Pope’s edict dismays liberal Catholics
By Madeleine Bunting in London
Liberal Catholics have responded with incredulity and dismay to the Pope’s edict to stamp out dissent.
Pope John Paul II has ruled in an apostolic letter that on a wide range of issues, including women as priests, the Vatican’s teaching is to be regarded as infallible and binding on all Catholics, or they will face punishment ranging from warnings to excommunication.

Has democracy any future?
By T.V.R. Shenoy
The late Biju Patnaik was a despairing man in the last days of his life. He foresaw the fall of the United Front, calling that bunch little more than a bunch of "squabbling lobsters".

75 YEARS AGO
Letter to the Editor
The Assembly electoral lists
SIR — May I request the courtesy of your esteemed columns for the insertion of the following few lines.
At the time of the last elections to the provincial and Central Legislature, the electoral lists for the local council as well as for the Council of State were separately prepared for each constituency.

By Madeleine Bunting in London
LIBERAL Catholics have responded with incredulity and dismay to the Pope’s edict to stamp out dissent.
Pope John Paul II has ruled in an apostolic letter that on a wide range of issues, including women as priests, the Vatican’s teaching is to be regarded as infallible and binding on all Catholics, or they will face punishment ranging from warnings to excommunication.
Liberal Catholic groups in the UK and the USA argued that this papacy was responsible for the dramatic decline of the Church.
"The clique surrounding the Pope in Rome have taken leave of their senses," said John Challenor, chairman of Catholics for a Changing Church. "They are deliberately shedding all the people they regard as wishy washy and making a hardline, rigid sect of the Catholic Church.
"That has nothing to do with the real meaning of Catholicism, which is about universality and diversity."
The numbers of Catholics in England and Wales had halved in the past 20 years, said Mr Challenor, as many Catholics disaffected with the papacy voted with their feet.
What particularly angers liberal Catholics is that Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in his explanatory note to the Pope’s letter specifically ruled out debate on women priests.
"There is no basis in scripture to limit the priesthood to men only," said Mike Hiland, a married catholic priest and co-ordinator of the Advent group.
"They say all 12 apostles were men, but that is neither here nor there. Should only Jews be ordained because all the apostles were Jews? Of course not. "Everywhere I hear criticism of the Catholic Church. It talks of justice but it doesn’t practise it. It talks of human rights but doesn’t practise them. They want Catholics to stop their brains thinking. It’s a sad Church that needs to kick people out; that’s not the way to resolve family problems." In the US, Catholics for a Free Choice described the Pope’s edict as a "pretty desperate move to stifle dissent and the huge wave of calls for church reform."
Of particular concern to many Catholics working as teachers and theologians is that the document is particularly addressed to them. In recent years rightwing groups, such as Pro Pontifice et Ecclesia, have taken it upon themselves to police clerics, bishops and laity for signs of unorthodox belief. They lobby the Vatican with considerable success.
This papacy has been marked by clashes with leading theologians. Most recently the excommunication of Father Tissa Balasuriya of Sri Lanka was lifted only when he recanted. The German theologian Hans Kung had his licence to teach at a Catholic university withdrawn when he challenged the doctrine of infalibility.
"This apostolic letter is Catholic fundamentalism," said a prominent liberal Catholic who did not wish to be named. "It is a massive extension of the doctrine of infallibility."
By arrangement with The Guardian, London.

By T.V.R. Shenoy
The late Biju Patnaik was a despairing man in the last days of his life. He foresaw the fall of the United Front, calling that bunch little more than a bunch of "squabbling lobsters". He also said that ordinary people were wondering if a dose of dictatorship wouldn’t help.
That last comment provoked predictable howls of outrage from his peers. But the events of the last week have done much to buttress Patnaik’s comment. If less than 50 members can bring the country’s supreme legislative body to a screeching halt, we must wonder if parliamentary democracy has any future in this country.
And what, pray, was the crisis that led Mulayam Singh Yadav, Laloo Prasad Yadav, and their flock to paralyse the Lok Sabha? It was, believe it or not, an issue to which every party had technically pledged its support — reservation for women. Much the same Bill had been prepared in Deve Gowda’s time but Mulayam Singh Yadav hadn’t uttered a peep at the time!
The moment such legislation became a real possibility, the Samajwadi Party and the Rashtriya Janata Dal showed themselves in their true colours — parties that seek to divide society into caste — and creed-based blocks. But let us give the Yadavs their due: if nothing else, they had the guts to oppose openly. There were cowards in every party who preferred to hide behind the excuse that it was necessary to forge a consensus before the proposed legislation could be tabled.
I have two points to make on this. First, the proper forum for reaching a consensus is the floor of the House. Second, please don’t try to fool people by mixing up ‘consensus’ and ‘unanimity’; seeking unanimity is a recipe for doing nothing.
However, irrespective of whether or not the 81st Amendment is passed, there are some things that should worry us all. The first is the ease with which the Lok Sabha was held hostage by a few recalcitrant members. The second is the continuing appeal of casteism for parties without a cause. And the weird part is that such idiocy has never paid electoral dividends.
Let us begin with V.P. Singh’s advocacy of Mandalism. He tried to pass it off as "social justice". But the electorate saw it for what it was — a pathetic attempt to cut Devi Lal, his own Deputy Prime Minister, to size. (Laloo Prasad Yadav has admitted as much openly.) But the Janata Dal that had won over 150 seats in 1989 lost of its seats in 1991.
Nor can you blame that on the division and sub-division of the Janata Dal. Add up the seats held by the Janata Dal, the Rashtriya Janata Dal, and the Samajwadi Party today. So far from achieving the glories of the past, they are hard put to reach even 50 members.
But V.P. Singh’s disciples aren’t alone in ignoring the fact that casteist politics don’t pay off in the long run. The siren song has seduced the Congress too, which is now jettisoning its old pan-Indian profile. After all, had the Congress stood firm against injecting casteism into a gender issue, the Women’s Reservation Bill would have been well into being launched today. But Sonia Gandhi drew back at the last from backing a Bill that her own husband had once proposed.
It has been a process of slow decline for the Congress. Jawaharlal Nehru transcended caste and creed. Indira Gandhi used those factors, but she too projected an image that wasn’t limited to any one constituency.
V.P. Singh is finally having his revenge on the party that expelled him a decade ago. The Congress has been lured into the blind alley of Mandalism. Will India’s oldest party also destroy itself as the old Janata Dal did?

