research and analysis.

Historical context To analyse the interface it is essential to understand what role has been envisaged for local governments by the Constitution of India. It has been argued that the Constitutions of most countries in the world

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make very little mention of local governments. According to Srivastava1 the Constitutions of very few countries in the world find any mention of local governments or rules for forming them. The Indian Constitution not only found a place for them in the initial phase but later went on to devise an elaborate arrangement of local governance structure through the Seventy-Third and Seventy-Fourth amendments to the Constitution.2 However, a look at the debates in the Constituent Assembly and the Parliament on the local government institutions indicates that there has always been ambiguity centred around their role in the governance structure in India. Constituent Assembly debates The ambiguity regarding the role of Panchayats in governance can be traced back to the exercise to shape India’s basic law in the Constituent Assembly where the debates centred on the nature of governance structure to be adopted. These can be synthesised largely into four groups: 1 2

3

4

Gandhians who wanted a pyramidal structure of governance with village republics as the pivot; Several members led notably by Ambedkar who were completely opposed to the idea of making the village the nodal point of governance structure as conceived in Gandhian village republics;3 Some members who supported the idea of villages as units of governance but only if situated within the larger framework of a modern nation driven by technology and science; And, the last group which treaded the middle ground by neither disparaging nor romanticizing the Indian village but pragmatically accepting that villages had a role to play in the governance process.4

The Congress Working Committee headed by Nehru did not recommend a ‘system of indirect, panchayat government’ as Gandhi had advocated but instead proposed that the Constitution ‘be a loose federation’.5 According to Austin the debates on the resolution focused more on ‘democracy, socialism and the responsibilities of legislatures’ and did not necessarily endorse an ‘“Indian” form of government’. Further there was ‘neither criticism of the omission of panchayat government nor was the subject mentioned’.6 Thus the first draft of the constitution produced by B.N. Rau, the

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Constitutional Adviser, did not make any mention of Panchayat or local government. Dr. Rajendra Prasad, President of the Constituent Assembly, was most vocal in pointing out this omission and proposed that the ‘idea of making the Constitution begin with the villages and go up to the Centre’. He further stated, ‘I strongly advocate the idea of utilizing the adult franchise only for the village panchayat and making the village panchayats the electoral college for electing representatives to the provinces and the Centre’.7 Rau, however, rejected this proposition on the grounds that the Assembly had already agreed on ‘direct election of lower houses both at the centre and the provinces’ and writing all the details of local government into the Constitution would make it very long and delay its completion. He felt that this should be left to ‘auxiliary legislation’.8 Several other members recommended giving scope for the development of Panchayats and these suggestions ranged from fostering Panchayats as a ‘form of local self-government, schools of democracy, as instruments of village uplift, providing financial support and a measure of autonomy’.9 Austin observes that none of these recommendations made any attempt to ‘make panchayats the base for an indirect system of government’. Further, all these amendments were made in Part IV of the Constitution dealing with the Directive Principles of State Policy, which contained the positive rights and were kept non-justiciable.10 However these debates do point to the extent to which the role of Panchayats in governance was discussed and also demonstrate that the Panchayats as form of local government had found favour with several members of the Constituent Assembly as early as 1948. Sarbani Sen’s analysis of the Indian Constitution from the perspective of popular sovereignty also confirms this view. According to her ‘the local government as a form of decentralization and creating political spheres of self-government was an idea that the Assembly members shared’.11 Following from these debates the final Constitutional framework that was adopted did not provide a clear role for Panchayats. Instead while determining division of power, local government was placed in the List 2 or State List of the Seventh Schedule qualified by a specific Article in Part IV devoted to Directive Principles of State Policy, giving the states the responsibility for establishing Panchayats.12 However, debates on local democracy continued at the national level in the subsequent period. Between 1957 to 1978, the government of India appointed two important committees and their reports had

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Kripa Ananthpur

significant bearing on the way the Panchayat Raj Institutions (PRIs) evolved later. 1

2

Balwant Rai Mehta Committee was appointed in January 1957 by the Policy Planning Division of the Planning Commission to review the ongoing Community Development Programme (1952) and National Extension Service (1953) and to recommend institutional and policy mechanisms to improve the two. Its report submitted in November 1957 advocated a three-tier model (district, block and village) of Panchayati Raj Institutions in all the states for establishing and effective delivery network for the national and state plans and programmes. According to the committee ‘the PR system establishes a linkage between local leadership enjoying confidence of local people and the government, and translates the policies of the government into action’.13 The committee did not envisage the system of PRIs as being local self-government, but as an agency at the lowest end of the delivery chain for implementing the policies of the government. Though the committee brought back attention to the importance of Panchayats, only some states attempted to implement these recommendations. Asoka Mehta Committee was set up by the Janata Party government that came to power after the Emergency (1975–77) in December 1977. Its report submitted in August 1978 made 132 recommendations to strengthen the PR that never took off since its inception in the 1960s. The Committee reported that the lifecycle of the PRIs had gone through three phases during the three-decade period: ascendancy (1959–64), stagnation (1965–69), and decline (1969–77). The committee recommended a two-tier structure consisting of mandal- (group of villages) and zilla-level (district) units of governance. Unlike the Balvantrai Mehta report, the Ashok Mehta committee report viewed the PRIs as institutions of local self-governance and vibrant units of development. Panchayati Raj is both a living continuum and also a unit of democratic self-management at the rural local level. The dual status is natural as well as desirable, once it is recognized that Panchayati Raj is a sub-system in relation to the democratic polity in the country and will also develop the potential of becoming a political system at the rural local level for the complex of transferred activities.14 Based on these recommendations some states like West Bengal and Karnataka initiated a decentralised structure of governance at the sub-state level.

From Panchayats to Parliament 3

279

Sixty-Fourth Amendment Bill: The first real attempt to give PRIs a constitutional mandate beyond Article 40 in the Directive Principles of State Policy was made by the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1989. The amendment was not received well in the Lok Sabha. There was heated debate whether it was constitutionally acceptable for the Centre to legislate on Panchayati Raj which figures in the state list and is the domain of the states. Apart from the Congress, none of the other political parties were in favour of this amendment.15 The Sixty-Fourth Amendment Bill proposed by the Rajiv Gandhi-led Congress government to confer constitutional status to Panchayats was defeated in the Rajya Sabha by three votes, hence could not be enacted. It failed mainly because it was seen as an alleged attempt to bypass the states by establishing a direct nexus between the lower levels and the centre; it was famously described as from PM (Prime Minister) to DM (District Magistrate) without CM Chief Minister. Although this was not part of the amendment but since they appeared together, the amendment was viewed suspiciously by the MPs. Hence this was seen to be politically motivated by the centre with a desire to bypass the states and have a direct relation with PRIs.

The seventy-third and seventy-fourth constitutional amendments These constitutional amendments were proposed by the P.V. Narasimha Rao government in 1993. The draft of these amendments had taken most of the features of the Sixty-Fourth Amendment. Since their enactment, they succeeded in conferring constitutional status to the PRIs. The Seventy-Third amendment to the Constitution aimed at deepening democracy at the grassroots by making mandatory the establishment of local governance structures at the village level. The biggest achievement of this amendment was to make the system more representative by bringing the socially and economically marginalized groups and women in the mainstream of political process and power sharing through affirmative action. By identifying Panchayats as ‘institutions of self-governance’, the formation of these local governance structures was now mandated by the Constitution. The Constitution mandates a three-tier system of local governance in all states except those with a population of less than two million. In the latter states the intermediate level need not be constituted. The Constitution also mandates that there should only be direct elections to all the three tiers.

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Reservation and representation Reservation for the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes in proportion to their population is mandatory. Rotation of reservation among constituencies is permissible for this purpose. One-third of all the seats are reserved for women and here too rotation among constituencies is permissible. Reservation in respect of the post of chairman at all the levels is also mandated. For the SC and the ST it is once again in proportion to their population and for women it is one-third. Rotation of constituencies is mandatory in this regard. Reservation for the backward classes is permissible both for membership and for the post of chairmen. The mode of election (direct or indirect) of the chairperson of the village Panchayat is left to the discretion of the states but for the other two tiers, the chairperson is chosen indirectly from among the members representing that particular tier of Panchayats. This autonomy regarding election of the chairperson appears to have resulted from a desire to leave matters that appear controversial at the discretion of the states. Further in order to provide organic linkages with higher tiers, the states are given the authority to provide representation for chairpersons of village Panchayat at the block level Panchayats and the chairpersons of block level at the district level Panchayats. Electoral term The PRIs were given a five-year term under the provisions incorporated in Part IX (Articles 243 to 243O) for the Panchayati Raj and Part IXA (Articles 243P-243ZG) for the Municipalities, unless they are dissolved earlier. Elections are mandated to be held no later than six months after the dissolution of a local body. Further, elections have to be held before the expiry of the five-year term. All matters connected with elections are mandatorily vested with the state election commission, which would be created to manage elections to the local bodies. Powers and responsibilities The provisions of IX and IXA provide a framework for the PRIs. Within the broad framework of the Constitutional provisions, the legislature of the state may, by law, endow panchayats with such powers and authority as may be necessary to enable them to function as institutions of self-government and such law may contain provisions for the devolution of powers and responsibilities

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upon panchayats at the appropriate level, subject to such conditions as may be specified therein, with respect to: a) the preparation of plans for economic development and social justice; b) the implementation of schemes for economic development and social justice as may be entrusted to them including those in relation to matters listed in the Eleventh Schedule (Article 243G). The power to impose taxes by Panchayats is to be legislated by the states. In theory, wide powers are envisaged here. Panchayats can be authorised to levy, collect and appropriate taxes, duties, tolls etc.; the state can also make assignments to Panchayat of taxes, etc. collected by the state; grants-in-aid to Panchayats from the Consolidated Fund of the state can also be made. The state can also provide for the constitution of a such Fund for crediting all monies received and for their withdrawal. A state finance commission is mandatory and shall be constituted once every five years.16 Srivastava, when studying the local government reforms in different countries in the world, found that such detailed arrangement for governance in rural and urban areas as laid down in the Constitution of India does not exist in the Constitution of any functioning democracy.17

Ambiguity in the relationship between Parliament and Panchayats Despite these impressive developments, there has always been an underlying ambiguity in the relationship between Parliament and Panchayats. Before the Seventy-Third amendment to the Constitution, the states were not very committed to devolving powers since it was not constitutionally mandatory. Most states that had created PRIs following the Balwantrai Mehta Committee Report allowed them to decay through neglect; in most cases elections were not even held periodically. Even the Asoka Mehta Committee Report did not make much difference. However, West Bengal and Karnataka were exceptions, but even their decentralization efforts evolved much later in the 1970s and 1980s. The emergence of competing sources of power is always treated with suspicion. With the centre changing its complexion and losing its earlier dominance states could not be expected to welcome the new paradigm of devolution warmly. They must have apprehended that the districts might offer competition to the state level. As mentioned

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earlier, the Sixty-Fourth amendment fell through mainly because of fears that states were being bypassed by the centre. Despite Seventy-Third and Seventy-Fourth amendments finding a relatively smooth passage, there was strong opposition from some quarters particularly from MPs representing DMK and AIADMK parties, probably one of the few times the two opposing parties from Tamil Nadu came together to oppose this move in Parliament.18 Subsequent debates in the Parliament on this new legislation centred on issues concerning ‘how this was an attempt to centralise governance; how the then party in power (Congress) was trying to strengthen the centre at the expense of states; how this was another attempt to bring back long abolished District Boards; and so on.’19 To a large extent the centre’s move to leave the actual framing of Panchayat Acts to the discretion of the states was an attempt to dispel these concerns. Invariably, in most states, the Panchayat Acts have retained ‘regulatory, supervisory and powers of dissolution raising the question of the extent to which the panchayats are truly of autonomous?’20 It is noteworthy that, despite these slight hiccups, Parliament and Parliamentarians have come out with landmark legislations to empower local governments. However there continues to be a constant negotiation of powers by the parliamentarians. While attempting to empower local governments on the one hand by directly devolving funds through centrally sponsored schemes like MNREGS, there is a constant attempt to undermine their powers and legitimacy on the other hand, through bureaucratisation or setting up of parallel institutions at the local level. We shall discuss this in the next section. Interface or interference? In India’s federal structure, local government (both the PRIs and ULBs) is a state subject. This raises the question whether the Parliament and the parliamentarians (MPs) play any role in the local governments; if yes, what? And, in case they have been assigned a statutory role, what is its implication on local democracy? •

Membership in PRIs: Reflecting on providing membership for MPs and MLAs in PRIs, the P.R. Nayak committee report (1996)21 strongly recommended against such a provision. It was felt that legislators and members of parliament, by definition are to address themselves to more macro concerns. Their perspectives

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should, therefore, be qualitatively different from those of elected representatives of Panchayati Raj Institutions. It does not seem desirable that the different levels, with patently different perspectives, should compete for the same space. It is advisable that the respective spheres of PRIs on the one hand and the parliament and Legislature on the other, are left without encroachment.22 •

•

•

Despite such misgivings it is interesting to note that most PR Acts provide a space for local MPs, MLAs and MLCs in local governments. Except Kerala and Maharashtra, all other state PR Acts allows membership for MLCs, MLAs and MPs in Panchayats. Some provide voting rights and others provide only representation without voting rights.23 This inclusion has been severely criticised by academics. While this is a permissible and not a mandatory provision in the Constitution, implementing it and providing membership to MPs and MLAs in PRIs sends a wrong signal against the legitimacy and efficacy of Panchayats. Another way the MPs and MLAs have found a way of controlling Panchayats is through the District Planning Committees. DPCs are constitutionally mandated bodies that were created to support PRIs in consolidating planning process at the district level along with the State Finance Commissions that were created to ensure that the state governments provided adequate funding for the PRIs. However of all these three institutions, DPCs are defunct everywhere but in Kerala. In most states DPCs have become a way of bestowing political favours to MPs and MLAs, who are nominated as members, even though it constitutionally violates the spirit of decentralisation.24 MPLADS: Another contradictory feature is the introduction of the MPLADS. In an interesting move, exactly one year after the Seventy-Third and Seventy-Fourth amendments were passed, the P.V. Narasimha Rao government also introduced Member of Parliament Local Area Development Scheme on 23 December 1993. Initially, ₹10 million was allotted to each MP to carry out development works in his/her constituency, the amount was enhanced to ₹50 million in 2011. Twenty-three items of works listed for implementation under the MPLADS are from the 29 subjects under the Eleventh Schedule devolved to PRIs. Thus, MPLADS directly overlaps with the activities of the PRIs. An analysis of the utilisation of the MPLADS funds in Karnataka by Public Affairs Centre indicates that there was poor utilisation of funds by the MPs. Some had not even bothered to initiate any programmes under this scheme. Using the data collected for 26 MPs for 2004–09

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Kripa Ananthpur and 22 MPs for 2009–11, they found that Lok Sabha MPs (57%) showed better utilisation than Rajya Sabha MPs (30%). This has been attributed to the lack of constituency linkages of the Rajya Sabha MPs. Utilisation among the Lok Sabha MPs deteriorated between Fourteenth and Fifteenth Lok Sabha. During 2004–09 only two MPs had fully utilised the allotted fund. Contrary to popular expectations, MPs from forward region utilised the funds better than the MPs from backward region. Educated MPs seem to be better at utilising the funds compared to uneducated or less educated MPs. Even where the MPs utilised the funds, the local priorities and needs such as health, education, sanitation, roads, etc. were overlooked in favour of constructing community halls and other construction works. Forty-eight percent of the funds were utilised to build community halls, compared to 2% on drainage and 1% on sanitation.25 MPLADS has come under severe criticism by advocates of decentralisation as completely going against the spirit and philosophy of decentralisation.26 It is viewed as a direct attempt to reinforce and retain the supremacy of MPs at the local level especially as these funds are channelled through district administration. Interestingly, gram Panchayats do try to access these MP funds directly without going through the higher tiers of governance. We also have evidence of traditional/customary Panchayats27 bypassing gram Panchayats to directly approach MPs for accessing these resources for development works in their village.28 This again subverts local democracy. Urban Local Bodies (ULBs): Where ULBs are concerned, we find a completely a different set of politics involved in the interface within urban governance. ULBs hardly have any significant role to play in urban governance as many of its functions have been privatised. As per the Seventy-Fourth amendment to the Constitution, states may provide representation for MPs, MLAs and MLCs representing their constituencies. In fact, in a direct blow to local democracy, Gulbarga bench of Karnataka high court recently upheld the voting rights (both in the election of Mayor and Deputy Mayor as well as no-confidence motion against them) enjoyed by MPs and MLAs in ULBs in Karnataka. Incidentally this was initiated by the state government opposing an earlier decision by a single judge bench prohibiting MPs and MLAs from voting in ULBs.29 However, in most instances, it has been found that different alliances forged by urban voters with different strata of political representatives are primarily driven by the class factor.30 For instance, elites directly interface with MPs/MLAs and do not approach the ULBs,

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which are seen as being important to, or representing the interests of, the urban poor rather than the urban population at large. Parallel Institutions: A lot of centrally sponsored schemes being implemented at the Panchayat level require the creation of a set of parallel institutions at the village level, which does not come under the purview of Panchayats. School development and management committees set up under centrally sponsored schemes such as Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (a campaign for universal education), health committees created under the National Rural Health Mission, watershed committees, and forest committees are some of these parallel institutions that control significant funds and function independent of the Panchayats. Since all these subjects are under the purview of Panchayats, the creation of parallel institutions with independent financial streams contravenes the basic philosophy of democratic decentralisation and devolution of power.

Towards a balanced interface This raises the question as to what constitutes an idealized form of interface between Parliament and Panchayats? A study in 1954 by W.J.R. Mackenzie on the role of MPs in local bodies in UK and Europe indicates that such a conundrum has plagued even developed countries where the system of local government has been in existence for much longer. Though local governments in the UK and Europe have come far in over six decades since the study, Mackenzie’s essay on local government and Parliament indicates the desire at the higher levels to monitor, if not control, the local and is an apt comparative tool for the Indian case given the fact that it happened in early days of development of democracy in the UK. Analysing the data on MPs with local government experience from the UK and other European countries, Mackenzie finds that in many countries the political experience flows from local to regional to national providing for a Parliament that is rooted in the local government experience. Using the examples of France and Russia, Mackenzie shows that although in France local governments were subject to strict central control, the presence of ‘deputes’ in local governments ensured a system where ‘political centralism was good deal stronger than legal centralism’.31 On the other hand, in Russia, although the local governments were framed within a relatively loose legal framework they had to function under the strict centralized rule as the centralized party system controlled the way in which these institutions functioned. Further, based on the data from the UK, Europe, and the USA, Mackenzie shows that the wide variation that exists in

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the level of integration between local governments and the Parliaments across countries needs to be analysed from legal and political angles. Mackenzie discovers mainly four forms of relationship: that of Britain and the settled Dominions, in which local government has much freedom in law, but is apt to be disregarded in practice; that of the democracies of Western Europe, in which local authorities are more limited in law, but have greater political influence (this is obviously related to differences in cabinet systems and party systems, as well as in the tradition of administrative law); that of the USA, where peculiar conditions are created by great diversity of local forms and by the separation of powers, which enables the Congress to remain obstinately local without doing serious damage to the national interest; and that of Eastern Europe, where Party overrides State, and the important matters are those decided in the inner councils of the Party.32 Although this data is outdated and the international political context has undergone enormous changes with Russia and East European countries shifting away from socialist forms of governance, the analysis of different forms of representation is still valid. Often the legal provisions may not reflect the way in which the integration works in reality as it is subject to political pressures. Further the political condition is often difficult to assess as it can result in both loose or close integration. Such a loose and close integration between Parliament and local government can have both positive and negative implications for local governments. ‘Close integration may mean that localities move the centre or that the centre moves the localities: a loose relationship may mean that the local authorities are free – or that they are simply disregarded’.33 The Indian context has to be understood within this complex framework of underplay between legal and political dimensions. The legal commitment exhibited towards local governance by the Parliament is exemplary and very detailed as mentioned elsewhere, but it is constantly challenged and compromised by the political compulsions of patronage politics both at the centre and the state. A look at the interface shows a constant game of tag (of decentralising and re-centralising power) that is being played by the Parliament where local governments are concerned. While from a policy perspective this is indeed detrimental to governance, what does such an oscillation mean to ordinary citizens at the local level? A short opinion survey carried out for this purpose revealed some interesting insights with a clear difference in the perception emerging between urban and rural citizens.34

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Urban citizens view Parliament as an important but a distant symbol of democracy. There is a general consensus on the primacy of Parliament and its role as a policy making and validation body in a democracy being sacrosanct – one that needs to be protected at any cost. Though removed from everyday life, yet it acts as a powerful agent for pushing the country towards their destiny. Parliament is seen as an institution that represents the diversity of the nation and seeks to promote and uphold the same. It is an instrument capable of developing a long-term perspective and enabling the country to take decisions that are generally beyond the capabilities of lower level institutions. Younger generations view this institution rather cynically as just a body that passes bills without sufficient evidence-based debate on important issues. However where interface between Parliament and local governments is concerned, there is a strong feeling among urban citizens that in a federal structure there should not be any direct interface as it undermines the powers of the states as it had already played a strong role by passing the Seventy-Third and Seventy-Fourth constitutional Amendments. Although several states have watered down the implementation of this Act, the Parliament should not be expected to intervene directly beyond this point. It is generally felt that the threetier system of democratic decentralisation enshrined in the Constitution should ensure that the voice of local government is articulated in the Parliament thus providing a two-way interaction. There is a strong feeling that the provision enabling the membership of MPs in local bodies (Art. 243 C (3) c and d)35 should be dropped as it sends a wrong message despite not being a mandatory provision. The need for interaction between all tiers of government, so that there is synergy, convergence of purpose, and sharing of knowledge, was felt strongly so also the need to have appropriate channels to enable local governments to take part in the national decision-making process. In a striking contrast, the rural citizens find it difficult to conceptualise Parliament as an institution. To the villagers, Parliament is synonymous with MPs or central government. Only a few elected representatives had a clear knowledge about the Parliament and its role. Unlike their urban counterparts, villagers do not view it as a symbol of democracy. Some elected representatives and village elders believe that the Parliament is meant for the development of the nation and it is in that forum the problems of the villages are discussed and programmes and projects to mitigate these problems are planned and designed. However it is strongly felt that the continuing lack of development of the villages in India is a clear sign that the Parliament is not effectively doing its job. They feel that the lack of interface is visible in

