Misusing National Herald case to disrupt House
The Congress has behaved in a most irresponsible manner by disrupting Parliament's proceedings over the National Herald case. The issue has nothing to do with either the two Houses or the Government. Based on a petition by a private citizen, Mr Subramanian Swamy, a trial court in Delhi had summoned Congress president Sonia Gandhi, vice president Rahul Gandhi and a few other senior party leaders before it as accused. The accused approached the Delhi High Court seeking quashing of the summons but the court declined their plea. Now they have to appear on December 19 unless they get legal relief meanwhile. The Congress has claimed that the case is one of “political vendetta” and “proxy litigation” by the Bharatiya Janata Party against its senior leaders. Now, it's true that Mr Swamy is a member of the BJP, but there is nothing to suggest that he has been acting on behalf of either the party or the Government. In fact, he has been pursuing the National Herald case for a long while now, and it had been on his radar even before the BJP-led Government assumed power. Moreover, he has enjoyed the reputation of being a lone-wolf maverick. On their part, senior Ministers in the Narendra Modi Government have made it clear that the regime has got nothing to do with the case, although they admit that the issues Mr Swamy has raised and based on which the senior leaders of the Congress have been made the accused, are serious enough to merit attention. But even here we don't have any arm of the Government investigating the matter as of now. Where then is the question of political vendetta when a court finds it appropriate to proceed with the matterIJ Surely, neither the trial court nor the High Court can be accused of being politically motivated, the first in issuing the summons and the second in upholding it. The Congress needs to understand that the matter has to be fought legally and not politically — and certainly not by blocking the functioning of Parliament at a time when crucial Bills of national import are pending approval. In any case, all that the court has done is to ask Ms Sonia Gandhi, Mr Rahul Gandhi and others to appear before it. Congress leaders can continue to take umbrage over this only at the risk of projecting themselves as people above the law of the land.
In the meantime, instead of raving and ranting against the Modi regime, the Congress should respond to the pointed legal questions thrown up. Since the matter has been in the public domain for long, the key details are known to all those who have been even casually following it. They need no repetition at length. However, it is important to bear in mind that the Delhi High Court, while dismissing the Congress leaders' plea for quashing the trail court's summons, said the issue “smacks of criminality”. The court also said that “questionable conduct of the petitioners needs to be properly examined… to find out the truth”. These are serious observations by the court, and the Congress cannot hope to effectively brush aside through a display of political brazenness. It is fine for Ms Gandhi to indulge in rhetoric — “I'm Indira Gandhi's daughter-in-law. I'm not afraid” — to fire up her supporters, but it does little to address the grave charges that she and others face.