Sunday, June 11, 2000		Article

‘Please listen, it’s Parliament’

WHEN Thomas Carlyle called the British Parliament ‘a talking shop’, he was merely commenting on the habit of the Victorian MPs to try to speak on each and every issue raised in the House. Atal Behari Vajpayee, however, raised the same issue, more than 40 years ago. "Do we have to speak on every issue" he asked, speaking on international affairs in the Lok Sabha in August, 1958.

"One requires a voice to speak, but to keep quiet, one requires both voice and wisdom", he continued. "In the international affairs we have developed a tendency of speaking a little more than necessary, and it is my submission that we should learn and practice the art of keeping quiet". With so much noise in our parliament today, the need to follow Vajpayee’s advice has become more imperative.

Moreover, a minute’s proceedings in Parliament cost the nation more than Rs 27000 and a single day’s session costs the Consolidate Fund of India more than Rs 1 crore. But keeping quiet is a Herculean task, while making a speech is the most easiest one. I have an uncle who wears a hearing aid, but when someone else begins to talk, he pulls off the aid. When most people are eager to hear their own talking, there cannot be a dialogue. When there is no dialogue, there is no democracy.

Listening to the other persons’ point of view has been the cardinal principle of India’s centuries-old culture. Dissent has strengthened our democracy in the past. In a situation where everyone is talking without listening to the other, there will be lot of sound and fury but, as Shakespeare said, it will signify nothing. To keep quiet, one requires confidence, self-control, knowledge of the subject, profundity of vision, an equable temperament. To pause is not to perish, to pause is to prevail.

The Indian politician, however, thinks that speech is the ladder by which he can climb to success. He believes that if he does not ‘speak’, he is finished. The best speeches in our parliament are delivered by those men and women who knew the importance of silence. So when we say that a particular Member’s silence is ‘as or more’ eloquent than his speech, we pay him the highest compliment. The nation must learn from the silence of our speakers and our speakers must learn from the silence of our sages.

At the same time it must be said that we have had in the past those whose speeches and silences were both eloquent. There was Prithviraj Kapur with his theatrical speech and dramatic silence, and there was Hirendranath Chattopadhya with his poems and songs. We had Nargis, the cine-heroine of yesteryear who sat in the Rajya Sabha with exemplary grace. She spoke very little and yet she is remembered fondly by one and all. The famous writer, R.K. Narayan, was a speaker or few words. He delivered only one speech, at the end of his tenure, one the heavy school bags that our children are burdened with at a tender age. That speech is still remembered as a masterpiece.

We also had Sardar Swarn Singh, the Minister of External Afairs, who spoke very little. It is said that when every other Minister commented on the country’s foreign policy, he spoke the least but listened to everybody. With that rare quality, he used to carry the day. Chidambaram, a flawless speaker, carefully listens to those whom he chooses to criticise.

It is, therefore, suggested that to obviate the self-defeating habit of endless talking without listening, a refresher course be arranged for the new as well as the old Members of Parliament as well as MLAs on the art of keeping quiet, on the art of listening, and finally on the art of speaking. The programme will go a long way in enhancing the spirit of democracy in the country, and will lead to excellence in human behaviour.