By Harihar Swarup
The two great Yadavs — Mulayam Singh Yadav and Laloo Prasad Yadav — are seen these days walking hand-in-hand in Parliament House. Both have set records in misgovernance in the two most important states — Uttar Pradesh and Bihar — of the Union accounting for 85 and 54 seats, respectively, in the Lok Sabha. Their shadows now loom large over Parliament as they derail the women reservation Bill and put both the BJP and the Congress in a tight spot.
While they governed U.P. and Bihar the two Yadavs did not see eye to eye politically and even when the United Front ruled Delhi and Laloo Prasad became the kingmaker and Mulayam Singh the Defence Minister, they were not on the same wavelength. But they put arms round each other’s shoulders as they entered the grand round building called Parliament House and said: "Look brother we are the Messiah of Dalits and minorities and we will espouse their cause come what may.... they are after all our vote banks."
Having set the Ganga ablaze with caste strife, the two leaders injected the same venom as all was set to push through the Bill seeking to reserve 33 per cent seats in Parliament for women. Members of their respective parties created scenes of unprecedented chaos raising an altogether new issue; earmark quota for minority, backward classes and Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe women too.
Obviously, Mulayam Singh and Laloo Prasad did not think for a moment the consequences of incorporating such a provision in the Bill and whether such a proposition was feasible or not. All they had in mind was political benefit which they got in full measure as the legislation has now been put on the backburner. The two Yadavs have also put the BJP and the Congress in a jam; the two major parties cannot take the risk of opposing the incorporation of the new provision in the Bill for fear of losing votes.
The two former Chief Ministers are having the last laugh and planning extensive tours of their states tom-toming their achievement and telling the Dalits, the minorities and the OBCs that they are their real saviour and, at the same time, sharpening the caste divide already plaguing North India in the wake Mandalisation of politics.
Both Mulayam Singh and Laloo Prasad have been creation of post-Nehru era and came in politics in the second half of the sixties. Both claim that Dr Ram Manohar Lohia was the source of their inspiration but both distorted the Lohia brand of Socialism for initiating the politics of caste and class. Both swear by Lok Nayak Jayaprakash Narayan, supported his movement and struggled during the Emergency but the way Mulayam Singh let loose caste war in U.P. and Laloo Prasad tore apart the social fabric in Bihar would put the Sarvodaya leader to shame.
They quote J.P’s oft-repeated slogan "jati hatao" and his teaching "do not talk of caste; do not mention each other’s caste" but what the two former Chief Ministers have been doing is just the antithesis of what the Lok Nayak preached.
Though Mulayam Singh drew inspiration from Lohia and J.P. in his younger days, his real mentor was former Prime Minister Charan Singh who spotted him and initiated him in active politics. Chaudhary Sahib was the unquestioned leader of Western U.P. and dominated the Jat belt. When he spotted the diminutive Mulayam Singh in a crowd of his followers he remarked. "Yeh chotte kad ka admi bade kam ka hai" (this little man is capable of doing big things). Mulayam Singh became an ardent follower of Charan Singh and became an important leader of the BLD (Bharatiya Lok Dal).
The other Yadav — Laloo Prasad — had a humble origin but acquired an unusually sharp mind. Son of a Class IV employee of Patna’s Teachers’ Training College, Laloo Yadav has really gone through hardship, struggle and misery and knows the pangs of poverty. He has set a record in procreation having produced eight daughters and a son. He has achieved the distinction of completing the full term as the Chief Minister of the most unruly state of India and putting his wife on his gaddi when his second term was cut short following the fodder scam. He had also to go to jail but even from there he managed the government by proxy. He still indirectly runs the Bihar Government and despite the worst-ever lawlessness prevailing in the state, the Centre does not have gumption to dismiss the Rabri Devi Government.
Lalooji, as his supporters call him, has sunk neck-deep in trouble having been cornered in the fodder scam known as the mother of all scams. One does not know what is in store for this son of a Class IV employee who rose like a meteor from the lowest rung of society to the highest position in Bihar.