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the existing gap between the policy and reality. The debates on local government and rural development problems in the Parliament should reflect local reality. For this to happen there should be a better flow of information between these two bodies. Villagers feel that presently there is only about 5% interface between MPs (i.e., Parliament for them) and Panchayats. In addition, rural citizens view the role of Parliament (MPs) as that of a safeguard against the dictates and policies of the state government that undermines the power and primacy of local governments. The best analogy of the interface came from one of the interlocutor, who is a dalit and former Gram Panchayat President. According to him: Parliament is like a grandfather who has several grandchildren (local governments). It provides a broader framework and intervenes only when the father (state government) is not doing its duty properly . . . the interface should be limited to ensuring that rights and primacy of the local governments is not compromised or undermined by state government. If Parliament constantly holds our hands, when will we learn to stand on our own? An effective interface should not only foster growth but also provides security in times of crisis.36

Final reflections This chapter attempts a tentative foray into understanding the interface between Panchayats and the Parliament. Its scope is limited to looking at the interface between the lowest tier of rural local government and the Parliament. The interface between intermediate institutions such as the taluka- (block) and zilla-level (district) PRIs and the Parliament has not been studied. But even in its limited form this chapter raises some important issues pertaining to local democracy that need further inquiry. It is interesting and heartening to see that Parliament as a symbol of democracy is still important to citizens even though these were largely articulated by urban citizens. Rural citizens, far removed from the realm of Parliament, view MPs as visual symbols of that institution. The extent to which the Parliament is removed from the everyday life is reflected in the way villagers think (or not) about the Parliament. The views on the nature of interface that is desirable are quite interesting as urban citizens tend to view any direct interface as going against the federal structure of governance since it undermines the importance of state level actors. Villagers on the other hand clamour for more

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formal interface and direct contact with MPs but only as a means of safeguarding their interests against state-level interference. However, the need for a better flow of information from grassroots to the highest policy making body and a greater downward accountability mechanism was acutely felt by both urban and rural citizens. The telling views of the villagers highlight the critical fallout of the complex underplay between the legal and political domains. Both the state and the central governments have constantly used local governments to further their own interests. State governments, particularly those ruled by opposition parties, have used local governments to consolidate their power base while the centre has used local governments to bypass the states. Ironically, both MPs and MLAs are united in ensuring that the powers devolved are constantly being undermined by the creation of parallel institutions or recentralised by schemes such as MPLADs. The recommendation of the Fourteenth Finance Commission to direct transfer of funds to local governments (bypassing states and the Centre), if implemented, would minimise interference. There should definitely be an interface between Parliament and local government, but creating an ideal interface that ensures space for local governments to grow without stifling them is challenging. In order to create a fostering interface, there is a need for better flow of information upwards so that the policy making process is genuinely informed by local realities and better downward accountability mechanisms put in place to ensure effective implementation of policies formulated by the Parliament. For this to be effective, a better convergence of the legal and political interests is required.

Notes 1 T.N. Srivastava, ‘Local “Self” Government and the Constitution’, Economic and Political Weekly, XXXVII(30), 27 July 2002, pp. 3190–3298. 2 Ibid. 3 Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, Chairman of the drafting committee of the Constitution, who was subjected to exclusion typical to an Indian village, said when the issue of giving primacy to villages with a Panchayat as a governing structure came up for discussion, ‘I hold that these village republics have been the ruination of India. I am therefore surprised that those who condemn Provincialism and communalism should come forward as champions of the village. What is the village but a sink of localism, a den of ignorance, narrow-mindedness and communalism? I am glad that the Draft Constitution has discarded the village and adopted the individual as its unit’. He obviously had misgivings that the upper and dominant castes would capture the institutions and further exploit the poor and dalits.

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4 Natraj et al., 2006, op. cit.; Ganapathy Palanithuria, Emerging Dimensions in Decentralisation, New Delhi: Concept Publishing Company, 2005. 5 Granville Austin, 1966, The Indian Constitution: Cornerstone of a Nation, Bombay: Oxford University Press, p. 33. 6 Ibid., p. 33. 7 Prasad’s letter to Rau, 1948 cited in Austin, 1966, op cit., p. 35. 8 Austin, 1966, p. 35. 9 Ibid., p. 36. 10 Ibid., p. 36. 11 Sarbani Sen, The Constitution of India: Popular Sovereignty and Democratic Transformation, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, p. 151. 12 Srivastava, 2002, op. cit., pp. 3190–3298. 13 Indira Hirway, ‘Panchayati Raj at Crossroads’, Economic and Political Weekly, XXIX(29), 22 July 1989, pp. 1663–1667. 14 Report of the Committee on Panchayati Raj Institutions (Chairman: Asoka Mehta), New Delhi: Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation, Department of Rural Development, Government of India, August, 1978. 15 V.K. Natraj, M. Majumdar, K. AnanthPur, G.S. Prasad and I. Banerjee, ‘Delegation to Devolution: A Comparative Study’, Monograph No. 4, Themes in Social Sector Research: The S. Guhan Memorial Series, Madras Institute of Development Studies, 2006. 16 Kripa Ananthpur, Interfaces in Local Governance, MIDS Working Paper No. 187, Chennai: MIDS, 2004, p. 6. 17 Srivastava, 2002, op. cit. 18 Natraj et al., 2006, op. cit.; Ganapathy Palanithurai, Emerging Dimensions in Decentralisation, New Delhi: Concept Publishing Company, 2005. 19 Ibid., p. 23. 20 Task Force on Panchayati Raj, Panchayati Raj in India – Status Report 1999, New Delhi: Rajiv Gandhi Foundation, 2000. 21 The government of Karnataka constituted to suggest amendments to Karnataka Panchayat Raj Act under the chairmanship of the state’s retired Additional Chief Secretary P.R. Nayak in 1995. The committee submitted its report in 1996 made several paths breaking recommendations such as the subordination of bureaucracy to elected representatives; power of dissolution to rest with higher tiers; creation of a state Panchayat Council: preparation of a perspective plan, and so on; it also advocated that MLAs, MPs and MLCs should not be given any formal representation in the PRIs. 22 P.R. Nayak committee report cited in Task Force on Panchayati Raj, 2000, op. cit. 23 Rajiv Gandhi Foundation, op cit., 2000. 24 PRIA, Status and Functioning of District Planning Committees in India, New Delhi: PRIA, 2009. 25 http://pacindia.org/uploads/default/files/media/pdf/a871d27b6fe3f20b fa3fab905210119e.pdf (Accessed on 5 July 2016). 26 M.A. Oommen and Mahi Pal, ‘MP’s Local Area Development Scheme; Dangerous Portent’, Economic and Political Weekly, XXIX(5), 29 January 1994, pp. 223–225. 27 Traditional or customary Panchayats are caste-based institutions that continue to operate at the village level in Karnataka. These are not legally

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29 30

31 32 33 34 35

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recognised institutions, but derive their legitimacy from local norms and beliefs. They are different from the Khap Panchayats of the north in that they are not a gotra (i.e., a lineage-based institution) but a congress of leaders of all caste groups in the village and hence show some semblance of plurality. While their main functions continue to be centred around managing local religious affairs and maintaining local law and order, some traditional Panchayats are also involved in local development works. For more details see Ananthpur, 2004, 2008, op. cit. Kripa Ananthpur, ‘Dynamics of Local Governance in Karnataka’, in Gopal Kadekodi, Ravi Kanbur and Vijayendra Rao (eds.), Development in Karnataka: Challenges of Governance, Equity and Empowerment, New Delhi: Academic Foundation, 2008. ‘Voting Rights of Elected Reps in ULBs Upheld’, Deccan Herald, 10 September 2015. Solly Benjamin, ‘Urban Futures of Poor Groups in Chennai and Bangalore’, in Neeraja Jayal, Amit Prakash and Pradeep K. Sharma (eds.), Local Governance in India: Decentralization and Beyond, Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2006. W.J.M. Mackenzie, ‘Local Government in Parliament’, Public Administration, 32(4), December 1954, pp. 409–423. Mackenzie, 1954, op. cit., p. 418. Ibid., p. 423. This section is drawn from a short opinion survey carried out as part of this study. Article 243 3 (c) of the members of the House of the People and the members of the Legislative Assembly of the State representing constituencies which comprise wholly or partly a Panchayat area at a level other than the village level, in such Panchayat; (d) of the members of the Council of States and the members of the Legislative Council of the State, where they are registered as electors within – (1) a Panchayat area at the intermediate level, in Panchayat at the intermediate level; (2) a Panchayat area at the district level, in Panchayat at the district level. Reflections by a Dalit interlocutor from Mysore district, 2013.

14 The first and the fourth estates in India Uttam Sengupta

I While the imposing Parliament House continues to draw visitors to the capital of the world’s largest democracy, there is little to suggest any connect between Parliament and the people. Despite 70 years of Independence, the Indian Parliament remains like an exclusive club, members of which get a ticket to power and privilege. Not many of the 800 million voters who elect the members of this exclusive club have much clarity about the role of Parliament. Nor do they seem to care. In a perceptive piece in The Indian Express (August 7, 2015) under the revealing headline ‘No one loves Parliament’, Praveen Chakravarty indicated that the performance of MPs seemed to have little correlation with their electoral prospects. Neither attendance nor their conduct in Parliament appeared to matter to the people at large during elections. The Parliament is of course expected to make laws and periodically review them. It is also supposed to act as a watchdog and monitor the functioning of the executive. And finally it is meant to give voice to the concerns and aspirations of the people. But over time people have come to associate ‘development work’ with the MPs. Members of Parliament are routinely expected to ensure that roads and bridges are built, civic services are maintained, health and recreational facilities are set up and above all, employment opportunities are created. Most of the MPs as a consequence are reduced to make the rounds of ministries, government offices and collectorates to nudge officials into action. As a matter of routine, therefore, during elections one reads reports naming villages which threaten to boycott polling if a promised bridge or road or school is not delivered by polling day. This has blurred the distinction between the municipal councillor or corporator, the MLA and the MP – all three representatives of the people essentially chasing similar objectives. MPs turn to the media

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to publicise the development work and the media by obliging such requests to reinforce the role of the MP more as a ‘doer’ and less of a thinker or a conscience keeper. This gets reflected in elections when voters do not mind people with criminal records, musclemen or crooked contractors and businessmen fielded by political parties as candidates. Strangely, there is considerable outrage in the media when Parliamentary sessions are washed out due to disruptions which have become increasingly frequent in the last few years. Typically when the monsoon session of Parliament was disrupted in July, 2015, two prominent TV channels pointed out the ‘loss’ suffered by the nation. While the NDTV projected the loss to be Rs 35 crore, the channel with the higher TRP Times Now came up with the figure of Rs 260 crore (See Indian Express, August 7, 2015). There was not much discussion, however, on the laws passed or not passed. Even journalists covering the Parliament, let alone the common man, are hard put to remember the 100 or 150 odd legislations passed by the Indian Parliament despite the disruptions. There is very little discussion in the media on why the legislations became necessary, how it was drafted and what would be the implications. The ignorance among the people, not surprisingly therefore, is pervasive and has resulted in growing indifference to the Parliament. But the photograph of Prime Minister Narendra Modi bowing and touching the steps of Parliament with his forehead in 2014 before the first session of the Sixteenth Lok Sabha duly made the front pages of newspapers and commentators agreed that the gesture, never attempted before by any MP or PM for that matter, was elevating. The Parliament, the PM said, was the ‘temple of democracy’. Muted criticism that he had made no such gesture at the Assembly building in Gandhinagar despite three terms as chief minister was lost in the overwhelming response that the gesture evoked in the media and among people. It was a moment to remember and will no doubt be recalled for a long time. But one is afraid that it remained what it was meant in the first place, a symbolic gesture which cynics might say was tailored for prime time television. Some things have changed little over time. Despite the ‘most productive session of Parliament in the last ten years’, the first budget session of the sixteenth Parliament barely deviated from the past. Yes, several legislations were passed, notably the Judicial Appointments Bill and the Constitution Amendment Bill allowing the government to constitute a Judicial Appointments Commission and put an end to the collegium system in vogue for a decade and a half. But the discussion

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unfortunately was perfunctory, high in rhetoric and low in substance. Indeed some would say that the debate was hurried and that the Bills were introduced in haste. Even a plain reading of the provisions made it clear how shoddily the bills were drafted. Only a highly incompetent ministry could have allowed the strange ‘veto power’ under which two members of the Commission could override the views of the majority. The even more ludicrous provision of one member being able to stall appointments in case the government (read the President) opposed it, was mercifully dropped but only because some MPs warned that it would not be legally tenable. No question was raised about the tardiness or indeed over the priority of the government and the unseemly haste with which the Bills were being pushed through Parliament. It did not come as a surprise therefore when the NJAC Act passed by Parliament was struck down as unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of India despite a spirited defence by the Attorney General in October 2015. The logjam continued and till July 2016 no headway was made in filling up nearly 400 vacancies of high court judges. That such important Bills, one of them amending the Constitution, were pushed through in a matter of ten hours through both Houses of Parliament is enough to raise disturbing questions. Is the government, which enjoys a clear majority in the Lok Sabha for the first time in thirty years, taking the House for granted is a suspicion which will need to be allayed. A weak opposition resigned to the government having its way is hardly inspiring. While the high voltage judicial appointments bill was at least debated, the Apprentice Bill, opposed by trade unions, sailed through without much discussion in either Parliament or in the media. As has been the trend in recent decades, the budget was also passed with little debate. The Economic Times reported on August 15, 2014 that 94 per cent of the demands were not discussed in Parliament at all. Delhi-based non-profit PRS Legislative Research (PRSindia.org) reported in 2013 that in the previous ten years, 85 per cent of budgetary demands were voted without discussions, that demands by the defence ministry were debated only once in these ten years although defence allocation is usually among the highest. The PRS study also calculated that on an average Parliament spent fifty-five hours every year to discuss Union Budget as well as the Railway Budget, which amounted to around 20 per cent of the total time Debates in Parliament similarly have generally been reduced to an exercise in one-upmanship and finger-pointing. Be it the debate on communal violence, nationalism, intolerance or price rise during

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2014–16, they have served little purpose other than grabbing the day’s headlines. The failure to have meaningful debates and come up with constructive and innovative solutions indicate a general listlessness in Parliament. The media of course chooses to highlight the more contentious but less substantial aspects of the parliamentary debates. Television channels found it more instructive to focus on why the Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi did not speak during the debate and whether the failure has ‘boomeranged’ on the Congress. It would have made more sense to learn what other speakers had said and if there was anything to learn from them. It is in the backdrop of such tittle-tattle that one needs to see President Pranab Mukherjee’s anguish articulated in his Independence Day address to the nation: ‘Has our democracy become too noisy,’ asked the President.1 Media’s obsessive interest in trivia ranging from MPs dozing during discussions, MPs complaining about food in the canteen, about Radio Jockeys mocking politicians to MPs ‘forcibly’ (though allotted by the Speaker) occupying rooms in Parliament may have also contributed to a perceptible decline of popular interest in the serious business conducted in Parliament. Till the mid-1990s newspapers like The Times of India devoted some space to replies given by the government to questions raised by MPs. Highlighted as LSQ and RSQ (Lok Sabha Questions and Rajya Sabha Questions), they often provided valuable information. But the practice was abandoned during the United Front Government (1996–98), with even news agencies no longer bothering to compile the replies as they did earlier. It was undoubtedly a reflection of the time and the decline of Parliament as an institution. It’s true that the official websites contain the information. But while it may help the researcher, it does little to educate the citizenry. A major failing of the Indian media has been its inability to put Parliament under any serious scrutiny. While diligent work by PRS Legislative Research and the Association for Democratic Rights (ADR) have diligently brought out details about the assets of MPs, their selfconfessed criminal records, attendance in the House, questions raised by them etc., and while the media have consistently reproduced these details over the past few years, no independent study has appeared in the media about the work of standing committees, for example. Content to report proceedings in the House, with increasing disinterest, few questions have been raised, for example, on the system of whips. The system of ‘whips’ ensures that MPs vote on party lines on legislations and motions. While such obligatory restrictions make some sense in respect to money bills and anything else that might jeopardise the survival of the government in office, the system does deny individual

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MPs to exercise independent judgement and voice their own opinions. This has made debates in Parliament predictable with MPs parroting clichés and repeating themselves in support of the party line. The patently undemocratic practice has continued to prevent free thinking. While there may be a case for ruling party MPs voting in favour of the government on budgetary issues, they can surely be allowed to voice their independent opinion on other legislations? Again this is an issue not examined or questioned in the media consistently enough. Similarly, there is nothing in the media to suggest that Parliamentary committees have been put through any scrutiny at all. Many such committees in the United States, for example, hold public hearings. But here in India even the Public Accounts Committee, despite its name, operates behind a cloak of secrecy. The composition and chairmanship of such committees are never questioned because of the totally erroneous acceptance that this happens to be the prerogative of the Speaker, and by extension the government, and hence need not be questioned. The fact that these committees often act whimsically, that their hearings are often attended by very few members, that many chairmen of such committees often leave in the middle of meetings, etc. are neither reported nor debated in the media. Nor for that matter are issues related to conflicts of interest and lack of specialisation of members ever noted. Serious mistakes and contradictions have often been found in final reports submitted by these committees. But they are noticed only by people directly involved or those directly affected by them. It is a telling enough commentary that neither our MPs nor our media have ever pointed them out. It is reasonable to reach the conclusion that the reports are compiled by bureaucrats attached to the Parliament and they are seldom supervised by the committees or the committee chairmen. While it has become fashionable to speak about ‘accountability’, nobody is clearly held accountable for these reports. While Prime Minister Modi lamented the gradual decline and practically the absence of wit and humour in Parliamentary proceedings (at a function to confer the best Parliamentarian awards), it is telling that all that he could recall was his party colleague Sushma Swaraj, then in opposition, saying that Sharad Pawar, the Maharashtra leader, then a minister, reminded her of Lalita Pawar, a popular actor who was known for her shrewish and villainous roles. Typically during the debate on communal violence in the Lok Sabha on August 14 when Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge objected to BJP member Kirti Azad referring and indeed accusing an MP who was not present in the House (Asaduddin Owaisi), the repartee that Azad

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could think of was to ask, ‘Kharge kyun Bhadke?’ (Why is Kharge so upset?) before reminding the House the popular number from Hindi films, ‘Shola kyun Bhadke’ (Why do dying embers of fire flare up?). Many such instances, which evoke laughter from MPs and attention, sometimes even appreciative, actually serve to highlight differences between wits and dimwits. The interesting experiment of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in having an interactive portal, mygov.nic.in, to enable citizens to directly discuss policy and implementation with the PMO is also a case in point. Why was it felt to be necessary in the first place? Could it be because the government felt the discourse in Parliament and the media were not substantive or illuminating enough? It could of course be a public relations exercise or a genuine attempt to identify gifted citizens with unique solutions. But in either case, the impression that it would have been unnecessary if the Parliament and the media had served the purpose is inescapable.

II It was the Scottish historian Thomas Carlyle who conferred on the press the honour of being described as the fourth pillar of democracy. But although newspapers played a stellar role in India’s freedom struggle, in independent India the media have generally displayed an aversion to invest resources on Parliamentary research. It has been left to two nongovernmental organisations, namely the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) and PRS (Policy Research Studies) Legislative Research, part of a not-for-profit company set up with grants from Ford Foundation and Google, to furnish media and researchers in recent years with data necessary to track Parliament better. ADR has successfully set up a nation-wide network to study affidavits on their assets and criminal cases pending against them mandatorily filed by candidates contesting elections. PRS on the other hand has been tracking the attendance and performance of the MPs in Parliament, questions asked by them and the number of debates in which they participated. Significantly even the PRS does not analyse the questions asked by MPs. The quality of interventions in the House or the speeches made is also scrupulously avoided by the media and such NGOs. Still, large sections of the media have gratefully lapped up the research outcomes of these two organisations and have successfully put pressure on MPs by highlighting the dismal record of MPs like Rahul Gandhi who barely spoke in the Fifteenth Lok Sabha. Data collated by ADR are routinely reproduced to highlight the growing

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number of well-heeled MPs getting elected and the number of elected MPs with criminal cases. But while such data have cast a cloud on the Parliament and MPs, they at best provide an incomplete and sometimes even unfair picture. To cite just one example, ADR dutifully reported ‘serious’ criminal cases pending against the CPM MP from Kerala, M.B. Rajesh, and the Indian National Congress (INC) MP from Uttar Pradesh, Ratna Singh (See Outlook). But PRS Legislative Research rated the CPM MP’s performance in the Lok Sabha highly. Apparently, Rajesh was framed by the police while leading a political agitation in the state. Even the Congress MP, one of the richest members in the House and scion of minor royalty, was facing charges of ‘dacoity’ among other things, a highly improbable act and an unlikely offence committed by the lady. Mainstream media, however, have invested very little time or resources to cross-check and verify the inputs provided by ADR and PRS, content to be fed with ready-to-consume data. Lacking both the expertise for research and the inclination, the media find it expedient to rely on data supplied by third parties. Also, while ADR has been highlighting the dramatic increase in assets of MPs between two elections, the law or the Election Commission does not yet require the MPs to explain the rise. Without investment details and an explanation of how the assets treble or quadruple in five years, the MPs have been getting away by claiming that appreciation and increase in the market value of their jewellery and immovable assets have been reflected in the affidavits. No concerted campaign has been witnessed in the media to raise the demand that suitable changes be made in electoral law to explain such rise in the returns filed by people’s representatives. Similarly, PRS or the media for that matter have not bothered to explore professional conflicts of interest that MPs and Ministers may have in discharging their duty. With several legal luminaries being members of one House or the other, fairness would demand that they declare the clients they have represented in court over the years. Former Finance Minister P. Chidambaram, who was in the board of several companies before becoming a minister, had no compulsion to declare the links. Nor is the present finance minister Arun Jaitley required to declare the number of corporate clients in whose pay roll he might have been. The present law minister Ravi Shankar Prasad appeared before the Supreme Court this year as a lawyer for Subrata Roy ‘Sahara’ and would have represented several other corporate bodies and industrial houses in court. But such obvious conflicts of interest do not seem to bother the Indian media much.

