Institutions that were once considered sentinels of individual liberty, fundamental rights and the values that our Constitution has stood for are slowly crumbling
The Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister, YS Jaganmohan Reddy, recently wrote a letter to the Chief Justice of India, accusing a sitting Supreme Court judge of protecting the interests of the erstwhile Government in the State. He also alleged that the judge had been influencing the roster of a few judges in the High Court (HC) in matters that have political ramifications for his Government. The Governor of Maharashtra, Bhagat Singh Koshyari, in an official letter to Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, accused and mocked him for being “secular.” A Minister in the Puducherry Government wrote a letter to Kiran Bedi, the Lieutenant-Governor of the Union Territory, and accused her of having a “vengeful attitude.” A month earlier, the Parliamentary Secretary of the Puducherry Chief Minister had issued a contempt of court notice against her. The West Bengal Governor, Jagdeep Dhankhar, continues to have frequent run-ins with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. The former Chief Minister of Jammu & Kashmir, Mehbooba Mufti, was put under a 14-month-long political detention for “being a threat to the security” of her people before being released recently.
We live in times when 25 elected MLAs, who were part of the Government, defected to the Opposition party in Madhya Pradesh. The Government was overthrown, which led to a by-election, costing the exchequer crores and an obvious political manoeuvring of the mandate given by the people. It is in these times that MLAs from the Opposition party in Punjab launched an overnight protest because the Government did not disclose to them the contents of a Bill that was to be tabled on the floor of the House. A local goon in Ballia, Uttar Pradesh, shot dead his political opponent in the presence of the Sub-Divisional Magistrate and police officials while a District Magistrate was seen on camera threatening the family of a deceased rape victim in Hathras.
The media, the fourth pillar of democracy, has turned into a cheerleader and has of late been acting as the mouthpiece of the Government. Allegations and counter-allegations among journalists have become the new face of the broadcast media today. Speaking truth to power isn’t a badge of honour for most TV media houses anymore and this has led to a loss of credibility. It is also in these times that we were witness to how the TV news industry manufactured myths and spun stories to frame the live-in partner of a dead actor as his murderer. Not just that, it also framed her as an active member of the drug syndicate, a money launderer and as someone who administered poison to him. All this, when the investigation was and is still under way. Each one of us was a party to this in so far as we allowed this to happen right under our noses and hailed this as a great example of journalistic freedom.
The challenge of our times is in the fact that institutions, which were once considered sentinels of individual liberty, fundamental rights and the values that our Constitution has stood for, are slowly crumbling. Whether it is the police, the judiciary, the media, constitutional functionaries such as governors or lieutenant-governors, the Cabinet, bureaucrats and our legislators, on whom the Constitution places an extremely huge amount of trust, lack of credibility is at an all-time high. Such a problem has to be looked at from two different perspectives. One is political and the second is constitutional. The political problem lies in the fact that the scenario today has become highly centralised. All that we care for as voters are personalities and not the issues or the institutions that concern us. We, therefore, don’t raise the right questions. Politics has become a personality contest. We continuously hear: This person vs Who? That person vs Who? And the answer to this question, most of the times, decides which way our votes will go. This ensures that our institutions remain weak and unaccountable while power remains increasingly centralised.
This has led to the rise of Machiavellian politicians who are master manipulators and rabble-rousers. They focus on the game more than its outcomes, are cool and calculating and for whom winning is everything. Such leaders create an inflated image of themselves, are attention-seekers and are highly charismatic. They are the best leaders who make the worst decisions.
The “presidentialisation” of politics within a democracy started from the US, where one person was shown to embody an abstract idea and then votes were garnered under his name. The Indian Constitution, on the other hand, lays down a different form of Government. Here, we elect our representatives, who in turn, are vested with the responsibility of electing the Prime Minister and the Chief Minister as the case may be. But, for political parties, personality contests make complete sense. This is because, by keeping the entire focus on one larger-than-life individual and spending all resources on him/her, it reduces political mobilisation, citizen participation and political discourse at the local constituency level. We, therefore, end up voting for corrupt leaders with grave criminal records in our respective constituencies. Such is the situation in India today that more than 4,500 cases are pending since decades against our sitting as well as former MPs and MLAs in crimes ranging from serious to heinous offences.
The other justification behind the sad state of our institutions today lies in the Constitution and the way we interpret it. Constitutional interpretation must always flow from constitutional morality, which is essentially a set of duties or norms of behaviour that is expected on the part of individuals who have been given the responsibility of holding constitutional positions. Such individuals need to take this as their obligation to protect democratic institutions from rotting. Such functionaries must act with constitutional objectivity and must uphold the spirit of the Constitution. The Supreme Court, in the National Capital Territory of Delhi vs. the Union of India case, held that constitutional governance must be encouraged wherein “rule of law” is the source of all State actions. This would enhance the trust that our polity lacks today and would give rise to a culture of constitutional idealism.
All that this seemingly complex theory of constitutional morality talks about is the “ability and commitment of constitutional functionaries to arrive at decisions on important issues consensually. That despite all differences, we are a part of a common deliberative enterprise.” Partnership and coordination between various institutions would allow for preserving the trust of the people in institutions of democracy.
The instances in Punjab, Puducherry, West Bengal and Maharashtra show that our constitutional functionaries lack constitutional morality.
The father of the Indian Constitution, Dr BR Ambedkar, gave a reason for it during the Constituent Assembly debates. He said that, “Constitutional morality is not a natural sentiment. It has to be cultivated. We must realise that our people are yet to learn it. Democracy in India is only a top dressing on an Indian soil, which is essentially undemocratic.” The sad news is that Ambedkar made this statement on November 4, 1948, which remains true even for the India of today.
Maintaining institutional integrity is all about exercising constitutional restraint, respecting the rule of law, not acting arbitrarily or in an unjust, unfair and unreasonable manner and not allowing political or social morality to be a factor in decision-making.
Ambedkar had reiterated that, “However good a Constitution may be, it is sure to turn out bad if those who are called to work it, happen to be a bad lot. And, however bad a Constitution may be, it may turn out good if those who are called to work it, happen to be a good lot. The working of the Constitution depends on the political parties and the citizens. It is, therefore, futile to pass a judgment on how good the Constitution is without reference to the role which the people and their parties are likely to play in the future.” Truly, it is after all, as the first President of India, Rajendra Prasad, stated, “Constitutions are lifeless things. They acquire life because of the men who control and operate them.”
(The writer is from the National Law University, Visakhapatnam)