Current General Studies Magazine: "Government must heed President’s words" September 2015

Current General Studies Magazine (September 2015)

General Studies - II "Polity Based Article" (Government must heed President’s words)

On March 28, 1987, the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi met President Giani Zail Singh after over a month of what was termed as a constitutional crisis, thanks to a cold war between the elected head of government and the head of state. The President, after all, had questioned several decisions made by the Gandhi-led Congress government.

The Prime Minister, on the other hand, did not trust the President, who had, on at least seven occasions, questioned the government’s bills in Parliament or decisions taken by the Cabinet, or worse, refused to sign bills into law. For example, President Singh asked why the government had no clear policy on the appointment of judges. At a time when there was only one television channel, the state-run Doordarshan, the news producers focussed only on the Prime Minister and his activities, giving less or no weight to any other person or event. Singh questioned Doordarshan’s coverage policy. More significantly, he questioned why his broadcast to the nation on Republic Day was edited.

There were other issues on which the two fought tooth and nail, mostly through government emissaries such as then Home Minister Buta Singh.

In 2015, President Pranab Mukherjee has, on at least five occasions, made it a point to speak about India’s diversity and secular nature, in what seems like jibes at the current government.

Mr. Mukherjee did not stop at that. On October 30, he commented on the Supreme Court’s decision to strike down the constitutional amendment on a National Judicial Appointments Commission, and to continue with the collegium system.

“No one can meddle in the process (of judicial appointments),” Mr. Mukherjee said at the Delhi High Court’s golden jubilee celebrations. “An autonomous judiciary is a vital feature of democracy. Yet, being an important pillar of democracy, it must reinvent itself through introspection and self-correction, as and when necessary.” He added, “Judicial activism should not lead to the dilution of separation of powers. Each organ of our democracy must function within its own sphere and must not take over what is assigned to the others.”

Perhaps the President’s words have been subdued by the media coverage given to writers, filmmakers and industrialists, but given the atmosphere of distrust between the government and the public intellectuals, the repeated advice to the government could possibly be seen not as words of presidential wisdom but as the utterances of a former Congress leader.

Mr. Mukherjee’s first speech on the topic came on October 7, soon after the lynching of a Muslim man, Mohammad Akhlaq, by alleged Hindutva activists in Dadri in Uttar Pradesh, on suspicions of storing beef. The President said at a function at Rashtrapati Bhavan: “We should not allow the core values of our civilisation to wither away. Over the years, our civilisation has celebrated diversity, plurality and promoted and advocated tolerance. These values have kept us together over the centuries.”

On October 19, in West Bengal, he said: “Assimilation through receiving is a characteristic of Indian society. Our collective strength must be harnessed to resist evil powers in society. Indian civilisation… has always accepted dissent and differences… We have a Constitution that accommodates all these differences.” Interestingly, the Rashtrapati Bhavan release was headlined: “Is tolerance and acceptance of dissent on the wane, questions the President.”

There has been no official government reaction yet to Mr. Mukherjee’s speeches. The Prime Minister made a reference to plurality in India in one of his election speeches in Bihar, but there has been no reference to Mr. Mukherjee’s speeches.

However, various BJP ministers, including Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari, have spoken out against public intellectuals for their criticism of the government on intolerance, and have also denounced the returning of national awards. This could mainly mean either of two things: the Cabinet feels that the President’s words are not important enough to react to (after all, the President’s office is mainly a ceremonial one), or it wants to take remedial measures to speak to the States and rein in fringe elements using appropriate laws to control what many feel is a vitiated atmosphere of intolerance. The latter seems improbable.

A third possibility could be that the government is waiting for an appropriate time to respond to the President’s views.

If the first option is correct, then it questions the very role of the President. It could well mean that the government is ignoring the President as he is seen as a Congress appointee more than a constitutional authority. He or she is constitutionally the most powerful person in the country, even if in reality, the post is more or less ceremonial.

If the government has committed to maintain the constitutional integrity of the President’s office, then it is obligated in some way to respond to Mr. Mukherjee’s speeches. This could be a benign statement that it respects the President’s views and will take them into account while making sure that incidents promoting intolerance will be dealt with appropriately under the law. It could also respond saying that though the President has put his views forward, it respectfully disagrees for various reasons.

But it should not keep quiet on an issue that has cleaved the country’s opinion makers, and the public, into two. On the one hand, you have the government and its supporters denying anything is wrong. On the other, you have the President, the highest officer of the land, speaking his mind.

This is why it is important to learn from the 1987 cold war between Gandhi and Singh. The government must realise the stature of the President comes from him occupying the highest constitutional office, not merely as a representative of a political party.
 

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