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Another glaring area of media using half-baked research is expenditure incurred under the MPLADS. While the PRS tracks the percentage of funds utilised by each MP, neither the Parliament nor the media are seen to be overtly worried about exploring what kind of difference it has made. There is nothing even on the websites of the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha to enable a comparison of best practices. An MP from Kerala, M.B. Rajesh, had used his MPLAD funds to provide dialysis machines in government hospitals in his constituency and built up a system so that patients could undergo dialysis at a fraction of the cost in private hospitals. This appears to be a worthy plan worth emulating elsewhere in the country. But neither the media nor the Parliament have evinced much interest in sharing such stories. There is no comparison of schemes undertaken in different states; there is no evaluation of systems put in place and reports on best practices and innovative investments are hard to come by. When it comes to Parliament, the media is obviously not much of a watchdog.

III The fourth estate’s relationship with the first three is clearly crucial in a functioning democracy. With technology having completely transformed the media in the last ten years, however, the relationship is undergoing changes, some of which may not even be clear. What is clear, however, is the inter-dependence of the four pillars and an urgency for them to help each other re-invent themselves and re-define the relationship. Of course Indian Parliament and the Indian media are both perceived as dynamic, robust and free. Both the institutions have undoubtedly contributed much to the polity and have much to be proud of. We would, however, be deluding ourselves if we do not face up to the creeping feeling that the two democratic institutions have let down the people. Worse, there is a feeling that they are clueless on how to respond to the demands of changing times and re-invent themselves. Is it also possible that the interest of the media in covering Parliament has declined in direct proportion to the growing gulf between people and Parliament? Speaking in Chennai on 14 April 2012, former West Bengal Governor Gopal Krishna Gandhi stirringly said, I do not and never shall subscribe to the cynical diminishing of our Parliament that some attempt. I do not and I shall not join in any chorus of abuse hurled at that institution. For to call Parliament by any synonym of slander is to slander ourselves.2

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But while we may not lose sight of the glorious role played by Parliament in the past, and for that matter the media too, it is by no means certain that they have been able to rise to contemporary challenges. Indeed in the same speech on the same evening, Mr Gandhi also said that Parliament must provide solutions to the menace of ‘Black Money, Corruption and mismanagement of resources.’ Implied in his statement was the lament that the solutions are still nowhere to be seen. In England, citizenship surveys are said to provide a barometer to assess how much the Parliament is trusted. Although in India we do not have any survey similar to the one in England, the Parliament does react to public sentiment articulated in the media, especially on television, as evidenced in debates, resolutions and laws related to violence against women, the need for an independent Lok Pal and on the various CAG reports revealing gross financial irregularities. This arrangement however runs the risk of allowing an overbearing, monopolistic and corporatised media to overwhelm the Parliament and force an agenda, which may not always be in national interest. A case in point is the media build up on the anti-corruption movement led by Anna Hazare in 2011. The question is whether the Parliament can look elsewhere for measuring public sentiment. Electronic petitions in England,3 which draw the attention of the British Parliament if they are signed by 100,000 people, is one tried and tested possibility that could be considered in India. However, we must consider this with statutory warning that ‘what may have worked in England may not necessarily work in a country as large and as diverse as India’. What is evident, however, is the need for Parliament to look at alternative platforms, even something as outrageous as sponsoring programmes on TV channels or sponsoring specific projects in print. With the media increasingly reluctant to spend time and money on research and on generating content, such an exercise could provide a way forward. The passage of the contentious Lok Pal Bill is another case in point. For the first time in India’s parliamentary history, a mass movement forced the Parliament to draft, debate and eventually pass a Bill which was first considered over four decades ago. While major political parties and successive Houses paid scant attention to the Bill, a movement led by Anna Hazare and ‘India Against Corruption’ took the debate out of the Parliament directly to the streets. The media amplified the demand and deepened the discourse, all the time showing the Parliament’s disconnect with the people. The executive and the Parliament were finally left with no choice but to negotiate with the protesters and make a virtue of necessity by passing the Bill after three tumultuous years.

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While the Lok Pal Bill reinforced the growing clout of the media, particularly the electronic media, the media failed to display the same level of messianic zeal in the case of several other important Bills, including those dealing with food security and acquisition of land. Debates on both these Bills in the media remained desultory and the media refrained from taking a stand on them, allowing instead the supporters and opponents of the Bills to have their say. Should the media have campaigned as vigorously as in the case of the Lok Pal Bill and forced the Parliament to look at one side or the other? Even more important is the question whether the relative lack of coherence and purpose were due to the media’s lack of understanding of the issues involved. Would an equally spirited campaign on the ground have helped the media focus better? It would certainly suggest that the media on its own is unable to weigh the pros and cons and requires experts and civil society, or corporate bodies, lobbyists and political parties in other contexts, to nudge it to a particular direction. Is the Parliament getting increasingly swayed by the media? While it is difficult, even too early, to give a definitive reply, there are indications that the lawmakers and people’s representatives are feeling the pressure of the mass media and are forced often to play to the gallery. Two resolutions passed by Parliament during the course of 2013 are worth taking note of. Both the resolutions took note of ambushes and skirmishes on the LoC in Kashmir and beheadings of Indian soldiers and warned Pakistan of grave consequences.4 The jingoistic resolutions, one suspects, were prompted by the jingoistic discussions on the subject in TV studios. They served little purpose, in fact they made normalisation of relations with Pakistan an even more difficult process. Indeed, the popular mood became so charged that the Defence Ministry, which had come out with a statement that militants may have infiltrated by putting on the uniform of the Pakistan army, felt compelled to retract it. Far more important questions actually went unaddressed. The frequent ambushes on Indian troops, the continued infiltration, beheading of some soldiers while others in the same patrolling unit survived apparently without a scratch, did create an impression that Indian soldiers were amateurish and the army’s preparedness, despite border fencing, night vision devices etc., left much to be desired. But rather than ask searching questions, the Parliament and the media took the easy way out. While the media appears to have been manipulating the Parliament, the law makers too have been manipulating the media. Long before the Joint Parliamentary Committee on the CAG’s report on 2G spectrum

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allocation submitted its report to the Parliament, the media thrived on selective leaks and reporting on the divisions in the committee. Arguably, every such committee deals with various dissenting opinions but conventionally it is the final report which would include recommendations and dissent. One can indeed fathom a deep sense of dissatisfaction in the polity. Serious Parliamentarians seem to believe, as Chatterjee undoubtedly did, that the media have trivialised the Parliament and no longer take the institution seriously. Serious media professionals, on the other hand, seem to think that Parliament has stopped taking itself seriously and it is time the institution reinvented itself. The former Speaker did not mince his words in acknowledging that Indian politics was going through a critical phase, perhaps even a crisis. Petty rivalry, lack of unity on national issues, differences based on populism and electoral considerations rather than facts and national interest and the lack of a national goal, he felt, characterised the tragic phase of politics in the country we are witnessing. Media professionals will also acknowledge the crisis through which mass media is passing through. A disproportionate number of publications, 60 thousand registered with the RNI, and around 800 TV channels including around 40 24/7 news channels have led to unforeseen consequences. A serious shortage of trained professionals, the virtual void of training space within the media, unrealistic expectations, high costs and growing uncertainty have plagued the media. The situation is even more confounded by the entry of corporate bodies, which today control the media in this country as they never did before, turning what was once a profession into a business with profit as the bottom line. Monopolies, cross-ownership across the media, the dominance of the market and commerce have contributed to muddy the water further. There is a feeling that despite sixty years of its existence, the Indian Parliament is still evolving, that it is still far less robust than the US Congress or the British Parliament, that it still has far less control over the Executive than the British or the American legislature. It is also certainly far less transparent in its functioning, barring the media access to vital proceedings to standing committees even as the committee system has evolved as the mainstay of Parliamentary deliberation. Some media professionals are of the firm belief that there has been a distinct shift in the quality of the media coverage, as well as the behaviour of Parliamentarians, since 2006–07 when live telecast of Parliamentary proceedings began. While Lok Sabha TV has made a killing by selling footage of the proceedings to both MPs and other news channels, the quality of debates has declined. The Question Hour

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has virtually become history as members in both Houses indulge in behaviour designed to grab eyeballs and push their own partisan propaganda. It suits the government because it escapes serious scrutiny while a smug opposition appears satisfied, scoring brownie points. Regional parties have determinedly used the live broadcast to grandstand on regional issues, be it Telangana, the Tamil issue or disruptive events in the North-East or West Bengal. On the other hand, media professionals complain that the live broadcast is far from professional and does not allow them a complete overview of the proceedings. You can make out on TV that disturbances are taking place in the House but the camera seldom shifts from the chair’s unperturbed face, making it impossible to find out who among the members are creating the disturbance and, often, why and what they are saying. Even uncorrected debates are uploaded to the website after a long delay and the process often takes six hours or more, defeating the purpose. It is clearly a chicken and egg situation. If the Parliament is dull, drab and less than incisive, the media coverage can scarcely be scintillating and insightful. On the other hand, if the media coverage routinely focuses on the inane and misses the wood for the forest, parliamentary proceedings are unlikely to become more meaningful and enlightening. Indeed, in recent years, the mainstream media, especially television channels, have made no secret of their indifference, if not contempt, for the role played by the executive and the Parliament. Television debates and newspapers both make it amply clear that the media do not think highly of either. The sentiment has fast come to be shared by the chattering classes and the cynicism does not appear to have left the people in general and the younger generation in particular untouched. This seems to have come about despite the launch of the two Parliamentary channels, Lok Sabha TV and the Rajya Sabha TV, which are barely six years old. The two Houses have also launched their own websites and, increasingly, more information and even live (but uncorrected) debates are being uploaded in real time. With over thirty private news channels on air, one would have expected a greater understanding of the Parliament and what it does or does not. Both Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha television channels have carved out a reputation for serious, meaningful discussions uninterrupted by screaming anchors and long advertisement breaks. The influence they now exercise was brought home by a tribal youth in a remote corner of Jharkhand, who told this writer that he would not vote for the sitting MP. Asked why, the young man disarmingly said that he had never found his MP raising questions, delivering speeches etc. on Lok Sabha

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television. When this writer suggested that he just might have missed watching his MP in action, he spiritedly replied that at least someone in the constituency would have watched him and the word would have spread. A casual glance through the New Delhi edition of The Times of India during March 2013 was also revealing. The Parliament went into a recess on March 22 and during the three preceding weeks, barely three reports from Parliament found place on the front page of the newspaper. The first related to the Prime Minister taking on the BJP and Narendra Modi and defending the government’s record. The second related to Rahul Gandhi ostensibly telling the media in the central hall that he neither intended to marry nor was he in the race for becoming the PM. The third report spoke of how the Union Home Minister slipped up in naming the Bhandara rape victims. While old-timers would possibly react with shock, views of the current crop of editors and owners on the subject are known all too well. The Parliament, they believe, is boring and people have no interest in reading about long-winded and rambling speeches, which are mostly sound and fury, signifying nothing. Nor are the readers interested in following up protests stalling Parliament, in the work of house committees or in the pompous resolutions adopted by the Houses. Both Parliament and the media, one is afraid, are to be blamed for the sorry state of affairs. Media have always thrived on the wisdom of brilliant and incisive law makers, who did their homework well, studied papers and were quick to notice discrepancies and oddities and convey them to the media. While a small number of MPs still continue to do so, their interventions are possibly far more partisan and cursory today than they were earlier. The media, in turn, have moved on, having little patience to either plough through papers or stick long enough with parliamentarians to produce more incisive reports. It is easier to focus on controversies and allegations and cause a sensation. Even when the TOI reported on the debate in Parliament on the so-called anti-rape Bill (sic), the report was dispirited and provided neither information nor illumination. Half a dozen MPs (Bhola Singh, Lalu Yadav, Sharad Yadav and Mulayam Singh Yadav among them) were quoted to justify the headline that the MPs came up with bizarre arguments (read: they are actually buffoons with no understanding of issues).5 In the midst of this report is a paragraph lauding the speech of Sandeep Dikshit of the Congress, without actually reporting what he said. Reports as casual as this are certainly unlikely to fire the curiosity of the readers. But while the media must share a major portion of the blame for the poor and clearly inadequate coverage of the Parliament, the latter too does not come out smelling of roses.

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While Parliament needs to change itself, for the media the process is going to be much more complex. Unlike the institution of Parliament, media is not one body. Diverse ownership, reach, languages and varying resources and degrees of skill etc. will necessarily mean that much of the media will follow the leaders and the trends set by them. Therefore, what the Parliament and bodies like PRS needs to do first is to analyse the big media’s response to Parliamentary functioning. All said and done, both Parliament and the media must reflect public concerns and reassure the people that they have public interest in mind and that they have the ability to rise above petty politics and commerce to address issues and find solutions that will help the nation become stronger.

IV Another media trend is the growing ‘Americanisation’ of the media following the ‘Americanisation’ of the Indian election campaign. This is happening through social networking sites Twitter and Facebook, both run by American companies and which are actively changing the mediascape in the country. Journalists are being encouraged to use Twitter; young journalists are being asked at job interviews how many followers they have on Twitter and media houses are discussing ways of incentivising the use of Twitter by employees. Executives from the US-based companies, according to some reports, are visiting media houses offering training on how Tweets can be monetised and profits raked in. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is an early convert and is said to have five million followers on Twitter. BJP, the RSS and other political parties have also been quick to jump on the bandwagon and have set up social media teams to take care of their communication strategies. The message that the Prime Minister has in fact succeeded in communicating at one level is that while he does need the mainstream media to win elections, he can govern through social media alone. The informal gag put on ministers, ruling party MPs and bureaucrats, who are now reluctant to discuss serious issues even in the central hall of Parliament, has reinforced that impression. The Indian Parliament, the Lok Sabha Speaker or Secretariat or the Chairman of the Rajya Sabha have yet to acquire a Twitter handle. There is little doubt though that the microblogging site Twitter can and will in the near future speed up and even improve communication between Parliament and the people. But the quality of communication or the message cannot obviously be enhanced by social media.

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On the other hand, what is undeniable, however, is the potential of the social media for mischief. A quick tweet often spreads an erroneous impression. Six weeks after the agitation that began in New Delhi against the alleged unfair bias in favour of English in the Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT) conducted by the Union Public Service Commission and introduced in 2011, neither columnists in national newspapers nor panellists on TV channels seemed to have grasped the admittedly complicated issue. The debate in Parliament on the subject was also equally convoluted and much of it, one suspects, was due to the initial spate of aggressive, mocking and completely incorrect impression created about the agitation. The plain truth is that on several issues of national importance, ranging from the Lok Pal Bill to the appointment of judges, from communal violence to the UPSC’s handling of recruitment of civil servants, the Parliament and the media together have often failed to provide much light. On the other hand, they have muddied the water, raised enough heat and dust without throwing up suggestions for the way forward. The years between 2004 and 2014 have witnessed the emergence of two TV channels dedicated to the two Houses of the Indian Parliament, websites of the two Houses, NGOs dedicated to tracking the Parliament and MPs, a proliferation of private TV channels and the unprecedented growth of the social media. While all this has changed the nature, form and speed of communication, what should be of great concern is the content and quality of the communication. Both Parliament and the media will therefore need to identify the reasons for their failure to communicate a coherent message to the people on most issues.

Conclusion So, finally it is legitimate to ask two questions. Which of the two institutions is more important for democracy? And which institution is better placed to manipulate the other? The answers are quite obvious. Media can never be a substitute for Parliament. And it is the Parliament and the parliamentarians, more often than not, which manipulate the media rather than the other way around. The media may or may not have the capacity to resist such manipulation. In some cases, media can also be willing accomplices to convey or magnify the message. An example may not be out of place. The Indian Parliament was rocked by several high octane controversies in April–May, 2016, one of which was related to the AgustaWestland helicopter deal. Following the conviction in an Italian court of two officials of the multinational

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company Finmeccanica, court papers revealed a message from a middleman in which he pleaded that the British High Commissioner in New Delhi be persuaded to lobby for the deal, especially with the then union minister Pranab Mukherjee and the Congress President Sonia Gandhi, who was the ‘driving force’. The government and sections of the media took this to be ‘evidence’ of the complicity of the politicians named in the message. And, for more than a week, senior ministers aggressively mounted an attack on the opposition, insinuating that evidence of the ‘bribe’ having been given to the politicians had prima facie been proved. The Union Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar spoke in Parliament passionately about the government’s resolve to punish the guilty. He followed it up by appearing on several TV channels to repeat what he had said in Parliament. But even the Defence Minister acknowledged that there was no conclusive proof against any politician and that the investigation would take time. The question that needs to be asked is whether in that case the Parliament acted wisely in debating something that was still ‘under investigation’? Or would it have sufficed if the government had been asked to present a statement of facts? On the face of it the discussions did not enlighten the citizens or educate them. On the contrary it would have confused some while convincing many more about the guilt of the politicians in question. They may eventually be found guilty or innocent for that matter. But did the Parliament allow itself to be manipulated is the question. And did the media question hard enough? Have politicians come around to view the media, especially TV news channels, as a more important forum than the Parliament? Judging by the Defence Minister’s conduct, it would seem so. And what is the role being played by social media, where everybody has an opinion? While social media has been magnifying debates, the nature of the beast is still not known, its impact still unclear. It is also pertinent to point out that people have increasingly lost faith in both politics and the media. While politicians in power to an extent can protect themselves from ridicule, the public hostility for the media has been growing alarmingly in recent years. The credibility of both Parliament and the media has eroded perceptibly and both these institutions need to re-invent themselves. The Parliament by changing the way it functions, by introducing a ‘Prime Minister’s Hour’ once every week as in the House of Commons by way of example, and the media by questioning the Parliament more closely and demanding access to deliberations in Parliamentary committees.

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If the objective of Parliament, politics and the media remains to act in the public interest, build an informed public opinion and find solutions to complex problems, they need to work more closely together. The relationship between the media and the government, to my mind, should remain adversarial. But Parliament and the media must necessarily be partners.

Notes 1 http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2014-08-14/news/52807928_1_ president-pranab-mukherjee-democracy-parliament (Accessed on 17 May 2016). 2 www.sify.com/news/indian-parliament-should-provide-solution-to-blackmoney-news-national-meoukghfhfgsi.html (Accessed on 17 May 2016). 3 https://petition.parliament.uk/, This is the website that indicates what electronic petitions are (Accessed on 17 May 2016). 4 Pranay Sharma, ‘News of a Beheading’, Outlook, 28 January 2013, www. outlookindia.com/magazine/story/news-of-a-beheading/283602 (Accessed on 17 May 2016). 5 http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Debate-on-anti-rape-bill-seesbizarre-arguments/articleshow/19081776.cms (Accessed on 17 May 2016).

Part V

Miscellaneous perspectives

15 Parliamentary staffing Expertise and coordination Raghab P. Dash

Parliament is the central institution in a democracy through which the people are represented, laws are passed and the government is held to account. As the supreme representative institution, Parliament embodies the will of the people, their urges and aspirations. It, therefore, has to remain truly responsive to their needs and concerns. For this, Parliament has to discharge a unique responsibility for reconciling the conflicting interests and expectations of different groups and communities through the democratic means of dialogue and debate, accommodation and consensus. Deliberative function of Parliament is, therefore, a subset of its representative role. As the highest legislative forum, law making is the most important function of Parliament. It has the responsibility to meet the rapidly changing needs of the society and provide a strong and relevant legal framework for good public governance. As the body entrusted with the oversight of the government, Parliament is responsible for ensuring that the government remains fully accountable to the people in discharge of its executive functions. Since Parliament has to perform these core functions, therefore the responsibilities of the Parliament Secretariat are to ensure as to how the services to support the Houses of Parliament, the Committees and the Members are governed, managed and delivered so as to contribute significantly towards a smoothly functioning parliamentary democracy. The objective of the Parliament Secretariat is to provide non-partisan services to the Presiding Officers and the Members keeping in view the supreme status and typical functional character of the Houses and preserve and improve the special qualities of the services provided to the Members while seeking to build organizational and professional excellence in terms of achieving higher levels of performance and efficiency.

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Independence of Parliament Secretariat and parliamentary staff Accountability of the executive to Parliament is central to parliamentary form of government. As the supreme legislative and representative body, Parliament needs a separate secretariat of its own, independent of the executive government, directly under the guidance and control of its Presiding Officer. As officers and staff of the Parliament’s Secretariat are required to cater to the multifarious needs of Parliament, the Presiding Officers and the Members of Parliament, it is imperative that Parliament’s Secretariat remains autonomous and independent of the government or any other organ of the state.

