INDIA IN SHAMBLES, ONLY THE JUDICIARY CAN SAVE US
7 03 2014
” INDIA IN SHAMBLES, ONLY THE JUDICIARY CAN SAVE US”
By SRI K C AGRAWAL
Book released on 7th March, 2014 at Press Club of India, New Delhi
On this occasion Sri Agrawal said that the post-independence era has seen us toil unremittingly through these 66 long years.
Sorrows, sufferings, and uncertainties of life have become the order of
the day for the common man. All our hopes are belied and we stand
cheated. There seems to be no difference between slavery then and
freedom now. If we look back, the present is only an agony and
frustration of our shattered dreams and broken promises.
While
our guardians enjoy the riches of their self-rule, the people are left
in the lurch to live or die with their own miseries. The approximately
5.85 lac odd villages where about 73 percent of our people languish
continue to toil under almost the same conditions of poverty,
illiteracy, ignorance, and backwardness as they did before independence.
It grossly flouts the pledge taken by our founding fathers when struggling for freedom.
People
from all walks of lives are disgruntled and frustrated. A state of
anarchy can be felt in all walks of life and a rebellion in the making.
Protests and agitations are now a regular feature of our country. Forty
percent of our country is infected with Maoism, Naxalism, Terrorism and
Seditious activism. Demands for divisions and freedom of States are
echoing from many quarters of the country and can be heard aloud.
Consistent failures of our Legislature and Executive are no more acceptable. The basic objectives of our Constitution viz., ‘economic freedom’, ‘dignity’, ‘equal status and opportunity’ and ‘fraternity’ must now be fulfilled.
Mere
freedom is meaningless unless the people are also free from their
perennial wants and uncertainties of life in terms of livelihood,
shelter, education and basic necessaries of lives.
Part
II of the book narrates how can we still place our country amongst the
most prosperous and powerful nations in the world through a responsible
and accountable system of governance by making optimum use of our
resources involving all the people of the land. Presently only a few
working for the rest makes little sense.
According
to Mr Agrawal good governance is like a good mother who works hard for
her living and rearing her children. The children also cling to her in
affection because they know their mother was doing her best to take care
of them. The book attempts to find out that mother for the people of
India with the help of learned judiciary. Establishing the government is a matter of the Constitution and the
Constitution is above the Parliament and Judiciary is the Custodian of
the Constitution. The Judiciary is empowered to oversee that the
Constitution is practised in its true letter and spirit by the
Legislature and the Executive.
According
to Mr Agrawal the consistent failures of the governments has happened
due to some inconsistent and contradicting provisions in our
Constitution. One of these contradicting provisions is Article 37 of Chapter IV, Directive Principles of State Policy. It
stipulates that Article 38 on socio-economic requirements (same as the
basic objectives of the Constitution) will be fundamental in the
governance of the country and Legislature shall endeavor their utmost to
accomplish these objectives in as short a period as possible. But if
the Legislature fails to accomplish this, the same shall not be
justiciable in the court of law. This contradicting provision has
germinated into large scale laxity and impunity amongst the Legislature
and the Executive culminating into no accountability and no
responsibility. This work culture has also permeated through the entire work force of the government down the line.
Judiciary
in context with Article 37 has, however, interpreted in Kesavananda
Bharati case that what is fundamental in the governance of the country
cannot be less important than the Fundamental Rights of the people. This
interpretation is a great hope and is like a silver lining in the dark
clouds. This makes Article 38 also equally justiciable like the
Fundamental Rights of the Constitution are. For fulfilling Article 38 on
socio-economic requirements vis –a-vis basic objectives Mr agrawal has
suggested three reforms in the electoral process viz;
Elections every 5 years are a sacred process to elect worthy guardians and establish a responsible and accountable system of governance. Our
present process of elections is highly abusive and obnoxious due to
luring the voters. Luring the voters masks the performance of the
Legislators and shifts their focus from constructive work to reliefs,
handouts, dole-outs and freebees etc. and allurements of quotas and
reservations. Similarly accusing and nagging the rival parties and
candidates also mask their own worthiness. All such acts germinate into
no responsibility and no accountability of our guardians and encourage
incapable and dubious characters enter the politics.
Just
and fair elections must take account of the actual developmental work
carried out by the parties and candidates in the past and their future
plans to accomplish the Basic Objectives of the Constitution. This is
their basic incumbency. Without this specific promise the elections
shall remain obnoxious and a self inflicted curse for the people of
India.
Mr Agrawal also insists for majority of votes.
The present lure of Politics (due to no accountability and no
responsibility) attracts many contestants from a constituency. As a
result number of contestants is large and one may get elected by
securing just 10-20% votes of their Constituency. This surely is not a
mandate of the people and therefore not legal. The Statutes and Laws
made by them in the Parliament or State Assemblies in true sense are not
legal. He therefore proposes for a two round system as adopted by some
countries. It shall also help in weeding out the dubious characters.
Mr Agrawal also talks to stop criminalization of politics.
For this to happen he proposes to debar a tainted candidate from
contesting elections. Similarly must be debarred a sitting Member of
Parliament or State Assembly until he is acquitted by law. Presently the
Parliament and Assemblies have large numbers of such dubious
characters. It is not only a blemish on our Parliamentary system of
democracy; it also acts as a horrendous retardant in the proper
governance of the country. It gives rise to callousness and malevolence.
According to him the
Law of humanity stands above all and demands the care of deprived and
long suffering people of our country first rather than a tainted
person or Legislator enjoying full liberty, dignity and authority while
they themselves are largely responsible for the persistent poor plight of our people.
Talking
of inconsistencies, one of them is lack of qualification of our
Legislators, Articles 84 and 173. It permits any Tom, Dick or Harry to
be our guardian and destroy the nation to his whimsical overtures. For
this anomaly to redress the Judiciary may direct the Parliament to
define ‘qualification’.
The
other is our Civil services, Article 311. These services are required
to create means and avenues for self determination of the people and to
develop the rural sector, create infrastructure, municipal and civic
services and all that makes the facet of the nation. This Article
extends them laxity and no responsibility and no accountability while
they are bestowed with enormous powers and authority. Mr Agrawal
suggests redressing this Article to make it effective and accountable.
Mr Agrawal
has also suggested to upgrade CAG (Comptroller and Auditor General) on
the lines of a third eye system similar to that of USA, to have a
surveillance of Legislators and Executives on a real time basis to
monitoring their activities and performance and nipping the rising
occurrences of scams and corruption in the system right in the bud and
save precious time of CBI and Vigilance Commission in investigations and
that of learned Judiciary in their adjudications. This may also
establish a fiduciary relationship of the government with the people of
India.
Presently also CAG does this but their findings become public only
after the crime is already committed, serving little purpose of their
findings and creating more controversies.
K C Agrawal
9810191394
Website: indiainshambles.com
PS: Please provide me your e-mail id and mobile number to send you this release on internet.
No comments:
Post a Comment