Independent Parliament Secretariat: a historic journey The Parliament Secretariat during the period between 1921 and 1924 The Secretariat of each House of Parliament has had a long chequered history. With the introduction of the Montagu–Chelmsford Reforms in 1920, the Central Legislature became bicameral and consisted of the Legislative Assembly and the Council of States. The administrative work of both the Houses of the Indian Parliament was carried on by the Legislative Department. The Secretary to the Government of India (in the Legislative Department) was Secretary to both the Houses and the entire personnel of both the Secretariats was made available from the staff of the Legislative Department. In 1921, the question of having a separate establishment for the Assembly was raised in the House by some Members,1 and the matter featured in debates during 1922 and 1923.2 In 1924, the government stated in reply to a question that ‘it has been decided that for the present, in the interest both of economy and efficiency, it is desirable that the business of the Legislative Assembly should continue to be conducted by the Legislative Department of the Government of India’.3 The Parliament Secretariat during the period of Presidency of Vithalbhai Patel between 1925 and 1928 The need for an independent secretariat was felt when in August 1925, Vithalbhai Patel was elected President (Speaker) of the Legislative Assembly. He and several Members of the Assembly felt that the independence of the elected Speaker was prejudicially affected because the Secretary of the Assembly was the Secretary of the Legislative

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Department under the Government of India. Soon after he assumed Office, Speaker Vithalbhai Patel convened a Presiding Officers’ Conference in January 1926 and a Resolution was passed advocating the creation of a separate office for the Legislative Assembly, independent of and unconnected with the government.4 The matter was referred to the government for consideration and action. As the government did not take any action in the matter for more than a year, the Speaker presented to the government a scheme on 17 August 1927, embodying the following important proposals:5 1 2 3

That the Assembly office should be separated from the Legislative Department of the Government; That its Principal Officers and establishment should be under the control of the Assembly through its President (Speaker); and That financial proposals of the new Department should be included in the annual budget without any sanctioning by the Finance Department, the Assembly to be the final judge as to whether the proposed expenditure was necessary.

Since the government was wavering to take any decision on the Speaker’s proposal, on 5 September 1928, Vithalbhai made a detailed statement in the House on the subject in order to exert more pressure on the government. He emphatically said, ‘As an elected President, I am responsible to the Assembly and to no other authority’.6 Highlighting the need for an impartial Assembly Secretary and staff, the Speaker further said:7 It goes without saying that if the business of the House is to be carried on to its satisfaction, the Secretary and the staff must in some way be responsible to the House and its President and not be subordinate to any subordinate authority. The President must feel he is getting independent and impartial advice from the Secretary: the Secretary and staff must also feel that they are there solely to serve and further the best interests of the Assembly. By his own statement in the House, Vithalbhai forced the government to make its position clear. Sir James Crerar, the Home Member (Minister) had to make a statement on the following day, explaining the government’s position. He informed the House that pending the settlement of the matter, the Governor-General with a view to meeting the wishes of the President, had decided that Secretary of the Assembly should no longer be a Member of the Assembly.8 As such, the

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government was averse to discuss the issue in the House. In order to avoid a stalemate, Vithalbhai suggested that the Leader of the House should discuss the matter with the leaders of various parties jointly in a conference to decide upon an agreed course of action. This suggestion was accepted, and as a result, a set of conclusions were reached which were embodied in the form of a resolution. On 22 September 1928, Motilal Nehru moved a resolution in the House that a separate Assembly Department be constituted and it was adopted unanimously.9 In reaching the aforesaid decision, the Viceroy also played a praiseworthy role. Accordingly, the government took steps to secure the sanction of the Secretary of State and a separate self-contained Department known as the ‘Legislative Assembly Department’ was created on 10 January 1929, in the portfolio of the Governor-General, with the President (Speaker) of the Assembly Department as the de facto head.10 Vithalbhai Patel deserved the singular credit for realizing the vision of a separate secretariat for the Legislative Assembly. He articulated his views on having a separate secretariat for the Assembly independent of the government with grit and determination and tactfully used his position as the President of the Assembly in raising the issue in the House either through allowing frequent questions or through making his own statement and, thus, forcing the government to settle the matter with urgency. A great defender of the independence of the Legislature, Vithalbhai spared no efforts to safeguard the rights and status of the Assembly and its President, even at times causing several deadlocks and forcing the government to respond. The government conceded on many contentious issues vis-à-vis the President of the Assembly because of the strength and resilience of Vithalbhai’s personality, besides his vast erudition and courage of conviction. The Parliament Secretariat during the period between Constitution making and democratic transition between 1947 and 1954 Under the provision of the Indian Independence Act, 1947, the legislative functions of the Central Legislature were taken over by the Constituent Assembly of India. There was, however, no change in the nomenclature of the Legislative Assembly Department. With the coming into force of the Constitution and the creation of a Provisional Parliament on 26 January 1950, the name of the Department was changed to ‘Parliament Secretariat’.11 Even after the Council of States (Rajya Sabha) and the House of the People (Lok Sabha) came into existence in 1952, the Secretariat of the

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House of the People continued to be called the ‘Parliament Secretariat’, and a new Secretariat called the ‘Council of States Secretariat’ was set up for the Rajya Sabha. The name of the Secretariat was changed to ‘Rajya Sabha Secretariat’ and ‘Lok Sabha Secretariat’ in 195412 with an announcement made by the Chairman, Rajya Sabha and the Speaker, Lok Sabha regarding the adoption of the Hindi nomenclature of both the Houses as the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha, respectively. Parliament Secretariat and the Constituent Assembly debates On 30 July 1949, Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, the Chairman of the Constitution Drafting Committee, moved a motion in the Constituent Assembly providing for Secretariat of Parliament under article 79-A of the Draft Constitution. While informing the Assembly the reasons for incorporating such a provision in the Constitution, Dr. Ambedkar drew the attention of the Members to the momentous efforts made by Vithalbhai Patel during the formative period of his presidency which yielded success in having an independent Legislative Assembly Secretariat. He also drew the attention of the Assembly to the resolutions passed by the Presiding Officers’ Conference on having an independent secretariat for Parliament. Since the independent Secretariat was already functioning and the Members were aware of its historic past, not much difference of views emerged. However, the Members, namely H.V. Kamath, Siban Lal Saxena, Mahavir Tyagi, R.K. Sidhva and Brajeshwar Prasad, who participated in the Constituent Assembly debate on the issue strongly defended the proposed constitutional provision on Secretariat of Parliament. While recognizing the necessity of a separate staff for the Parliament, Brajeshwar Prasad, a Member of the Constituent Assembly, felt that the questions relating to appointment, promotions and other conditions of service should not have been left to be determined by Parliament. He suggested:13 It should be clearly laid down in the Constitution that all questions relating to appointment, in fact all appointments, must be made by the Federal Public Service Commission and not by the Speaker or the Chairman of the Upper House. Having due regard to the facts of our political life, when there is hardly a Ministry in the provinces which is not being condemned for patronage, for undue favour, for provincialism, it is not safe to vest this power or leave it in a nebulous state or to ask the Parliament to regulate

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The suggestion of not investing the power of recruitment of personnel for the Parliament Secretariats with the Chairman, Rajya Sabha and the Speaker, Lok Sabha did not find favour with the Assembly. Perhaps, the then existing practice of recruitment of parliamentary staff by the Speaker weighed heavily on the Members of the Assembly. It was felt that the Speaker, being the custodian of the dignity of the House and the rights and privileges of its Members, alone could ensure that recruitment is made for the right kind of personnel for the Secretariat. Since there was unanimity in the Constituent Assembly about the constitutional provision for the Secretariat of Parliament, Dr. Ambedkar did not find it germane to reply to the debate and article 79 A of the Draft Constitution (which later became article 98 of the final Constitution) was adopted, paving the way for the constitutional status of the Parliament Secretariat. Parliament Secretariat under the Constitution According to the Constitution of India, Parliament is the sole guardian and judge in all matters relating to its proceedings and privileges. Subject to the provisions of the Constitution, its procedure and conduct of business, each House of the Parliament is empowered to regulate its own procedure and the conduct of business under article 118 of the Constitution of India. It has also been specifically provided under article 122 that the validity of any proceedings in Parliament shall not be called in question on the ground of any alleged irregularity of procedure. Further, no officer or MP in whom powers are vested by or under the Constitution for regulating procedure or conduct of business, or for maintaining order in Parliament, shall be subject to the jurisdiction of any court in respect of the exercise of those powers. All these constitutional provisions symbolize the supremacy of the Parliament within its own sphere of activity. The underlying object behind these powers, privileges and immunities is to protect and preserve the freedom, authority and dignity of Parliament and its functioning. With the underlying objective of ensuring an unimpaired exercise of Parliament’s powers, the Drafting Committee, which was to prepare the Constitution of India, decided to give constitutional recognition

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to the independent status of the Secretariats of Parliament. It is under article 98 of the Constitution of India that the provisions have been made for separate and independent Secretariats for the two Houses of Parliament under the overall control of the respective Presiding Officers. Article 98 of the Constitution of India reads as under: 98 Secretariat of Parliament. – (1) Each House of Parliament shall have a separate secretarial staff: Provided that nothing in this clause shall be construed as preventing the creation of posts common to both Houses of Parliament. (2) Parliament may by law regulate the recruitment, and the conditions of service of persons appointed, to the secretarial staff of either House of Parliament. (3) Until provision is made by Parliament under clause (2), the President may, after consultation with the Speaker of the House of the People or the Chairman of the Council of States, as the case may be, make rules regulating the recruitment, and the conditions of service of persons appointed, to the secretarial staff of the House of the People or the Council of States, and any rules so made shall have effect subject to the provisions of any law made under the said clause. Thus, article 98 of the Constitution envisages that Secretariats of Parliament shall be independent of the Executive. The employees of the Secretariat shall form a class distinct from the civil servants and work under a separate and autonomous system of control and regulations. It is aimed at ensuring that both Houses of Parliament are assured of independent advice and assistance and the directions of the Presiding Officers are implemented without executive interference.

Characteristics of independent Parliament Secretariat Separate rules for recruitment and conditions of services of the persons serving Parliament and the persons serving the Union/States It would be instructive to note that article 309 of the Constitution makes a provision somewhat similar to article 98 (2) and (3) in respect of the recruitment and conditions of service of persons serving the Union or State Governments. Separate provisions for recruitment and

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conditions of service for the persons serving in the Union/States and the Parliament Secretariats amply indicate the independence of Parliament from the executive in the matters of having separate secretariats with requisite human resources. So far no legislation has been enacted by Parliament of India under article 98 (2) of the Constitution for regulating the recruitment and conditions of service of persons appointed to the secretarial staff of either House of Parliament as in the case of article 309. However, in pursuance of article 98 (3), the Recruitment and Conditions of Service Rules for both the Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha Secretariats were framed and promulgated by the President of India in consultation with the Chairman, Rajya Sabha and the Speaker, Lok Sabha in 1957 and 1955, respectively. These rules have the force of law. The powers conferred on the Chairman, Rajya Sabha or the Speaker, Lok Sabha by these Rules are exercised by them through Recruitment and Conditions of Service orders issued from time to time. As it is, the Executive has no direct control over the conditions of service of the employees of the Secretariat. Exemption from the purview of UPSC All posts in the Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha Secretariats are excluded from the purview of the UPSC. The UPSC deals with the recruitment in respect of civil services at the level of the Union Government. The UPSC is not consulted in the matter of recruitment of employees of the Secretariats of Parliament and a provision to this effect has accordingly been made in the Union Public Service Commission (Exemption from Consultation) Regulations, 1958. In accordance with the special provisions contained in the Constitution, the Secretariats of both the Houses conduct their own recruitment and function as independent entities under the guidance and control of their Presiding Officers. Exemption from the purview of Central Administrative Tribunal CAT The Administrative Tribunals Act, 1985 which establishes the jurisdiction and powers of the CAT in relation to the cases concerning recruitment and related matters in civil services under the Union, is not applicable to any person appointed to the secretarial staff of either House of Parliament. Any dispute regarding service matters can be raised only in the High Court of Delhi and the Supreme Court of India.

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Suo-motu non-applicability of central pay Commissions recommendations and central government decisions to Parliament Secretariats In view of the independent status of the Secretariats of Parliament, the recommendations of the Pay Commissions set up by the government of India from time to time are not automatically made applicable to the officers and staff of the Secretariats. The Chairman, Rajya Sabha and the Speaker, Lok Sabha jointly appoint a Parliamentary Pay Committee14 to advise them on the revision of pay and other conditions of service of the parliamentary staff. According to well-established convention, the orders applicable to the Ministries/Departments of the Government of India do not ipso facto apply to the officers and staff of the Secretariats of the two Houses, unless explicitly adopted. The orders of the Government of India are adopted in the Secretariats subject to such modifications, variations or exceptions, if any, as the Chairman/Speaker may by order specify. After the promulgation of the recruitment and conditions of service rules of the persons serving the Parliament secretariats, this position has been formally accepted by the government. The guiding principle behind such mechanisms, arrangements, conventions, etc. has been that the independence and autonomy of the Secretariats of Parliament vis-à-vis the executive would not be possible if the parliamentary staff were to depend upon the government or any other agency for their career prospects, promotions, pay scales, etc.

Financial autonomy: budgets of Parliament Secretariats Financial autonomy is one of the important aspects of the independence of the Secretariats of Parliament of India. In this context, the position of independence has been maintained in the field of expenditure incurred in respect of salaries and allowances of the officers and staff of both the Secretariats. The Budget Estimates of the Lok Sabha and Lok Sabha Secretariat and the Rajya Sabha and Rajya Sabha Secretariat are prepared, as per the budget code of the government, under the various units of appropriation. The Budget proposals, after the approval of the Chairman, Rajya Sabha and Speaker, Lok Sabha, as the case may be, are forwarded to the Ministry of Finance for incorporation in the Union Budget. The Budget Estimates of the Rajya Sabha/Lok Sabha are not subject to examination by any Departmental Committee of the Ministry of Finance or any other Committee of Parliament. In case the

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Ministry of Finance has to make any suggestion in respect of the Estimates, the same is submitted to the Chairman/Speaker for consideration and orders and a final decision acceptable to both is arrived at after discussion. The expenditure incurred on various units of appropriations is met from the Consolidated Fund of India. As in the case of other Ministries of the Government of India, separate Demands for Grants in respect of the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha are also laid before both the Houses of Parliament. Parliament sanctions the expenditure through the Appropriation Act. No cut motions or discussions relating to the Budget of both the Houses of Parliament and the respective Secretariats are allowed on the floor of the Parliament. If a Member wishes to have any information, it is supplied to him under the orders of the Chairman or the Speaker, as the case may be. Once the Demands for Grants of the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha and their Secretariats are passed by Parliament and placed at the disposal of the respective Secretariats, the Executive does not interfere in the financial management nor is its concurrence sought on any expenditure, whatsoever, within the allotted grants.

Speaker: the torchbearer of Parliamentary independence Vithalbhai Patel, the first elected President of the Legislative Assembly, displayed his finest understanding of the nuances of parliamentary democracy when he insisted and also got an independent Legislative Assembly Department to serve the Presiding Officer and the House. Speaker G.V. Mavalankar and his illustrious successors continued with the high traditions and reminded the Executive, from time to time, about their role vis-à-vis Parliament. Several strident communications found to be part of parliamentary record between the Speaker and the Prime Minister/the government on a range of issues. In the context of parliamentary administration, it would be edifying to note that Speaker Mavalankar at the time of framing of the Lok Sabha Secretariat (Recruitment and Conditions of Service) Rules, recorded the following minutes in regard to the use of the term ‘consultation’ in the said rules: I am unable to accept the principle of a compulsory consultation with the Ministry. If the Ministry – the Finance Ministry in particular – insist on their concurrence, on the supposition that the Speaker will be unreasonable and that they alone are the guardians of the financial interests of the Government, the Speaker also

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may be equally allowed to consider that the Finance Ministry will merely have the point of rupees, annas and pies and will not be able to appreciate and understand the requirements and necessities of the Lok Sabha Secretariat. . . . In my view, therefore, I cannot agree to any provision where the consent of the Ministry is necessary for giving effect to what the Speaker thinks is essential in the Lok Sabha Secretariat and the Lok Sabha.15

Parliamentary staff – expertise and specialization The Secretariat of each House of Parliament serves its respective Presiding Officers,16 the House, the Committees and the Members in numerous ways. Each one of them requires the services of the Secretariat in distinct ways, depending upon their priorities and responsibilities. Servicing the Presiding Officers Since smooth conduct of the proceedings of the House is the prime responsibility of the Presiding Officers, they require an efficient Secretariat, which among other things, should be well conversant in rules, practices, precedents and conventions that govern the functioning of the House. Competent and well-informed staff at the Table (including the Secretary-General) is required to assist the Chair in no time by providing requisite information/inputs, which in turn help him in the orderly conduct of the House. At times, Members raise ‘Point of Order’17 on procedural matters, inviting the attention of the Presiding Officers, who make their rulings/observations on the points of order raised. For this, the Presiding Officers need requisite inputs in short time to dispose of the issue before the House. On several substantive matters, they reserve their rulings and only after consideration of all material information, rules and precedents, they make detailed rulings, which constitute the defining parameters of addressing similar issues in future. The Secretariat through a team of dedicated staff well-versed in parliamentary rules and practices plays an important role in providing requisite assistance to the Presiding Officer in all such matters. Servicing the House Parliament is the highest seat of democracy. Deliberation, legislation and oversight constitute the core work of Parliament, with which all the Members strive to associate with in one form or other. However, the time available with Parliament being limited, there is always

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pressure to dispose the listed business by providing adequate opportunities to the Members. As such, the available parliamentary time also often gets wasted due to avoidable disruptions. As a result, both the Houses sit quite late in the night to make good the time lost. The Secretariat is there all throughout to provide necessary support and assistance. There is no fixed time of duty for a parliamentary staff; it goes on till the House gets adjourned for the day and many more hours beyond that to prepare the record of business transacted during the day and also to prepare for the next day’s business. Secretarial service during the session is an uninterrupted continuum – an endless spiral that only ceases with the termination of a session. Since Parliament is the hub of the institutional complex of our democracy, parliamentary approval of executive decisions as also its record are sacrosanct and unassailable. Given its sanctity, there is an underlying pressure on the Parliament Secretariats to remain ever accurate, ever meticulous and ever vigilant. The staff working in the session-related sections are required to be alert at all times. A little laxity here or a little delay there on the part of the personnel of the Secretariat dealing with the session related work can cause a huge amount of botheration and inconvenience, not only to the Parliament but also to the government. Besides, keeping the records of the proceedings of both the Houses for the posterity is always a challenging task. The publication of parliamentary debates is a fundamental element of parliamentary tradition. Since the production and publication of parliamentary debates guarantees the preservation of memory and parliamentary history of the country, in both the Secretariats of Parliament, there are separate Verbatim Reporting Services, comprising professionally competent high-speed reporters for making verbatim record of the House proceedings. The highly specialized and competent reporters18 are capable of taking verbatim reports of the House with remarkable speed and accuracy, both during orderly and disorderly situations. These reporters use the traditional systems of transcribing and publishing parliamentary debates and, from time to time, also remain exposed to the rapid changes in information and communication technology in this regard. They are on the job right from the first minute of a day’s sitting till the last minute when the House gets adjourned for the day. In fact, their major work starts when the House is adjourned. They transcribe what they report in quick time and upload the same in the Internet for the benefit of all those who want to follow parliamentary debates. The transcription of floor debates of both the Houses that capture the deliberative core of our democracy could be possible only because of these skilled reporters.

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Servicing the committees Parliamentary committees occupy an important place in our parliamentary set-up. These are known as ‘mini Parliament’, embodying the representativeness, legitimacy and the authority of the House. It is in the parliamentary committees that a substantial part of the deliberation on the legislative and other related business is conducted. Indian Parliament has an elaborate system of parliamentary committees, which inter alia deals with a range of functions from allocating time for the business to be transacted in the House to examining petitions, to scrutinizing delegated legislations, to monitoring the implementation of Government Assurances, to ensuring the timely laying of Papers on the Table, to overseeing the moral and ethical conduct of the Members. With the introduction of the Department-Related Standing Committee (DRSC) system in 1993, the scope and importance of parliamentary committees have gone up. There are 24 DRSCs, 16 functions under the supervision and control of the Speaker, Lok Sabha and hence serviced by the Lok Sabha Secretariat and eight functions under the supervision and control of the Chairman, Rajya Sabha and hence serviced by the Rajya Sabha Secretariat. The DRSCs are joint Committees comprising Members19 from both the Houses. The Chairman of a Committee is appointed out of the Members of that Committee and in respect of the committees functioning under the Lok Sabha, a Member of Lok Sabha is appointed the Chairman, whereas in respect of the committees functioning under the Rajya Sabha, a Member of Rajya Sabha is appointed as the Chairman. The basic functions of these DRSCs are as follows: 1 2

3 4

To consider the demands for grants of the related Ministries/ Departments and report thereon; To examine Bills, pertaining to the related Ministries/Departments, referred to the Committee by the Chairman or the Speaker, as the case may be, and report thereon; To consider the annual reports of the Ministries/Departments and report thereon; and To consider national basic long-term policy documents presented to the Houses, if referred to the Committees by the Chairman or the Speaker, as the case may be, and report thereon.

The DRSCs do not consider matters of day-to-day administration of the related Ministries/Departments. These Committees examine the functioning of various Ministries and Departments covered under them and are also instrumental in securing the accountability of the

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Executive to the Legislature, which is the cardinal principle of parliamentary democracy. The Chairman of a Committee, in consultation with other Members of the Committee, determines its agenda and the Committee Secretariat works in close coordination with the Chairman in its dayto-day functioning. The Committee Secretariat, on behalf of the Committee, convenes the meeting, prepares the agenda, calls for papers and materials from the government on a subject under the consideration of the Committee, calls for official and non-official witness to depose before the Committee, accompanies the Committee on its study visits, studies the relevant issues concerning the subject matter under examination, prepares questionnaire to elicit information from the government and, finally, prepares the draft report to be placed before the Committee. In a cross-party perspective, the Chairman and Members often contribute significantly to the Committee proceedings during the examination of witnesses as also during the internal deliberations. However, it is the Committee Secretariat, which diligently performs its duty in the background, provides the requisite support to the Committee and registers its contribution in enhancing the content quality of the Committee Reports. Though a Member’s preference and interest get largely accommodated in deciding the parliamentary committee membership, yet it remains in a constant state of flux due to a host of political and administrative reasons. Expertise on a subject which comes with long years of membership with the concerned Committee is normally not developed in the scenario of frequent changes in the committee membership. But, this deficit is made good by the Secretary-General of each House who ensures that the secretarial work of the Committees is performed by qualified, competent and experienced officers. The capacity of the Committee Secretariat is also enhanced through organizing workshop/training and capacity-building initiatives from time to time. The proficiency of the Committee Secretariat on a subject is enhanced by the exposure they get during the study visits of the Committee as also during the numerous opportunities when the Committee interacts with the domain experts, who are called to depose before the Committee. Servicing the members The Secretariat of each House of Parliament serves its own Members.20 Since Members belonging to all political parties are represented in Parliament, the Secretariat serves each one of them without any political

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or ideological considerations. The non-partisan and objective character of parliamentary staff is the defining feature of a progressive and forward-looking Parliament Secretariat. Major Sections of the Parliament Secretariats provide dedicated services to the Members. These include the Question Section, Legislative Section, Bill Section and the Simultaneous Interpretation Service that help sharpen the parliamentary and legislative role of the Members. Since parliamentary question is a potent weapon in the armoury of the Members to elicit information from the government on the floor of the House and thereby securing the accountability of the executive, the parliamentary staff in the Question Section attaches utmost priority to the work of processing, examining the admissibility of the notices of Questions as per rules and establishing correspondence with the Ministries and the Members in relations to Questions. Besides, the parliamentary officers and staff attached with the Legislative Section meticulously process the notices of the Members for raising matters of urgent public importance through the parliamentary devices like Short Duration Discussion, Calling Attention, Motions and Resolutions. The Bill Section, which apart from dealing with the government Bills, also provides assistance to the Members in drafting Private Members’ Bills, which are presented by the Private Members in the House. Simultaneous Interpretation is one of the premier services provided by the both Secretariats for the benefit of their respective Members to facilitate them to effectively participate in the proceedings of the House and its Committees. This highly skilled and specialized service is dedicated to providing simultaneous interpretation of the proceedings of the respective House primarily from Hindi to English and vice-versa and also of the parliamentary committees, when required. There are also skilled language interpreters who undertake simultaneous interpretation in English as well as in Hindi of the speeches made in several Indian languages21 specified in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution. Simultaneous interpreters are language facilitators who possess higher linguistic skills and instinctive anticipation to bridge the gap between two parties – the speaker and the listener. Parliamentary interpreters are periodically provided training exposures to sharpen their linguistic skills. There are also a number of sections in the Secretariat such as Notice Office, Members’ Amenities Section, Members’ Salary and Allowance Section, Conference and Protocol Section, Members’ Reference Service22 in Library, Reference, Research, Documentation and information Service (LARRDIS) that provide personalized services to the Members and look after their requirements and entitlements. Responsiveness to Members’ needs, proactive service delivery approaches and improved

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client relations with the Members are the hallmark of the Members’ Service Sections. All these Sections strive to provide the Members the highest standards of service and attention. Functional restructuring of Parliament Secretariats In 1974, on the basis of the recommendations of the First Parliamentary Pay Committee, both the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha Secretariats were restructured on the functional basis into different services, keeping in view specialized nature of their functions and responsibilities. Both the Secretariats are organized on a functional basis into ten services, namely, Legislative, Financial, Executive and Administrative Services (LAFEAS), LARRDIS, Verbatim Reporting Service, Simultaneous Interpretation Service, Editorial and Translation Service, Printing and Publications Service, Private Secretaries and Stenographic Service, Parliament Security Service, Drivers and Despatch Riders Service and Messenger Service. Each service caters to the needs of the Presiding Officers, the House, the Committees and the Members. The functioning of the Parliament Secretariats has been devised in such a way as to facilitate its working as an independent organizsation. Assessment The persons of calibre and expertise with appropriate educational background are recruited to carry out the specialized nature of work required to be handled by Parliament Secretariats. Besides their core competency, the personnel of the Parliament Secretariats needs to possess the right attitude of serving the Members of Parliament to enable them to perform their constitutional duties. Reflecting on the attributes of the parliamentary staff vis-à-vis the executive secretariat, R.K. Sidhva, a learned Member of the Constituent Assembly, suggested:23 I wish to make it clear that the staff of the Secretariat (legislature) should be quite different from the staff of executive. The staff of the legislature should be chosen from persons who are amiable, social, kind, useful and helpful to the Members, and not that kind of staff which exists in the Secretariat (executive). The employees of the Parliament Secretariats while rendering nonpartisan and objective secretarial assistance to the Presiding Officers, the Members and the Parliamentary Committees sustain the progressive change in Parliament’s work profile, making their own profound

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contribution to realizing a more secured democratic future. They consist of people with a sound knowledge of the Constitution, parliamentary practices, procedures and precedents for making Parliament more effective in discharging its manifold responsibility.

Parliamentary staff: coordination and cooperation Given the fusion of authority between the executive and the legislature in a parliamentary system, they ought to cooperate with each other to ensure that Parliament transacts its listed business. From the executive side, the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs has been made the nodal authority to coordinate with both the Parliament Secretariats for smooth transaction of business. In the days of session, both the secretariats of Parliament remain in constant touch with the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs and the vice-versa. As such, the Parliamentary Affairs Minister is the Government Chief Whip, who puts forth the government position on any issue before the Presiding Officers of both the Houses. Coordination is central to effective parliamentary functioning. And, this is done both between Parliament Secretariats and the Parliament Secretariats on the one hand and the concerned Ministries/ Departments of the government on the other. Ours is a bicameral Parliament. Since legislations24 have to be passed by both the Houses, there remains a constant channel of communication between the two Houses with regard to passage of Bills in one House, which generates work for the other. Both the Houses constitute Parliament and, as such, enjoy the same status and importance vis-à-vis the government. The government of the day by virtue of being in office enjoys a legislative majority in the Lower House. But the same may not be in the case of the Upper House, whose composition changes biennially25 depending upon the electoral outcome of the State Legislative Assemblies. The government, therefore, cannot afford to treat both the Houses differentially. The Ministers of the government always ensure utmost coordination with the Parliament Secretariats so that their parliamentary duties in answering Questions, laying papers, making Statements, introducing the Bills, replying to the debates, etc. in one House do not clash with the other. As per the present scheme of things, the Executive exercises control over the legislative processes through legislative agenda formation and floor management. But, this cannot be done without parliamentary coordination among different stakeholders. Though legislative agenda is determined at the behest of the government, it is the Secretariat

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of each House which meticulously manages the agenda. No items of business be it Questions, Motions, Resolutions, Bills or Debates could be possible to be taken up by the House unless active coordination between the Parliament Secretariats and the government is preceded and thorough ground work, based on rules and practices governing each House, is accomplished. The skills of parliamentary coordination are displayed best when the Presiding Officers engage in resolving deadlocks with a view to restore normalcy in parliamentary functioning.

Conclusion Parliamentary procedures in India are multi-layered and cumbersome; parliamentary time is scarce and precious; parliamentary approval of executive decisions is sacrosanct and incontrovertible; and parliamentary functioning is often chaotic and unpredictable. All these notwithstanding, Parliament must discharge its assigned responsibilities, remaining at the forefront of our parliamentary democratic governance. And, for this Parliament Secretariats must deliver on their strength of expertise and coordination. Truly, behind a well-functioning House is a well-functioning Secretariat, which caters to each section of the House with characteristic non-partisanship. The domain of parliamentary activity is vast and covers the entire spectrum of nation’s affairs. The Secretariats of the Parliament of India own a special responsibility for sustaining, standardizing and strengthening the dignity and authority of Parliament.

Notes 1 Legislative Assembly Debate, 5 March 1921, p. 595. 2 Ibid., 16 March 1922, pp. 3166, 3167 and 3169; 22 September 1922, p. 772; 15 March 1923, pp. 3461 and 3464. 3 Ibid., 1 February 1924, p. 28. 4 H.M. Patel, Vithalbhai Patel, New Delhi: Publications Division, Government of India, 1983, p. 129. 5 Legislative Assembly Debate, 5 September 1928 , p. 221. 6 Ibid., p. 219. 7 Ibid. 8 The Secretary of the Assembly was nominated as a Member of the House. He identified himself with the government and not with the House or the President. 9 Legislative Assembly Debate, 22 September 1928, pp. 1249–1263. 10 Ibid., 28 January 1929, p. 2.

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11 M.N. Kaul and S.L. Shakdher, Practice and Procedure of Parliament, New Delhi: Metropolitan Book Co., 2009, pp. 1061–1062. 12 Rajya Sabha Debate, 23 August 1954, pp. 36–37; Lok Sabha Debate, 13 May 1954, pp. 7388–7389. 13 Constituent Assembly Debates, 30 July 1949, pp. 8–9. 14 The First Parliamentary Pay Committee was set up by the Chairman, Rajya Sabha and Speaker, Lok Sabha in 1974. 15 Report of the First Parliamentary Pay Committee, 1974, p. 5. 16 The Chairman, Rajya Sabha and the Speaker, Lok Sabha, as the case may be. 17 An appeal to the Chair for guidance or a ruling on a matter of order or procedure. 18 Reporters are available in Hindi, English and Urdu languages to prepare floor versions of the debates. 19 There are 21 members from the Lok Sabha and 10 members from the Rajya Sabha. 20 The Parliament Library, though under the administrative control of the Lok Sabha, serves the Members of Rajya Sabha also along with the Lok Sabha Members. The LARRDIS of the Lok Sabha Secretariat caters to the research and reference requirements of Rajya Sabha Members as well. 21 Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Oriya, Punjabi, Tamil, Telugu and Urdu language interpretations are currently available in the Parliament Secretariats. 22 This service is a part of the LARRDIS of the Lok Sabha Secretariat. 23 Constituent Assembly Debates, 30 July 1949, pp. 7–8. 24 Except Money Bills, Rajya Sabha has co-equal powers with that of the Lok Sabha in matters of legislation. 25 Rajya Sabha is a permanent body, it does not dissolve, one-third of its Members retire on the expiration their six-year term every second year. See Article 83 (1) of the Constitution of India.

16 Parliament in India’s foreign and security policy From a conscience keeper to an active arbiter Rahul Tripathi The early years In the early years, shaping India’s foreign and security policy was deeply influenced by the then Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, who also looked after the Ministry of External Affairs himself. While Nehru’s own domineering personality and his vision on India’s role in foreign affairs may have been a crucial factor, as a newly independent nation, India was too much engaged with the domestic issues and concerns that inhibited either Parliament or for that matter the political parties to have a distinct view on foreign policy matters. Nehru’s world view and his vision of India’s global role led to the crafting of the Indian foreign policy and had a lasting influence on international relations. Therefore some of the dominant perspectives that shaped the foreign policy during the early years: peace and non-alignment in international affairs, pan Asian and African solidarity, belief in multilateralism as espoused by the United Nations principles; all were seen as a direct extension of India’s own ideals and goals as set out in the freedom movement and were not really seen as a matter of debate.1 Though seen as a preserve of the executive, foreign policy was also required to be institutionalized in the context of parliamentary democracy in India. Like all executive decisions need a parliamentary ratification in spirit and substance, foreign policy could hardly have remained an extension of government policy on external affairs, but required a strong domestic consensus as well. As M.L. Sondhi has aptly stated: A turn towards future-oriented interdependence in Indian foreign policy requires that the Indian Parliament develop its latent capacity in the specialized field of external relations. The Consultative Committee for the Ministry of External Affairs can pursue the logic of the Prime Minister’s interpretation of the social strategy of the reorientation in world affairs.2

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He therefore emphasized that the political decision-making system must remain in the domain of the Ministry of External Affairs, the External Affairs Minister, and the Prime Minister, but Parliament should have a central social function in providing new norms of decision making. He argued for the Parliament in the interest of the nation, working towards institutional adjustments which could enable both the executive and the legislature to perform their respective roles more vigorously in shaping the new international environment and to which Indian foreign policy may be given a high priority.3 While there appears to be an overarching influence of the executive in both conceptualizing and implementation of foreign policy during these early years, there are some interesting interventions visible in parliamentary debates that ensued during the time, when occasional assertions by the Parliament over foreign policy matters leaves a mark. In a debate on the need for legislative control over executive relating to India’s borrowings from other countries, for example, it was pointed out in the Constituent Assembly: The House will also recollect that this House sitting as Parliament, during the last budget session and even in earlier sessions, pointedly asked the Prime Minister and perhaps the Finance Minister too whether loans borrowed from foreign countries, from America, or may be from USSR if Government will consider such a proposal, will be subject to any political economic or military strings. After all, I am sure that Parliament will ultimately decide our international relations. It is neither the executive nor the President but Parliament which will have the final word on what our foreign relations are going to be, what our international policy is going to be.4 The possibility of the executive being at variance with Parliament in certain matters and if the executive took into its head to pursue a foreign policy which Parliament later on may not approve or which be quite in consonance with the decisions of Parliament in this regard, a very unfortunate situation could arise when a commitment will have been made by the government of the day by the President and the executive with regard to borrowing or the raising of loans from foreign countries.5 The Parliament, therefore, was very much aware and keen from the inception that a necessary balance must be maintained between the legislature and the executive while framing important foreign and security policies on some key questions keeping the national interest

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of the country in mind. Nehru, who was his own External Affairs Minister, made it a point to depute officers of various divisions of the Ministry of External Affairs to brief the MPs on various foreign policy concerns. He would also at times send a senior officer of the United Nations division to brief the MPs. This was in addition to his personally addressing the MPs through the Parliamentary Consultative Committee on External Affairs. As there was no standing committee of Parliament on External Affairs, these informal interactions also played an important role of training the young IFS Officers to get exposed to the working of the Parliament.6 In fact, the first time the Parliament actually saw a more proactive deliberation on a foreign/security policy was during the unfolding crisis between India and China beginning from the uprising in the Tibet and Dalai Lama seeking asylum in India. This also brought in the open, perhaps for the first time, divisions within the Indian political establishment (particularly the communist parties) with regard to the policy that India was adopting towards the uprising in China. While there was one view that Tibet could not be discussed in the Parliament, as it was part of China, and would set the undesirable precedent of the Indian states being discussed in Parliaments abroad, there was the other view that appreciated the Indian government’s stand. The following two instances amply demonstrate this: On 4 May 1959, the Rajya Sabha debated Tibet on the basis of a Motion for Adjournment moved by Dr. H.N. Kunzru (Independent). Initially there was a brief discussion on the admissibility of the Motion which was however allowed to be moved. Mr. H.D. Rajah (Republican Party): Sir, before Dr. Kunzru is allowed to move his Motion, I want to raise a point of order. This Motion is not consistent with the Constitution of our country. Presumably this Motion was admitted in the House under the Seventh Schedule, item 10, ‘Foreign Affairs; all matters which bring the Union into relation with any foreign country.’ Now, Sir, Tibet is not a foreign country. It is a part of China. If this House is going to discuss a foreign country, it must be China; because Tibet is a part of China. If this dangerous precedent is accepted by us, I say in all humility, then Soviet Russia will have a right to discuss in their Parliament our Kerala affairs and so many other matters. . . . I, therefore, say that Tibet not being directly connected with our Constitution, and Tibet being a part of China, whose suzerainty over Tibet we have accepted. . . . It will infringe the provisions of the Panchsheel which we have accepted. The Prime Minister had

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also entered into a declaration with the Prime Minister of China that domestic affairs in another’s country will not be interfered with and there will be non-intervention.7 H.N. Kunzru (Congress) too made a statement in the Parliament on the Tibet issue on the same day: No one can deny that the reaction in India to the situation arising out of the events in Tibet was strong and swift. Even in Parliament all parties, with the exception of the Communist Party, united in expressing their concern at what was happening and when the Prime Minister announced in the Lok Sabha that the Dalai Lama had entered Indian territory, the news was received with joy and enthusiasm in which most of the parties, except the Communist Party, shared.8 As the events were to turn out later, as the Sino Indian Conflict broke out in 1962 and the ignominious setback it brought to India’s creatively crafted world view, the Parliament itself played a key role in dissecting and deliberating the manner and circumstances that shaped the events. In many ways, the incident brought out an epochal shift in foreign policy conceptualization and framing in the post-Nehruvian era as greater ‘dispersal and decentralization’ of the same gradually started taking place. While under both Lal Bahadur Shastri and Indira Gandhi, the MEA got a greater leeway from the PMO, there was at the same time a continuation of the ‘consensual’ approach when it came to the Parliamentary deliberations. As the two major issues that were to bring in Parliamentary position into a greater focus; the issue of Kashmir and relations with Pakistan as well as the question of nuclear policy evoked by and large greater resonance between the executive and the legislature and the trend continued. The same shall be highlighted through the two-pronged role that the Parliament envisaged for itself as discussed in the following sections: Parliamentary Oversight and Parliamentary Deliberation.

Parliamentary oversight For most part of the initial years, the Parliament saw itself as a body of consultative character where the government would put forth the issues it felt were significant from a foreign policy perspective and it would be followed by a debate. At another level, individual members could also take up foreign policy matters and seek clarification by the

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government through the raising of motions. At a more substantive level, the same was done through ‘Consultative committees’. These committees, though useful, were often seen as having a limited role. The consultative committee on external affairs was no exception: It is not unfair criticism to point out that in spite of some excellent work done by the Consultative Committee on External Affairs, there are shortcomings especially in developing new approaches and new techniques to enhance its thinking on fundamental problems of international relations. The Committee has sometimes scrutinized government policies in the light of major events which have figured in headlines even though they were proved ultimately to be of ephemeral significance from the point of view of Indian interests. Volatile public opinion often deflected the attitudes of members of Parliament to a kind of debate which did not always encourage use of academic knowledge or in-depth information of foreign policy issues. While it is not possible to prescribe in detail the changes which should be made in order that the Consultative Committee, or Parliament as a whole, should evolve a new philosophy of the role of the legislature in foreign policy, it is clear that the relevant factual evidence on foreign affairs will elude the legislators unless they plan their work ahead. Both Parliament and the Ministry of External Affairs could profitably turn their attention to the following three matters, which would enormously improve debate on foreign policy:9 The essence of the consultative committee mechanism as an instrument of oversight can be gauged at three levels: 1

2

Greater Interface between Legislature and Executive: In a Parliamentary democracy, the decisions are to be seen as an extension of ‘people’s will’. Matters relating to foreign policy, though may be seen as impacting the external world, do have a resonance in so far as domestic audience is concerned. Policies on external economic relations relating to foreign aid and investment as well as foreign policy with regard to the neighbouring countries are bound to have an impact on the people of the country. The Parliament, seen as an extension of people’s representation, therefore needs to be part of a continuing interface with the government on foreign policy matters. Incorporating diversity in decision making: Parliament reflects diversity of the opinion across the political spectrum which may

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or may not concur with the established position of the government. A foreign policy crafted after due deliberation therefore carries greater sanctity and legitimacy in the eyes of the world and people. It also ensures a certain continuity that sustains even with the change in the political executive. Enhances the capacity of the Legislature: Very often foreign and security policy issues are seen as being too technocratic and specialized in nature, often leading to a disinterest in the legislature. This may often result in the government carrying out policies without an informed debate. The consultative process on the other hand albeit its limitations appeared best suited for a certain capacity expansion on foreign policy matters.

A loosely knit ‘consultative process’ therefore needs to be in place despite its limitations owing to the apparent bridges it built with the executive. In an era of coalition politics with far more competing interests, often the distinction between foreign and domestic policy gets more and more blurred as the government comes under the greater scrutiny of its own allies and the opposition. In this direction a crucial change was made with regard to the above interface by way of introducing a new system of DRSC in 1989. The DRSCs are to have the following functions: 1

2

3 4

To consider the Demands for Grants of the concerned Ministries/ Departments and make a report on the same to the Houses. The report shall not suggest anything of the nature of cut motions; To examine such bills pertaining to the concerned Ministries/ Departments as are referred to the Committee by the Chairman, Rajya Sabha, or the Speaker, as the case may be, and make report thereon; To consider Annual Report of Ministries/Departments and make report thereon; and To consider national basic long-term policy documents presented to the House, if referred to the Committee by the Chairman, Rajya Sabha, or Speaker, as the case may be, and make reports thereon.10

The Standing Committee on External Affairs was constituted on 8 April 2003. The Committee since then has 31 members out of which 21 members are nominated by the Honourable Speaker from amongst the Lok Sabha MPs and ten MPs from the Rajya Sabha are nominated by its Chairman. A Minister is not eligible to be member of the Standing Committees. If a member is appointed a Minister,

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he or she ceases to be member of the Committee. The Chairman of the Standing Committee on External Affairs is appointed by the Lok Sabha Speaker from amongst the Members of the Committee representing Lok Sabha. The tenure of the Standing Committee on External Affairs is one year from the date of its constitution, unless the Lok Sabha is dissolved earlier.11 A cursory look at the content of some of the recent Reports of the Standing Committee on External Affairs shows that the committee not only scrutinizes some important issues relating to the Ministries needs and demands but also does a critical evaluation of some of the foreign policy initiatives in a nuanced manner. For instance some of the major issues discussed in 2012–13 report included the following: 1 2 3 4 5

Ministry of Finance called upon to enhance the allocation of Ministry of External Affairs; Government asked to expedite the ongoing Projects in Afghanistan; Government criticized for providing insufficient funds for Projects in Bhutan; Slow Progress in implementation of Resettlement/Rehabilitation work in Sri Lanka criticized; Slow pace of construction of SAARC University strongly criticized.12

The trend continued with the latest Standing Committee on External Affairs which in its latest report for 2015–16 was more scathing in its criticism of MEA for not being able to pursue its case effectively with the Ministry of Finance for increased allocation of funds for international assistance programmes as well as Indian missions abroad and their being a mismatch between the role that India was expected to play in the global affairs and the enabling financial support that was required to be given to the MEA in this direction by the government.13 It is apparent therefore that the DRSC on External Affairs does not confine itself to administrative issues alone, but also takes upon itself to comment and pass remarks on specific aspects of foreign policy concern even if they may of minor implications. As a follow up the government files an action taken report which gives an update on the manner in which it has been able to follow up on the recommendations given. There is still scope for further deliberation on the issue in case the opposition is not satisfied with the progress maintained as part of the action taken. But one is not too sure if there is a further follow up on the issue.

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India and global parliamentary fora The Parliament of India as an institution also has been instrumental in direct diplomacy by engaging in several multilateral parliamentary initiatives at the global level. The more prominent ones include the InterParliamentary Union (IPU), set up in 1889, which acts as a multilateral body at the global level providing a platform for parliamentarians of the world to come together and promote ideas of democracy and cooperation. With a membership of 164, it acts as an important forum where states represented by their respective Parliaments exchange their views on parliamentary democracy and discuss issues of mutual concern. In a way, the forum provides an opportunity for soft diplomacy for member nations. India has been an active member of the IPU since 1989 and has always had a representation on all the important meetings of the association. India has led the IPU thrice since its association began, during the years 1969, 1993, and 1997. In addition, India has also been keenly associated with the Association of Secretaries General of Parliament (ASGP), which is a consultative body of IPU, which consists of senior parliamentary officers of member nations and discusses parliamentary rules and procedures across the member nations. The Secretaries General of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha are the members of this body.14 Besides, India also has been a part of Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA), which has its stated objectives as ‘promotion of rule of law, individual rights and freedoms and parliamentary democracy’. The CPA cell facilitates the visits of Parliamentary delegations to Commonwealth conferences and also coordinates the activities of the state cells. During the Fifteenth Lok Sabha, the CPA cell is recorded to have sent as many as 23 Parliamentary delegations across various parts of the world for the CPA related conferences, workshops.15 Such fora, though not having a direct bearing on the state policy, does act as effective tool in mobilizing public opinion on key issues and building informal understanding among law makers across the region.

Parliamentary deliberation While the aforementioned administrative and organizational interventions do count by way of the Parliament overseeing the conduct of foreign policy and security, the significance is seen more at the deliberative or discursive level. As a forum for national debate, Parliament perhaps provides the most comprehensive platform for discussing the issue of foreign policy and national security threadbare. In an era of live news

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and comments by bytes, the very fact that the proceedings are telecast live also enables the people to know what their respective leaders think and discuss on matters crucial for national security. There is however an important rider here. A Parliamentary debate can only be as good or as bad as the inclination and the propensity of the political class to engage on a political debate is. In the absence of such an inclination at times, such debates may turn into unnecessary confrontations and postulations which benefit none. Moreover, as seen in the recent years, both the Houses have been disrupted for days together undermining the very essence of Parliamentary democracy. Besides, what makes the issue more complicated is that a Parliamentary debate (or lack of it) becomes a precursor to the domestic political tussle that moves out of the Parliament and starts determining (rather undermining) the foreign policy consensus that earlier prevailed and the same is often done on grounds of political calculus rather than inherent merit.16 Three brief examples are taken to substantiate the point: 1

2

The Indo-US Nuclear Deal: Nuclear Issue in India has always had a general consensus among political parties with the premise that the country needs to keep its nuclear options open give the peculiar regional and international nuclear environment that it faced ever since it decided to go nuclear in the 1970s. The only exception to this were some of the left parties which were always over cautious of seeing the nuclear issue become a pretext for getting closer to the United States. Therefore, once the government showed its determination to go ahead with the Indo-US Nuclear deal, the CPI(M) withdrew support to the then UPA-I Government. While such a response from the Left was not difficult to anticipate, what was surprising was the approach of the BJP and its allies whose NDA government was credited with actually initiating the process of the deal. The Parliamentary debate on no confidence motion that followed the withdrawal of support was marred by charges of ‘cash for votes’ unheard of in the history of Parliament in India. The FDI in Retail Issue: Just as there appeared to be a near unanimity on the foreign policy and nuclear security issues, there was the perception of growing convergence on economic reforms between the two bimodal political alignments in India – the UPA and the NDA, with again the exception of the left parties. With the onset of financial meltdown, however, since 2008 and increasing domestic political fallout of austerity measures, the nature and pace of new reform measures were bound to create a political backlash. Caught in a difficult situation, the UPA II government

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decided to give a big push to the reigniting reforms by deciding to go ahead with FDI in retail. While the opposition of the Left was expected, what was surprising was the opposition by the BJP which had spoken of in principle acceptance to FDI in retail in its manifesto. This time, it was the turn of the Trinamool Congress to withdraw support. While the matter was not put up as a vote of confidence, but the government did agree to a debate on FDI in the parliament which was thankfully not marred by the unpleasant events that had taken place during the 2008 vote. The issue over condemnation of Sri Lanka’s action during the final phase of the war against the LTTE in Sri Lanka had always been a burning issue in the context of India’s domestic politics, yet it had never taken a toll on the survivability of the ruling dispensation at the centre. Just as one was coming to terms with post-LTTE stability in Indo-Lanka Relations, the revelations (most of which was already known) of the Sri Lankan Army’s atrocities on civilian populations created a furor in political circles in India and abroad. Not finding the government receptive of its demand for a stringent resolution against Sri Lanka at the United Nation Human Rights Council, the DMK, an ally of UPA II, threatened and finally withdrew support. The vagaries of political compulsions were evident as the political parties in Tamil Nadu vied with each other to show greater sympathy to the Tamil cause, often putting the position of the Central government at odds on the Sri Lankan front. Here again the matter did not go through the Parliamentary rituals as the TMC suddenly rediscovered the need for national consensus on foreign policy, forgetting its own position on the FDI-in retail and the Teesta Issue with Bangladesh.

These three cases do point to the growing dissonance within coalition partners on foreign policy issues which has had a bearing on how the Parliament dealt with the issues.

Conclusion So how does one make a sense of the unfolding dichotomy in the domestic-foreign policy linkage in the era of coalitional politics and the role that Parliament could play in the issue? It is quite apparent that the era of bimodal politics and ensuing coalitions is there to stay and therefore Parliament would continue to remain as diverse, disparate, and perhaps prone to greater disruption. Such diversity should not be seen as a challenge, but an opportunity that perhaps has the

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potential of making decision making in India more democratic, plural and accountable as also the clamour in the recent civil society resurgence shows. It is also quite apparent that foreign and security policy too cannot be kept bereft of these domestic moorings any longer and will therefore have to be brought within the ambit of wider deliberations. This calls for a ‘Common minimum agenda’ on core national issues of strategic importance on which Parliament can still help and forge a consensus. While the Parliament can help laying down the overall perspective plan on foreign policy and security issues, the task of writing the fine print must be left to the Executive with should have a continuing interface with the various other wings of social and political life of which Parliament shall continue to be a critical one.

Notes 1 Sumit Ganguly, India’s Foreign Policy: Retrospect and Prospect, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2011, p. 2. 2 M.L. Sondhi, Parliament and Indian Foreign Policy, 24 July 1976, http:// mlsondhi.org/Indian%20Foreign%20Policy/PARLIAMENT%20AND%20 INDIAN%20FOREIGN%20POLICY.htm (Accessed on 15 May 2015). 3 Ibid. 4 Statement by Shri H.V. Kamath, Constituent Assembly Debates, vol. IX, 10th August 1949, http://parliamentofindia.nic.in/ls/debates/vol9p9b.htm (Accessed on 15 September 2015). 5 Ibid. 6 J.N. Dixit, Indian Foreign Service: History and Challenge, New Delhi: Konark, 2005, p. 100. 7 Statement by H.D. Rajah, in the Parliament on the Tibet Issue 4 May 1959, www.claudearpi.net/maintenance/uploaded_pics/Rajya_Sabha_ May_4.pdf (Accessed on 20 September 2015). 8 www.claudearpi.net/maintenance/uploaded_pics/Rajya_Sabha_May_4. pdf (Accessed on 20 September 2015). 9 M.L. Sondhi, Parliament and Indian Foreign Policy, 24 July 1976, http://mlsondhi.org/Indian%20Foreign%20Policy/PARLIAMENT%20 AND%20INDIAN%20FOREIGN%20POLICY.htm (Accessed on 25 May 2016). The three areas as listed out in the article referred to these: a) India’s contribution to Peace Research, b) The Indian Image and the Socio-Cultural response to International Systemic imperatives, and c) Communication Problem of India’s Foreign Policy – Intergovernmental and Intersocietal communications. 10 See http://164.100.47.133/ls/committee/drsc05.htm#Functions (Accessed on 30 May 2016). 11 Ibid. 12 For details, see Press Release on Report on the grants for Ministry of External Affairs for 2012–13 presented on 8 May 2012.

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13 See the Tenth Report of the Standing Committee on External Affairs 2015–16, of the Sixteenth Lok Sabha, presented on 23 December 2015, http://164.100.47.134/lsscommittee/External%20Affairs/16_External_ Affairs_10.pdf (Accessed on 3 June 2016). 14 www.parliamentofindia.nic.in/ls/ipu.htm (Accessed on 30 May 2016). 15 http://164.100.47.132/LssNew/CPA/visit_abroad.pdf (Accessed on 30 May 2016). 16 Teresita a Schaffer, India’s Foreign Policy, www.brookings.edu/blogs/upfront/posts/2013/04/02-india-foreign-policy-domestic-schaffer-schaffer (Accessed on 1 June 2016).

17 Parliament as a spectacle Politics by other means Smita Gupta

Parliaments around the world are cacophonous, chaotic, and, generally, partisan. It is in this melee that laws are made, budgets approved, governments called to account, and critical national issues flagged and debated. The tone is, more often than not, combative: only governments in trouble, or those that need help to pass a tricky piece of legislation, sound conciliatory. Occasionally, some exchanges on the floor of the House are deemed to have crossed the red line; these exchanges are described as unparliamentary and offending MPs are asked to withdraw their remarks that are then expunged from the records. Historically, Parliament is a place where quick-wittedness and humour, sometimes bordering on the uncivil, has always trumped decorum, as competing ideas and interest groups battle for space. By its very nature, it is an adversarial rather than a consensual forum, as opposition parties seek to place before the people alternate points of view from that of the government of the day in the hope that they will, in due course, replace the ruling party or coalition – as the case may be – in the next general elections. The Indian Parliament is no exception. Sit in the galleries high above the green chamber of the Lok Sabha, or the red one of the Rajya Sabha, and watch, when Parliament is in session, scenes from the never-ending drama of the world’s largest democracy at work, changing with bewildering rapidity. As political parties joust with each other to push forward concerns most important to their constituents, passions rise and ebb. Walkouts, storming the well of the House, shouting slogans, holding up placards, and demanding adjournments are all par for the course. The occasional disruption to draw attention to matters of urgent importance may have some justification but, over the last two and a half decades, the proliferation of political parties in India, and the competition posed to them by a growing number of other non-parliamentary

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actors in the arena of policy making – once almost exclusively the preserve of Parliament – has added to the babble. New devices of communication have become available and political parties have begun to resort to increasingly more raucous – even bordering on the violent – methods to make a point, as the Congress’s L. Rajagopal did in the Fifteenth Lok Sabha when he used a can of pepper spray in the Lok Sabha to oppose the introduction of the Bill whose passage would give sanction to the creation of a new state of Telangana. The incident turned the Lower House literally into a battlefield: the shards of glass, broken microphones, and noxious fumes that even led to hospitalisation of some members shocked the nation, and resulted in the suspension of sixteen MPs and the expulsion of Mr Rajagopal. Veteran Communist Party of India leader Gurudas Dasgupta, who has been a member of both Houses – thrice in the Rajya Sabha and twice in the Lok Sabha – said in an interview, a day later, ‘When I came to Parliament (in 1985), it was much better. Acrimony during debates was there but the House wasn’t converted into a boxing ring. Now, articulation has been replaced by lung power.’1 But it isn’t just that MPs have given the go-by to the rules that govern the conduct of business in Parliament; many senior politicians like Mr Dasgupta feel governments, too, have contributed to the culture of obstructionism, if indirectly. In the interview quoted in the previous paragraph, he said: there’s a subtle effort by the government to reduce sittings of the House. Parliament is meant for government business but it is also the highest forum for raising public issues. . . . A day may come when Parliament may be reduced to signing registers and going home, without a word of discussion, drawing a daily allowance and monthly salary for being present in the House. The then Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, Arun Jaitley,2 had expressed similar views in an article written in 2011: To meet for less than 70 days in a year is inadequate. Short durations lead to paucity of time available for debates, issues of public importance and legislation. When members, particularly from the opposition, want to raise several issues, the privilege is denied for paucity of time. The gagging of debate leads to obstructionism. Parliamentary obstructionism then becomes an acceptable mode to highlight an issue of public importance. More time is lost. Legislations are then cleared in haste in order to cover up the backlog.

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Smita Gupta There have been suggestions in recent years to legislatively provide for a minimum 100 days’ session every year.3

But despite the growing recognition that they are confronting a serious problem, political parties have yet to address it frontally. Meanwhile, the Indian Parliament is gradually being reduced to a spectacle, a set of exclamation marks or, in some cases, question marks. As drama overshadows the substance, attention is shifting to non-parliamentary actors – dangerously undermining the significance of Parliament in the world’s largest democracy. The lack of time means that, inevitably, the government of the day prioritises what is its major concern – the passage of legislation – leaving very little time for the debate and discussion in which the opposition – indeed, even ruling party MPs – could have its say. Opposition MPs, then, only too often, begin to resort to grandstanding to attract both favourable attention and attract applause not just from the media but also from their constituencies.

The transformation In India’s first two decades as an independent nation, in the 1950s and 1960s, Parliament sat for 120–140 days a year; today, the average is half that figure. Indeed, the Fifteenth Lok Sabha lost over one-third of the scheduled hours to disruptions. If each of the first three Lok Sabhas logged over 3,700 hours in the House, in January 2014, when the Fifteenth Lok Sabha had just one session left, it had sat for less than 1,350 hours.4 The First Lok Sabha passed on an average of 72 bills each year; in the Fifteenth Lok Sabha, that figure dropped to 36.5 Budgets are now almost routinely approved virtually without any discussion: indeed, in the first half of the budget session that ended on 22 March 2013, the Rajya Sabha returned the budget without any discussion at all. Question Hour – the one hour allocated at the start of the day for ministers to respond to questions of national importance – is frequently disrupted by MPs anxious to commence Zero Hour that begins an hour later, so that they can raise issues that they believe are of more pressing concern. By obstructing Question Hour, the opposition denies the government the time to place its point of view before the house, give clarifications to questions that, ironically enough, it has asked. Indeed, the lack of time has affected the level of deliberation on the Bills that are passed. Over a third of all Bills passed by the Fifteenth Lok Sabha witnessed less than one hour of debate. These include key Bills such

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as the one that protects women from sexual harassment at workplace, which was passed without any debate early in 2014. If the Indian Parliament has begun to appear more chaotic and noisy in recent years than its counterparts elsewhere in the world, one reason is the increasing number of political parties functioning in the country. In the Fifteenth Lok Sabha, for instance, there were as many as 38 political parties represented in the Lok Sabha; 12 of them had at least 9 members or more; in other words, enough to make their presence felt. These parties represented different ideologies and regions, not to mention different caste and class interests, all of which they ensured were reflected on the floor of the House. So, when MPs of the DMK and the AIADMK blocked the proceedings of Parliament in the first half of the budget session in 2013 to foreground human rights violations of Tamils in Sri Lanka, the parties’ critics could accuse them of grandstanding, but they were highlighting an issue that struck a chord with their voters in Tamil Nadu. When MPs from Telangana marched into the well of the House in that same session demanding the early formation of a separate state, they were reflecting what people from the region they represented wanted. When Bahujan Samaj Party MPs disrupted the house asking for early implementation of reservation in promotions for scheduled castes, they highlighted a key demand of their core constituents. And when Samajwadi Party MPs crossed swords with the BSP on this issue, they were seeking to protect the interests of the OBCs who would be adversely affected by such a decision. MPs, after all, are sent to Parliament by the people to voice their concerns, to fight their battles – and when there isn’t enough time to have a deliberative discussion, they tend to flag issues or make their points in a manner in an abbreviated way, something that makes for an effective sound byte suitable for television audiences. So while a larger number of political parties has made Parliament more representative, giving it greater legitimacy, making it the only institution in the country that truly reflects not just every region but every section of society, that cannot be an end in itself. For Parliament’s importance lies in its being the focal point for national debates: it is a body for deliberation and discussion, a process through which policy is made, and laws crafted. Slogan shouting cannot be a substitute for substantive debates; obstructing the proceedings of Parliament – or grandstanding to attract attention to an issue important to a party’s support base – cannot become the only method through which parties express their views in that forum, just as a text message on a mobile phone cannot replace a conversation, or a 140-word tweet take the place of a reasoned argument.

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But this is precisely what is happening: the space for meaningful debate has shrunk and, consequently, has added to the reasons why politicians as a class are viewed negatively, as the rise of the apparently ‘non-political’ Aam Aadmi Party has demonstrated. The latter’s success lay in its representatives initially seeming to be unlike traditional politicians. Much of that appeal has faded since but clearly, today, both politics and politicians stand diminished.6 ‘It is a matter of agony for the Presiding Officers that several legislations of far-reaching importance and significance are passed by Parliament without any serious discussion,’ said former Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee delivering the Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Lecture entitled ‘Status of Parliamentary Democracy in India’, at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi on 14 November 2007. ‘The most glaring instance,’ he continued, where the concept of executive accountability to Parliament is compromised is with regard to the management of the financial business of government, including the presentation, discussion and passage of the budgetary proposals, the demand for grants and others. There is a growing feeling of resentment and concern when the budget of a billion-plus people is passed without any discussion due to disruption of proceedings.7 In a statement to the media on 7 September 2012 – the closing day of the monsoon session that year – former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said, We take pride in the fact, that we, since independence, have been a practising, functioning democracy. What we have witnessed in this session is a total negation of that, and all right-thinking people in our country should stand up and unitedly come up with the voice that come what may, Parliamentary institutions must be allowed to function with the norms as we have known them since India became independent.8 Referring to the report of the Comptroller and Auditor General on coal block allocations, he continued: We have great respect for the institution of CAG, but if we do respect this institution, we must be willing to debate its finding in the Public Accounts Committee or even on the floor of Parliament which we have always been willing.’ Frontally attacking

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the BJP, he added, ‘The Opposition chose not to take advantage of the subtle institutional practices dealing with the reports of CAG and insisted on disrupting Parliament. This is negation of democracy. . . . If this thought process is allowed to gain momentum it will be a grave violation of Parliamentary politics as we have understood (it).9 But there is a counter-argument to this: Mr Jaitley wrote in 2012, Parliamentary obstructionism should be avoided. It is a weapon to be used in the rarest of the rare cases. . . . If parliamentary accountability is subverted and a debate is intended to be used merely to put a lid on parliamentary accountability, it is then a legitimate tactic for the Opposition to expose the government through parliamentary instruments available at its command.10 Of course, the same Mr Jaitley discovered in the Sixteenth Lok Sabha – when his party came to power – that the boot could be on the other foot. Shortly after two key reform bills on coal and mines got parliamentary approval in March 2015, Mr Jaitley – now union finance minister – criticised the Congress, saying the politics of ‘obstructionism’ practised by that party had ‘failed.’ ‘It is an important day for Indian democracy, Parliament and Indian economy as the politics of obstructionism led by Congress failed today,’ he said, adding that the strength of Indian democracy and better sense of the country’s law makers had prevailed. Clearly, some degree of obstructionism has always been there in Parliament, but there can be no justification for wasting over a third of the scheduled hours, as statistics for the Fifteenth Lok Sabha reveal. Indeed, it would suggest that disruptions have become an end in itself, subtly – and adversely – changing the purpose and character of Parliament. In a critique of Mr Jaitley’s argument in favour of parliamentary disruptions, Tarunabh Khaitan, who teaches law at Oxford University, wrote in an article entitled ‘The Real Price of Parliamentary Obstruction’: Obstruction is certainly not a “parliamentary instrument” made available to members by the rules of the Houses. Nor is it morally defensible, at least in the manner and form in which obstruction is practised in our legislative bodies. Parliamentary obstruction in India has effectively substituted the constitutionally mandated

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Factors responsible for downgrading Parliament A number of complex factors – political, economic, social, and technical – have contributed to the downgrading of Parliament as the premier forum for debate and policy making. If the polity changed dramatically, with the political arena suddenly finding itself populated by a rapidly growing number of parties with conflicting agendas, all struggling to make their voices heard in Parliament, departmentalrelated Standing Committees, the televising of parliamentary proceedings, political activism by the courts, and even bodies such as the CAG, the exponential increase in 24-hour TV news channels and the ubiquitous role of the social media that has transformed the communication business, a burgeoning new policy community representing civil society as well as big business have all brought conflicting pressures on the government, adding to the chaos. As Indian democracy deepened and political parties proliferated, especially over the last two and a half decades, new actors entered the arena of policy making. Earlier, MPs were the major mediators between the people and the crafting of national policies: as representatives of the people, they spoke for them, and reflected their aspirations. Now, it is not just the larger number of political parties that have added to the noise, new actors in the shape of advocacy groups, NGOs, civil rights groups, environmentalists, industry lobbyists, and social protestors have entered the fray. With so many conversations in the public space, MPs appear to be in retreat, focusing entirely on how to get re-elected, concentrating on communicating to their own constituents, with the televising of parliamentary proceedings a handy – and instantaneous – tool of communication. The polity has changed almost entirely: for the first four decades after independence, barring the Janata Party government that ruled the country between 1977 and 1979, the Congress dominated the political arena – and Parliament. Jawaharlal Nehru actively promoted and encouraged his political opponents to speak their minds as he believed that dissent was essential for the functioning of a healthy democracy. However, this dissent did not represent a real threat to the Congress, as the numbers – and the public support it represented – were with the Congress.

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The first real stirrings of a challenge to the Congress came in 1989 when the Vishwanath Pratap Singh-led National Front government came to power, and the Bharatiya Janata Party went from 2 to over 80 seats in Parliament. The 1990s witnessed two events that, in very different ways, fundamentally changed the India that won independence in 1947. The first was the process of economic liberalisation and globalisation set in motion between 1991 and 1996 by the Congress government led by P.V. Narasimha Rao, a process that transformed India, creating an impatient, aspirational class, obsessed with its own well-being and improvement; the second was the destruction of the Babri Masjid in Uttar Pradesh’s Faizabad district on 6 December 1992 that helped – in large measure – to push the other national party, the BJP, to the political centre stage. The 1990s also saw the rise of subaltern politics, with Lalu Prasad Yadav, Mulayam Singh Yadav, and Mayawati setting the political and social agendas in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh respectively. A majority of the representatives of these parties belonged to sections of society that had long been suppressed – and Parliament gave them a forum that placed them in the spotlight. How did these political challenges impact Parliament? If the Congress now had to deal with another national party, the BJP, one that came to power at the head of the National Democratic Alliance and was in power between 1998 and 2004, the two national parties also had to deal with a whole range of smaller, largely regional parties snapping at their feet with a host of new agendas. As politics became more competitive, it suited those in the opposition not to give the government of the day that much time to state its case in Parliament, inform the public about its achievements, legitimise its policies, or demonstrate its leadership. Faced with a hostile opposition, uncooperative allies, and an increasingly fractious environment, the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government (2004–2014) – like its predecessor, the BJPled NDA – had retaliated by concentrating on the essentials, pushing through financial business and key laws, striking out-of-house deals to do so, in the process, sacrificing the debates that are the heartbeat of democracy; the number of laws that were passed also shrank. Discussions among political parties took place, but these were private meetings between the government’s parliamentary managers and opposition leaders, the one trying to persuade and offer baits, the latter making demands. The focus shifted to deal-making, trying to get Parliament to function, even if barely. The UPA government even set up a Group of Ministers to deal with the media to explain, from time to time, what it was seeking to do in

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Parliament. Two key press conferences it called in its second tenure were on the Lok Pal Bill in 2011 and on the issue of human rights violations of Sri Lankan Tamils and the demand by the Dravidian parties for a parliamentary resolution on the issue in 2013. But while such press conferences proved useful in telling people what the government was trying to do it was not an effective substitute for parliamentary debate. Questions at a press conference are asked by journalists, not opposition MPs. In a debate, the parties challenge and respond to one another, modifying their views in the process. Many voices are heard, many conversations take place, unlike at a government briefing, where once the message has been scripted, the challenge is to deliver it, unfiltered and unchanged. If the BJP had perfected the art of obstructing Parliament when the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government was ruling the country, the latter is currently trying to imitate the BJP – that is now in power – especially as it has been reduced in the Lok Sabha to double digits.

Other factors Other measures, some with very different intentions, also contributed to the downgrading of parliamentary discussions. One was the departmentally related Standing Committees: initially, on 18 August 1989, three Subject Committees, the Committee on Agriculture, the Committee on Science and Technology and the Committee on Environment and Forests were set up as an experiment to enhance executive accountability. Subsequently, encouraged by the performance of these three Committees, a comprehensive system of seventeen departmentally related Standing Committees was set up in April 1993, covering all Central Government Ministries/ Departments. The Standing Committees were restructured during the Fourteenth Lok Sabha in July 2004 and the number of DRSCs was increased from 17 to 24. What do these DRSCs do? They consider the Demands for Grants of the concerned Ministries/Departments and report on them to the Houses; examine Bills pertaining to the concerned Ministries/Departments that are referred to them by the Chairman, Rajya Sabha, or the Speaker, Lok Sabha, and make reports thereon; consider annual reports of Ministries/Departments and make reports thereon; and consider national basic long-term policy documents presented to the Houses, if referred to the Committee by the Chairman, Rajya Sabha, or the Speaker, Lok Sabha, as the case may be, and make reports thereon.

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The impact of this was that much of the substantive discussions and debate shifted to these Standing Committees, leaving the parliamentary floor to rabble-rousing and grandstanding. MPs, cutting across party lines, have told this writer that the atmosphere in these committees is, by and large, serious and issues are discussed threadbare, quite unlike what is witnessed on the floor of Parliament. But all this is happening offline, so to speak. Interestingly, among the reasons for setting up such Standing Committees – apart from improving executive accountability – was that MPs would focus on the issues, not on making news, if such discussions took place on camera. That may have been achieved, but it has left Parliament that much poorer – as the debates within the Standing Committees are not seen by the public. Around the same time, with the object of bringing Parliament ‘nearer to the people,’ it was decided that its proceedings would be televised. The Address by the President to the members of the two Houses of Parliament was telecast live for the first time on 20 December 1989 and subsequently in 1990. It was the Congress’s Shivraj Patil as Lok Sabha Speaker who mooted for the first time a comprehensive proposal ‘highlighting the feasibility, technical viability, modalities and the general advantages of telecasting parliamentary proceedings.’ Since 25 August 1994, Lok Sabha proceedings have been telecast live. It was hoped at the time that the fact that MPs could now be watched – and judged – by their voters would make them better behaved: indeed, one of the concerns that were expressed at the time that even ‘unparliamentary exchanges’ that are subsequently expunged would be on view. But what happened in reality was that MPs wanted their constituents back home to know that they were fighting their causes, protecting their interests – and they were doing it vigorously. The focus inevitably shifted from the serious to the theatrical. Simultaneously, the last two and a half decades have seen an exponential increase in 24-hour news channels that have begun to influence the working of the print media as well. There is a vast web of communications tools, including the world of social media that MPs are still grappling with. Television, where the visual is more important than the auditory, has dumbed down the news: it is more effective to show MPs shouting slogans in the Lok Sabha than to show excerpts of a meaningful speech. And TV talk shows are increasingly becoming a substitute for parliamentary debates, talk shows where the anchor’s predilections act as a filter for what is received by the viewer. When I started covering Parliament in early 1986, print journalists sat through lengthy debates, reporting them faithfully; now, taking a cue from TV, the press galleries are full only when there is some

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‘action’ in the house, or the budget, a no-confidence motion, or a bill that has aroused popular special interest is being discussed. Even news agency reporters who, earlier, would record everything in detail now send out very sketchy dispatches. MPs, as a result, have been affected by the nature of the coverage. And now, only too often, press briefings by political parties focus on what was said in the house, or what their members were not allowed to say because of disruptions. There are even jokes about the most publicity-hungry MPs who rush out of the building every now and then to the bank of TV cameras positioned there to say their bit: one senior MP even said that sometimes TV journalists humour members of his tribe by simply positioning a camera before them without actually switching them on. A few years ago I briefly anchored a programme on Lok Sabha TV during the session: the mandate was to discuss the key issues taken up during the week with a set of MPs. And, unlike the private channels, where the focus is on the articulate and personable, I was told that I must invite MPs from all parties, by turns, so that everyone got a chance. After the bigger parties, when I got around to the smaller parties, many of these MPs expressed their gratitude at being given a forum in which to air their views on national issues: a few even told me that they had never received an opportunity to speak in the house. In the process, I found myself getting educated. As the world has shrunk, and the number of voices in the public space has grown, thanks to a range of new communication tools, the range of actors who want to mediate in the making of laws and policy – once the domain of Parliament – has grown. For the government, taking a decision is far more complicated than it was before. In recent years, as the government struggled to enact laws on land acquisition or food security, or set up a Lok Pal, the debates taking place inside Parliament were overshadowed by those outside, with even the courts and constitutional bodies such as the CAG laying the line down on policy issues on subjects such as the sale of spectrum. The competition has also meant that to attract attention, some amount of grandstanding in inevitable. In the case of the Lok Pal Bill, the government faced with the Anna Hazare movement and its demand for a Jan Lok Pal Bill took the unprecedented step in April 2011 of including members of the group in the official drafting committee.12 In the end, it did not work out in the way it was expected to, and a government draft went to the Standing Committee of Parliament attached to the Personnel Ministry. It was passed, eventually in the Lok Sabha in December 2011, even though the government failed to give it constitutional status. But it took the UPA

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government another two years to push it through the Rajya Sabha, as some opposition parties who had voted for it in the Lok Sabha changed their minds later on some of the Bill’s provisions. It is little wonder that the UPA government, which had to take the brunt of criticism on the contents of the Bill, spent an inordinate amount of time in the closing year of its tenure looking for ways to get this Bill – and others that it considered important – through without too much real discussion.

Impact of the liberalisation of the economy If part of the problem in passing legislation is that the opposition – even when publicly in agreement with the government on the objectives of a certain Bill – tries to slow down the process of its passage merely to make its prime movers look bad, the liberalisation of the economy has also added to the problems of the government of the day. It has meant that, in many cases, the voices of industry have to be heard as much as those of the people or the NGOs, not to mention the lobbyists, and these groups are often at loggerheads. A few years ago, as the then Union environment minister, Jairam Ramesh, decided to hold a series of public meetings across the country on the controversial Bt Brinjal that had been cleared by the country’s bio-technology regulator for its commercial cultivation. The meetings were attended by various stakeholders including scientists, agriculture experts, farmers’ organisations, consumer groups, and NGOs who had opposed the genetically modified brinjal. In the end, a moratorium was imposed on Bt Brinjal by Mr Ramesh in February 2010. Without going into the merits of the decision that was eventually taken, it is interesting what the consultation process revealed – farmers groups were divided, the scientific community was divided, industry was for it, and the state governments that Mr Ramesh quoted in his Speaking Order at the end of the process – cutting across political lines – were all opposed to it. Even though the government did not go through with it, two years later, in 2012, a parliamentary panel recommended a probe into the issue of Bt Brinjal, saying that adequate tests had not been carried out and the approval committee was under ‘tremendous pressure’ from the ‘industry and a minister’ to approve it. With so many new actors putting pressure on governments, the emerging policy environment is making it increasingly difficult for governments to make and implement decisions. Engaging in an open debate over key issues, as Mr Ramesh did, was unproductive, with trained advocacy experts scattering public opinion and putting the government on the defensive.

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Conclusion ‘Intolerance, divisiveness, corruption, confrontations and disrespect to dissent are increasingly vitiating our socio-political system,’ former Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee said in 2007, stressing: Added to this is the attempt by some institutions to malign and marginalise important people’s forums with intent to occupy larger space than what is ideally feasible or constitutionally permissible in a representative democratic system. Judicial activism is sought to be justified because of the perceived decline in the effectiveness of parliamentary accountability. Frequent interventions in the exclusive jurisdiction of the legislature will only contribute to further eroding the authority of Parliament.13 So, today, Parliament, which used to be the primary forum for discussions aimed at identifying the public interest and the actions that government might take in order to promote the public interest in specific circumstances, now has a host of competitors. The discussions may not always have been entirely disinterested, but Parliament was where MPs – who represented the people – came together to debate rival views, leading in some cases to a convergence of views as opposition parties modified government plans, or the government succeeded in bringing the opposition round to its point of view in a spirit of give and take.14 Parliament is important because it provides an institutionalised context for discussion by people who represent all sections of the people across the country. There is a greater legitimacy to their discussions than that of the many other groups that have sprung outside claiming that they represent the people. After all, MPs have been elected to office, and Parliament is a reproduction in miniature of the larger polity. All other claimants are only self-styled representatives. Debate in Parliament not only aims at convergence to a common view; it also provides information on the subject at hand in order that each representative can clarify his or her own view and vote accordingly. Disruptions in Parliament, therefore, occur either because of opposition to some government-sponsored draft legislation – or some aspect of it – or because some political party – or parties feel that some current, non-legislative issue deserves priority. Opposition parties need to act as a break on the government if, in their opinion, the government is attempting to pass a law with dangerous consequences. Simultaneously, raising non-legislative issues and grievances is an important

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representative function. Unfortunately, a combination of lack of time and something approaching a breakdown of relations between government and opposition has begun to make this difficult. Grandstanding is inevitable. It is also not true that MPs are less educated than they once were, as middle-class India would like to believe. On the contrary, the percentage of MPs without secondary education has decreased from 23 per cent in 1952 to 3 per cent in 2009; the percentage of graduates – and that includes postgraduates and doctorates – has gone up from 58 per cent in 1952 to 79 per cent in 2009. What also distinguishes Parliament from other forums – especially in India – is that it is truly representative of the many linguistic, economic, religious, and caste groups that populate the country: it may not be perfect but it has a far greater legitimacy in being the arbiter of decisions and ruling on the public good. It does not matter that politics is adversarial – that is how it should be. Too much consensus would imply cartelisation, unhealthy for a democracy. Parliament, by ceding space to non-parliamentary actors, is only vitiating the process of decision making, converting the nation’s most powerful forum into a spectacle. In the process, people are gradually beginning to lose faith in parliamentary democracy – and a host of new actors, as well as traditional politicians, are resorting to other means to gain support. This is a dangerous trend for Indian democracy, and it is for the MPs themselves to make the change: some signs of this realisation are visible in 2016. But the government and opposition need to sit together both to increase the sittings of Parliament – so that both sides get time to perform their functions – as well as learn to build a healthy working relationship. If the burden of responsibility falls on the government of the day, the opposition must also learn when grandstanding pays and when it deteriorates into mere obstructionism.

Notes 1 Mohua Chatterjee, ‘If Parliament’s Impaired, Indian Democracy in Great Peril: Gurudas Dasgupta’, The Times of India, 15 February 2014. 2 Arun Jaitley has been Union Finance Minister in the BJP-led NDA government following the sixteenth general election in May 2014. 3 Arun Jaitley, ‘Checking on the House’, The Indian Express, 25 April 2011. 4 M.R. Madhavan, ‘How to Make India’s Parliament More Accountable’, The Financial Express, 7 January 2014. 5 www.prsindia.org/parliamenttrack/parliament-updates/legislativebusiness-in-the-15th-lok-sabha-3251/ (Accessed on 17 May 2016).

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6 For an analysis, see Ajay K. Mehra, ‘AAP and After’, Uday India, 21–28 February 2015. 7 www.jnu.ac.in/JNUNewsArchives/JNUNews_Nov_Dec07/seminars.htm (Accessed on 17 May 2016). 8 www.thehindu.com/news/resources/transcript-of-pms-statement-to-mediaoutside-parliament/article3870885.ece (Accessed on 17 May 2016). 9 Parliament could work only for six out of nineteen days of sittings in that session as the BJP continued to demand the Prime Minister’s resignation besides cancellation of coal block allotments and setting up of independent inquiry. 10 www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-opinion/defending-the-indefensible/ article3829561.ece (Accessed on 17 May 2016). 11 http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2215859 (Accessed on 17 May 2016). 12 Anna Hazare, a social activist, started a hunger strike to pressure the government to enact a stringent Lok Pal Bill. For a detailed analysis, see Ajay K. Mehra, ‘Anna’s Anguish and Augury’, Uday India, 30 April 2011 and ‘India’s Rise Against Corruption: A View Beyond Anna Hazare’, Uday India, 10 September 2011. 13 Somnath Chatterjee, ‘Parliamentary Democracy and Some Challenges’, www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-opinion/Parliamentary-democracyamp-some-challenges/article14875518.ece (Accessed on 17 May 2016). 14 www.jnu.ac.in/JNUNewsArchives/JNUNews_Nov_Dec07/seminars.htm (Accessed on 17 May 2016).

Index

Page numbers in italic indicate a figure. accountability 163–181; and delegation 169–170; device 170–172; enforcing responsibility 184–199; job specifications 165–167; measuring decline and failure 176–181; opposition and 203–214; overview 18–23; party mobilization and 165; structuring 167–169 Adjournment Motions 47 Administrative Reforms Commission: first 50–51; second 52, 56, 198 Administrative Tribunals Act 1985 318 adversarial politics 153 Agarwal, Arun 199 agonistic pluralism 95 AIADMK 148 Alemao, Churchill 124 All India Institute of Medical Sciences (Amendment) Bill 48 All-India Services 9 Ambedkar, B. R. 99–100, 315 Ansari, Hamid 99, 197 anti-defection law 70, 153, 172, 177, 196–197 Appropriation Act 320 Arora, Balveer 107 Arter, David 166 ASGP see Association of Secretaries General of Parliament (ASGP) Asoka Mehta Committee 278 Asom Gana Parishad 189

Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) 55, 57–58, 295, 297–298 Association of Secretaries General of Parliament (ASGP) 337 Attlee, Clement 218 Attorney-General 38 Austin, Granville 276–277 autonomy of Parliament 191–192, 195 Azad, Kirti 296–297 backward classes 140, 143–144 Bahujans 144 Balakrishnan, K. G. 126 Balavantrai Mehta Committee 278 Bansal, Pawan Kumar 121 Behar, Amitabh 154 Benami Transaction (Prohibition) Act 241 Bharatiya Jan Sangh 38 Bombay Bullion Association 122 Brahmins 142–143 British Parliament 300 Budget Estimates of Parliament Secretariats 319–320 Call Attention Motions 47 capturing polling booths 114 Carey, John M. 165 Carlyle, Thomas 297 Cash for Questions 120–124 caste composition of MPs 141–143; backward classes 143–144; Bahujans 144; Brahmins 142–143

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central government decisions: non-applicability to Parliament Secretariats 319 Central Legislative Council 2 Central Vigilance Commission Act 2003 241 Chacko, P. C. 102 Chagla, M. C. 40 Chakravarty, Praveen 292 Chapter IXA of the IPC 52 Chavan, Y. B. 207 Chemical Weapons Regulation (Amendment) Bill 48 Chidambaram, P. 298 Chief Election Commissioner 53 Chief Justice of India (CJI) 66 Chopra, Pran 12 Chowdhury, Renuka 148 citizenship surveys in England 300 Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT) 306 coalition: collective responsibility of Cabinet 195–196; era of 189; state level parties and 73–74 Code of Conduct 49–50 committee system 49 Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA) 337 Communist Party of India (CPI) 38 Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI-M) 27, 189, 264, 338 community development programme 40 Competition Commission of India Act, 2003 242 Confidence Motions (CM) 251–269; fragmented legislature and unstable minority governments (1990s) 261, 261–264, 262; legislative suppression and majority governments (1970s and 1980s) 258–261, 259–260; loose bipolar legislature and stable minority governments (1999 and beyond) 264–265, 265–266; overview 251–253; relative equilibrium and majority governments (1950s-1960s) 254, 254–258 Congress 3, 25, 30, 38; secular alternative to 189

Congress Socialist Party 189 Consolidated Fund of India 320 Constituent Assembly 3–4, 37, 56; Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRI) and 276–279; Parliament Secretariat and 315–316 Constitution 37, 39; Article 98 317; Article 98 (2) 318; Article 98 (3) 318; Article 105(3) 123; Article 118 316; Article 122 316; Article 143 234; Article 226 123; Article 309 317; Article 352 9; Article 356 10; Drafting Committee 316–317; Ninety-First Amendment 198; Secretariat of Parliament under 316–317; Seventy-Fourth Amendment of 279; Seventy-Third Amendment of 275, 279; SixtyFourth Amendment of 279; tenth schedule of 70 Constitutional Amendment Act: Fifty-Second 66, 77; Ninety-First 198; Ninety-Ninth 2014, 66 Constitution Amendment Bill 293 consultative committees 41 cooperation, parliamentary staff 327–328 coordination, parliamentary staff 327–328 corruption 40–41; charges against MPs 72 corrupt practices 113–114 cost of Parliament 58 Council of States Secretariat 315 CPA see Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA) CPI see Communist Party of India (CPI) CPI-M see Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI-M) Crerar, James 313 criminal cases, against MPs 115–119, 116, 118 criminalization of politics 51–56, 114–120; candidates with criminal record 115; capturing polling booths 114; data on criminal cases against the MPs 115–119, 116, 118; poll financing 119–120; three dimensions 114

Index CSAT see Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT) Dahl, Robert 204–205 Daphtary, C. K. 38 Dasgupta, Gurudas 27, 343 decline, reasons why Parliament in a state of see state of decline, reasons why Parliament in delegated legislation 233–247; constitutional law 234–235; judicial control 234–235, 243–247; overview 233–234; parliamentary control of 236–243; weak legislative control over 237–243 Delhi Development Act 1957 241 Delhi Laws Act 234–235 deliberation, foreign and security policy 337–339 deliberative democracy 163–164 de-linking of state and Parliament elections 43–44 democratic transition between 1947–1954, Parliament Secretariat during 314–315 democratization of Parliament 135–156; context of 145–147; North-South divide 147–148 Department-Related Standing Committee (DRSC): Chairman of 323; Dua on 193; foreign and security policy 335–336; functions of 323, 335; National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution on 193 Deshmukh, C. D. 91 Deve Gowda, H.D. 23, 264 Dikshit, Sandeep 304 Directive Principles of State Policy 40, 66, 243–244, 277 disruptions, in Parliament 46, 218–229; early years 222–224; evolution 219–222; media outrage due to 293; overview 218–219; reasons of 226–229; taking centre stage 224–226 DMK 148 doctrine of checks and balances 65

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doctrine of separation of powers 65 downgrading Parliament, factors responsible for 348–353 Dua, B.D. 11 ECI see Election Commission of India (ECI) Economic Times, The 294 Eden, Anthony 107 educational qualifications of MPs 45, 220–221 Eighty-First Constitutional Amendment Bill 112 election: de-linking of state and Parliament 43–44; financing 119–120; Rajya Sabha 45 Election Commission of India (ECI) 52–56, 114–115, 117, 120 Electricity Act 2002 242 Emergency under Article 352 9 Energy Conservation Act 2001 242 England: citizenship surveys in 300; electronic petitions in 300 English vs. Hindi 221–222 ethics 49–51 Ethics Committee 50 evolution of Parliament 1–3; stages of 137–145 executive: accountability of 68–69, 312; legislative oversight of 68; and legislature 66–68 Facebook 305 FDI see foreign direct investment (FDI) financial autonomy, of Parliament Secretariats 319–320 floor management 167, 181, 327 Food and Standards Act 2006 242 foreign and security policy 330–339; consultative committees 334–335; DRSC 335–336; global parliamentary initiatives 337; parliamentary deliberation 337–339; Standing Committee on External Affairs 335–336 foreign direct investment (FDI): in retail sector 102, 338–339 formative years, 1952–1972 37–42

360

Index

fragmented legislature and unstable minority governments (1990s) 261, 261–264, 262 Gadgil, N.V. 91 Gandhi, Feroze 13, 39–40, 47 Gandhi, Gopal Krishna 299–300 Gandhi, Indira 23, 43–44 Gandhi, Rahul 295, 297, 304 Gandhi, Rajiv 25, 108, 279 Gandhi, Sonia 265, 307 Gandhi-topied Congressmen 38 Gaonkar, Dileep 90, 92 Gazette of India 236 gender representation 109–113 Ghose, P.C. 10 golden period of Parliament 64–65 Gopalan, A.K. 224 Government Chief Whip see Parliamentary Affairs Minister Government of India Act (1909) 2 Government of India Act (1919) 2 Government of India Act (1935) 2 Gowda, Rajeev 113 grammar of politics 96 Guha, Ranajit 96 guns, to MPs 14, 57–58 Gupta, Shekhar 103 Guwahati High Court 48 Hanumanthaiya, K. 50–51 Hardgrave, Robert L., Jr. 108 Hazare, Anna 72, 103, 200, 300, 352 Helms, Ludger 205 Hindi Chini Bhai Bhai 41 Hindi vs. English 221–222 Hindu 141; Brahmins 142–143 Hindu Code Bill 40 Hindu Mahasabha 38 Hindu upper caste representation 143 Houses: parliamentary staff servicing 321–322 humour in Parliamentary proceedings 296–297 identity groups: politicisation and mobilisation of 61; transformation of 61 Imperial Legislative Council 2

INC see Indian National Congress (INC) India Against Corruption (IAC) 96, 300 Indian Constitution, The (Khosla) 12 Indian Councils Act (1861) 1 Indian Councils Act (1892) 1–2 Indian Express, The 292 Indian National Congress (INC) 1–3, 298; see also Congress Indian Parliament: A Comparative Perspective, The (Kumar) 10 Indian Parliament: A Comparative perspective, The (Mehra and Kueck) 11 Indian Parliament: A Critical Appraisal, The (Pai and Kumar) 11 Indian Parliament: The Changing Landscape, The (Dua, Singh and Saxena) 11 Indo-US Nuclear Deal 338 Information Technology (Intermediaries Guidelines) Rules 2011 241 In Re: The Delhi Laws Act 1912 234 institutional decline 64–70 Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority Act 1999 242 Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) 337 IPU see Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) Jain, D.K. 126 Jaitley, Arun 104, 241, 298, 343 Janata Dal 189 Janata Party 207 Jan Lok Pal Bill 352 Jethmalani, Ram 123 Jha, Rajesh 191 JMM bribery case 122–123 job specifications, Parliament 165– 167; checks 165; decisiveness 165; deliberation 165; information 165; representation 165 Joint Select Committees 191 Joshi, Devin 88, 92 journalists 293; social networking sites and 305

Index judicial activism 66 Judicial Appointments Bill 293–294 judicial control, on delegated legislation 234–235; weak, implications of 243–247 judicially crafted rights 66 judicial ‘over-reach’ 66 Kamat, H.V. 91, 315 Kapur, Devesh 187 Karunanidhi, M.K. 148 Kesavanada Bharati case 65 Keshav Singh case 196 Kharge, Mallikarjun 296 Khehar, J.S. 10 Khosla, Madhav 12 Kihoto Holohan v. Zachillhu 66 Kochanek, Stanley 108 Kohli, Atul 44 Kosa, Muchaki 108 Kothari, Rajni 254 Krishnamachari, T.T. 40, 47 Kueck, Gert W. 11 Kuldip Nayar v. Union of India and Others 9 Kumar, Avinash 11 Kumar, Vijay 10 Kumarswamy, H.D. 148 Kunzru, H.N. 333 Laclau, Ernesto 86, 90–92 Lal Batti syndrome 57 LARRDIS 325–326 Law Commission 52, 56 law making 47–48 legislative agenda 327–328 legislative autonomy 166 legislative efficiency 166 legislative oversight of executive 68 legislative suppression and majority governments (1970s and 1980s) 258–261, 259–260 Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE): Indo-Lanka Relations 339; Sri Lankan Army and 101, 339 LIC-Mundhra deal see MundhraLIC deal Lok Pal Bill 103, 172, 194, 221–222, 300–301, 306, 350, 352

361

Lok Prahar 117 Lok Sabha 39; changing membership profile 135–156; composition of 44–45; disruptions 46; educational qualifications of members 45; Eighth 143–144, 191, 207–208, 219, 224–225, 229, 260; Eleventh 46, 142, 222, 262, 264; Ethics Committee 50; Fifteenth 44–45, 62, 71, 104–105, 116, 144, 147, 177, 179–180, 195, 208–209, 222, 225, 252–253, 265, 268–269, 337, 343–345; Fifth 108, 191, 207, 258–260; First 1, 14, 26, 45, 56, 62, 108, 110, 176, 191, 219– 220; Fourteenth 45–46, 62, 102, 112, 147, 152, 177, 192, 199, 220, 222, 225, 265, 350; Fourth 108, 191, 207, 220, 223–224, 254–258; Ninth 64, 73, 143–144, 208, 219; occupational character of 140; opposition in 206–209; representation of members 61–62; Second 44, 108, 191, 220, 223, 256, 268; Seventh 137, 141, 191–192, 259; sittings of 46; Sixteenth 20, 62, 64, 67, 71, 105, 110, 117, 229, 293; Sixth 141, 207, 259; socio-economic indices of composition 139; Speaker of 10, 47, 320–321; Tenth 142, 192, 219–220, 225; Third 108, 191, 223, 256; Thirteenth 46, 177, 180, 208, 265; Twelfth 46, 144, 192, 208–209, 261 Lok Sabha Committee on Subordinate Legislation 236 Lok Sabha TV 302–304 Lokur, Madan B. 10 loose bipolar legislature and stable minority governments (1999 and beyond) 264–265, 265–266 LTTE see Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) Mackenzie, W.J.R. 285–286 Madhukar, C.V. 197 Mahajan, Sumitra 105 Maharaj, Swami Sakshi Ji 125

362

Index

Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) 2005 238, 242 majority governments (1950s–1960s), relative equilibrium and 254, 254–258 majority governments (1970s and 1980s), legislative suppression and 258–261, 259–260 Malhotra, Inder 140–141 Malhotra, V.K. 121, 123 Manchester Guardian 218 Mandal Commission 149 Marriage Laws (Amendment) Bill 194 Mavalankar, G.V. 320 Mavlankar, G.V. 38–39 Mayawati 148 McMillan, Alistair 87 media 292–306; ADR and 297–298; Americanisation of 305–306; coverage, quality of 302–303; food security and acquisition of land bills 301; Lok Pal Bill 300–301, 306; major failing of 295–296; manipulating Parliament 301–302; MPLADS and 299; MPs and 292–293; outrage due to disruptions of sessions 293; parliamentary debates and 294–295; professionals 302–303; public sentiment articulated in 300; technology 299; trivial issues and 295 Mehra, Ajay K. 11 Mehta, Ashok 91 Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) 25, 41, 45, 51 Member of Parliament (MP) 7, 10; caste composition 141–143; Code of Conduct 49–50; conceptualizing limited role 154–155; corruption charges against 72; criminal cases against 115–119, 116, 118; de-linking of state and Parliament elections and 44; educational qualifications 45, 220–221; efficiency 140–141; ethics 49–51; guns and ammunition 14, 57–58; Lal Batti syndrome

57; North-South divide 147–148; occupational status of 140; Question Hour 46–47; redefining parliamentary functions 150; representation of 61; salaries and allowances 14, 56–57; Secretariat serving 324–326; social and economic profile 137–143, 138, 143 Member of Parliament Local Development Area Development Scheme (MPLADS) 283–284; constitutional validity of 125–126; introduction of 198–199, 283; media on 299; Operation Chakravyuh 124–126; under-utilisation of funds 72, 74, 126 Menon, V.K. Krishna 41 Mill, John Stuart 18, 106, 163 minority governments (1990s), fragmented legislature and 261, 261–264, 262 minority governments (1999 and beyond), loose bipolar legislature and 264–265, 265–266 Misra, Dipak 10 Mitchell, W.J.T. 94 Modi, Narendra 304; photograph of, showing bowing and touching the steps of Parliament 293; Twitter 305 Moily, Veerappa 52 Montagu-Chelmsford Reforms 2 Montegue-Chelmsford Reforms 312 Mookherjee, Syama Prasad 41 Morley-Minto reform package 2 Morris-Jones, W.H. 1, 13, 93–94, 105, 107–108, 139, 218–219, 254 Motilal Nehru Committee 2 Mouffe, Chantal 86, 95 Mudgal, H.D. 122 Mukherjee, Hiren 228 Mukherjee, Pranab 99 Mukhopadhaya, S.J. 117 Mundhra-LIC deal 40, 47 Murthy, K.S. Krishna 54 Muslim League 2 Muslim representation 63 mygov.nic.in 297

Index Narayanaswamy, V. 222 Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) 96 National Commission for Higher Education and Research Bill 193 National Commission for Protection of Child Rights 194 National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution 197 National Election Watch (NEW) 55, 57–58, 154 national extension service 40 National Front Government 189 National Highways Authority of India (Amendment) Bill 48 National Institute of Fashion Technology Act 2006 242 National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro-Sciences, Bangalore Bill 48 National Institution for Transforming India see NITI Aayog National Investigation Agency 2008 242 National Judicial Appointment Commission Act (NJAC) 66, 294 national parties: representation of 62, 63, 64 National Rural Health Mission 285 Natural Gas Regulatory Board Act 2006 242 NDTV 293 Nehru, Jawaharlal 38, 276; expulsion of H.D. Mudgal 122; ‘Freedom at midnight’ speech 218; Rameshwaranand 223 Nehru, Motilal 314 Nehruvian India 65 NEW see National Election Watch (NEW) NITI Aayog 187–188 NJAC see National Judicial Appointment Commission Act (NJAC) No Confidence Motion (NCM) 251–269; fragmented legislature and unstable minority governments (1990s) 261, 261–264, 262; legislative suppression and

363

majority governments (1970s and 1980s) 258–261, 259–260; loose bipolar legislature and stable minority governments (1999 and beyond) 264–265, 265; overview 251–253; relative equilibrium and majority governments (1950s–1960s) 254, 254–258, 256 North-Eastern Areas (Reorganisation) Act 1971 48 North-South divide 147–148 occupational character of Lok Sabha 140 Odisha Legislative Assembly 197 Official Language Bill (1963) 221, 223–224 On Populist Reason (Laclau) 91 Operation Chakravyuh 124–126 Operation Duryodhana 120–124 opposition, and accountability 203–214; assertiveness 205; framework for analysis 204–206; Lok Sabha 206–209; Singh on 203–204; tasks of 205; Vajpayee on 203–204 Pai, Sudha 11 Palmer, Norman D. 108 Panchal, J.M. 126 Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRI) 275–289; Asoka Mehta Committee 278; Balavantrai Mehta Committee 278; Constituent Assembly debates 276–279; constitutional amendments and 279; electoral term 280; membership in 282–283; powers and responsibilities 280–281 Panchayats, Parliament and: ambiguity in relationship between 281–285; balanced interface between 285–287; historical context 275–281 Pandey, Ambrish 57–58 Parliament: cost of 58; data on 6–8; discourses on 163–164; downgrading of, factors responsible for 348–353;

364

Index

economic liberalisation and 353; essays on 11–12; evolution 1–3, 137–145; formative years, 1952–1972 37–42; golden period of 64–65; growing irrelevance of 45–46; improvement needed 59; job specifications 165–167; number of sittings 46; research/ studies on 9–11; roles 166; as a spectacle 342–353; in state of decline 61–75; transformation 344–348 Parliamentary Affairs Minister 327 Parliamentary Committees; of Privileges and Ethics 50; on Health and Family Welfare 193; on Human Resource Development 193–194; on Subordinate Legislation 235–236; parliamentary staff servicing 323–324; Secretariat 324 parliamentary democracy: evolution of 1–3; framework and functioning 4–6 Patel, H.M. 40 Patel, Vithalbhai 26, 312–315, 320 Patil, Shivraj 45 Patnaik, A.K. 117 Pawar, Lalita 296 Pawar, Sharad 296 Pay Commissions recommendations: non-applicability to Parliament Secretariats 319 Pelizzo, Ricardo 93 political parties 38 political representation 85–97; criminalization of politics 114–120; democratic delays and deficits 91–92; democratic limits 86, 92–94; domains of 86–88; ethnography of 85–86; gender 109–113; issues in 15–18; of members 61–62; of national parties 62, 63, 64; old and new forms 94–97; Operation Chakravyuh 124–126; Operation Duryodhana 120–124; redefining 151–153; significance for 100–107;

of state level parties 62, 63, 64; unequal 88–90 political vs. politics 90 politics: criminalization of 51–56; grammar of 96 poll financing 119–120 Polsby, Nelson 166 Poorna Swaraj 2 power and politics 97 Praja Socialist Party 38 Prakash, A. Surya 7, 13–14, 102 Prasad, Brajeshwar 315–316 Prasad, Rajendra 277 Prasad, Ravi Shankar 102, 298 Prasad, Rupendra 24 Presidential ordinances (1952–2009) 67, 67–68 Presiding Officers 10–11; accusations of being partisan 71; authority 70–71; declaration of assets and liabilities 50; nominating members to committees 49; secretariat and 311; self-punishment 167; servicing 321 Presiding Officers’ Conference, 1926 313 Press Gallery 41–42 Privileges Committee of the Lok Sabha 50 P.R. Nayak committee report 282–283 Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Bill 193–194 Protection of Women against Sexual Harassment at Workplace Bill, 2012 48 PRS Legislative Research 7, 102, 152, 196, 294–295, 297–299, 305 Public Accounts Committee 41, 296 public sector undertakings: Parliamentary control over 187 P.V. Narasimha Rao v. State 196 Question Hour 39, 46–47 Radhakrishnan, Sarvepalli, Dr. 39 Raja, A. 148

Index Raja Ram Pal v. Speaker, Lok Sabha 196 Rajeeve, P. 241 Rajesh, M.B. 298–299 Rajkhowa, Jyoti Prasad 10 Rajya Sabha 9–10, 39; Council of States Secretariat 315; election 45; Register of Declaration of Assets and Liabilities 50; sittings of 46; Committee on Subordinate Legislation 236, 242–243; TV 303 Ram, Jagjivan 207 Ramana, N.V. 10 Rameshwaranand, Swami 223 Ram Rajya Parishad 38 Rao, P.V. Narsimha 67 Rau, B.N. 276–277 Raveendran, R.V. 126 recruitment and conditions: persons serving Parliament and persons serving the Union/States 317–318 redefining parliamentary functions 150 Rehfeld, Andrew 97 relative equilibrium and majority governments (1950s–1960s) 254, 254–258 representation see political representation Representation of the People Act 1951 9, 37, 51, 115, 123; Section 8 of 52–55 Representation of the People (Amendment and Validation) Act 2013 119 Representation of the People (Third Amendment) Act 2002 50 responsibility: enforcing 184–199 retail sector, FDI in 102, 338–339 Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (Amendment) Ordinance 67–68 Right to Information (RTI) 96; Act 2005 238; Rules 2012 238 Roderigues, Valerian 11–12

365

Roy, Subrata ‘Sahara’ 298 rural citizens/villagers 287–288 Sabharwal, Y.K. 123 salaries of MPs 14, 56–57 Salim, Mohammad 121 Santhanam, K. 24 Sanyal, Kaushiki 197 Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan 285 Sathasivam, P. 126 Saxena, Rekha 11 Saxena, Siban Lal 315 scheduled castes: representation from 61–62, 140; reservation in Panchayats 280 scheduled tribes: representation from 61–62, 140; reservation in Panchayats 280 Secretariats: assessment 326–327; characteristics 317–320; Constituent Assembly debates 315–316; Constitution and 316–317; exemption from the purview of central administrative tribunal 318; exemption from the purview of UPSC 318; financial autonomy 319–320; functional restructuring 326; independence of 312; during the period between 1921–1924 312; during the period between 1925–1928 312–314; during the period between 1947–1954 314–315; recruitment and conditions of services 317–318; responsibilities 311; suo-motu non-applicability of central pay commissions recommendations and central government decisions 319 Secretary to the Government of India 312 Section 8 of Representation of the People Act 1951 52–55 Select Committees 191–192, 194 Setalvad, M.C. 38 Shankar, B.L. 11 Shastri, Lal Bahadur 333 Short Duration Questions 47 Shourie, Arun 109

366

Index

Sibal, Kapil 55–56 Sidhva, R.K. 315, 326 Simon Commission 2 Singh, Jaswant 102 Singh, Karan 125 Singh, Manmohan 203–204 Singh, M.P. 11, 194–195 Singh, Ratna 298 Singh, V.P. 149, 189 Sinha, Yashwant 102 Sixty-Fourth Amendment Bill 279 social: Laclau’s ideas of 90–91; political and 90–91 social and economic profile of MP 137–143, 138, 143 social issues 40 social media 305–306 social networking sites 305 Social Watch India 12; 102 Sondhi, M.L. 330 Soren, Shibu 119 Srivastava, T.N. 276, 281 staff 311–328; coordination and cooperation 327–328; expertise and specialization 321–328; servicing the committees 323–324; servicing the House 321–322; servicing the members 324–327 Standing Committee on External Affairs 335–336; members of 335–336; reports of 336 Standing Committee on Personnel, Public Grievances and Law and Justice 194 Standing Committees 49 Star News 124 state level parties: coalition and 73–74; culpability of 73; decline of Parliament 72–75; as family parties 74; patronage politics 74–75; representation of 62, 63, 64 state of decline, reasons why Parliament in 61–75; conduct of the members 70–72; defections 70; executive and legislature 66–68; institutional decline 64–70; legislative oversight 68; new state parties/elected members

72–73; non-elected institutions and 69–70; sittings 69 State of Democracy in South Asia (SDSA) 210 Stephen, C.M. 207 Supreme Court 40, 51; delegated legislation 235; Kesavanada Bharati case 65; Kihoto Holohan v. Zachillhu 66; Minerva Mills case 65; monitoring 66; Waman Rao v. Union of India 65 Supreme Court and the Constitution (Chopra) 12 Swaraj, Sushma 103–104, 296 Tamil Nadu: state party majority 64 Tandon, Purushottam Das 41 TDP see Telugu Desam Party (TDP) technical trap 166 television, parliamentary proceedings on 27, 45, 175, 227, 295, 300, 303–304, 348, 351–352 Telugu Desam Party (TDP) 74, 148, 189–190, 195, 265 Tewari, Manish 197–198 Thomas, Lily 117 Thomas, P.J. 269 Times of India, The 223–224, 295, 304 Tinker, Irene 108 transformation 344–348 TV channels, proliferation of 306 Twitter 305 Tyagi, Mahavir 315 ULB see Urban Local Bodies (ULB) Union Public Service Commission (UPSC): CSAT 306; Secretariats excluded from the purview of 318 United Front 189, 208, 295 UPSC see Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) urban citizens 287 Urban Local Bodies (ULB) 284–285 Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly 197 Vajpayee, Atal Bihari 203–204 Venkatachalaiah, M.N. 51

Index Venugopal, K.K. 125–126 Verghese, B.G. 12–13 Wallack, Jessica S. 92, 173 Waman Rao v. Union of India 65 What Ails Indian Parliament (Prakash) 7 Wheare, K.C. 8

367

Whips Conference in 2008 197 Wilson, Woodrow 165 wit and humour in Parliamentary proceedings 296–297 Yadav, Laloo 148, 222 Yadav, Mulayam Singh 148 Yechury, Sitaram 46