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Balance of power No party time |
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Tender hands
China’s military might
Long-lost friends
Sen and parliamentary sensibility Putin’s surprise endorsement Inside Pakistan
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Balance of power THE Supreme Court’s call for judicial restraint and the need to follow the doctrine of separation of powers in letter and spirit is most welcome. The judgement delivered by a Bench consisting of Justice A.K. Mathur and Justice Markandey Katju is particularly significant because it unequivocally rules that the judiciary has no powers to usurp the roles of either the legislature or the executive. It is a free and frank admission by the highest court of the country that the judiciary has been overstepping its limits while exercising its functions and thus disturbing the delicate separation of powers. In the constitutional scheme of things, the powers and functions of the legislature, the executive and the judiciary are very clearly spelt out. The legislature makes the laws, the executive implements the government’s policies and the judiciary enforces the rule of law. There is bound to be friction if any organ, including the judiciary, oversteps its limits. The Bench specifically referred to the Jagdambika Pal’s case (1998), involving the Uttar Pradesh Assembly, and the Jharkhand Assembly case (2005) and said these were two “glaring examples” of judicial over-reach. It also disapproved of the Delhi High Court’s intervention in such issues as fixing age and other criteria for admission to nursery schools, unauthorised schools, supply of drinking water, free beds in hospitals, begging in public and use of subways. The judiciary cannot create a law and run the government by encroaching on the domain of the executive or the legislature, it said. The apex court’s exhortation to the judges to follow the doctrine of separation of powers scrupulously and exercise utmost judicial restraint is bound to improve its relationship with the legislature and the executive in the times to come. Over the years, judicial over-reach has had an adverse effect on the lawmakers and the bureaucrats. Monday’s ruling will, hopefully, rectify the imbalance and have a sobering effect on the other two organs. As the Bench itself ruled, judicial restraint will not only protect the independence of its own authority but also help recognise the equality of the other two organs, something which the founding fathers of the Constitution had envisaged.
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No party time LEADER of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Lal Krishna Advani has been anointed as the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate in the next general elections. This follows former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s disinclination to take up the responsibility in view of his state of health. For Mr Advani, the announcement by party president Rajnath Singh is just a small hurdle he has crossed in his path. Several factors contributed to the denouement, one of them being the lack of consensus on the leadership question in the BJP. Factionalism and divisions are nowhere else so rampant as in the BJP. In fact, Mr Advani’s success will depend to a large extent on how he is able to unite the party under his leadership. Be it in Gujarat or Himachal Pradesh where the party is strong or Kerala, where it is at its weakest, the BJP is a house divided against itself. Mr Advani has several other obstacles to cross to reach his destination. While the ruling UPA may not be in the pink of health to face an immediate election, the reluctance to call the Left bluff on the nuclear deal being an indicator, there is nothing at all to suggest that the BJP will be its natural beneficiary. In Gujarat, which has often been described as the laboratory of Hindutva, the Modi phenomenon has so overshadowed all other factors that a victory for him will not be considered a victory for the BJP. The BJP could come to power last time only because it was able to carry conviction with its coalition partners. The towering presence of Mr Vajpayee served as a strong adhesive for the National Democratic Alliance. Unfortunately for Mr Advani, his candidature is unlikely to inspire the same kind of confidence among the NDA constituents because of his close affinity with leaders like Mr Narendra Modi and espousal of such divisive causes as Ayodhya. His attempt to steer clear of such negativism by giving Mohammed Ali Jinnah a secular certificate only antagonised the hardcore Hindutva section of the party. Though he seems to have overcome the Jinnah hangover, he has to go a long way to emerge as a natural leader of the non-Left Opposition. What he does from now till the elections are announced will give a clear indication of whether he has it in him to turn the tables on the Congress or not. In other words, it is too early to party.
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Tender hands TV images of two boys yoked together as oxen to till a land, which reportedly belongs to a Union minister’s brother, have shaken the public conscience. That such outrageous incidents happen in Bihar should surprise no one. Though Union Minister for Rural Development Raghuvansh Prasad Singh has dismissed the incident as “staged-managed” by TV channels, his brother, Raghuraj Singh, has reportedly justified the act saying the land was too slippery to use oxen or tractors. The minister’s political opponents have seized the opportunity to demand his resignation. Well, an inquiry has been ordered and, if found guilty, the minister’s brother would be booked for violating the laws governing child labour. It is common knowledge that, despite the legal restrictions, children are engaged to work in farms and industries, sweetshops and homes. According to the International Labour Organisation, India has 44 million child labourers, the highest in the world. The issue of child labour has been used by NGOs and protectionists in the US and Europe to reject imports from India. There has been some effort to curb the menace, but the nasty practice, especially in the fields, is yet to receive the required attention. Laws alone cannot solve the problem. It requires a multi-pronged approach and involvement of parents, the state and civil society. Poverty drives parents to send their dear ones to work. The state will have to empower the poor by providing them access to education and employment opportunities in cooperation with the corporates and NGOs. Women empowerment should be a priority. To begin with, child workers should be rehabilitated and trained in skills which are in demand. More funds need to be channelled in this area. It is a shame that a country that boasts of 9 per cent growth should see its children labour in the fields and factories, when they should be in schools.
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I do not much dislike the matter, but/ The manner of his speech. — William Shakespeare
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China’s military might
AN interesting, but largely meaningless, term was recently coined by Pentagon officials to describe the present state of US-China relations. They described China as a “peer competitor”, meaning that it was not an adversary and could even be a partner at times without being an ally. In other words, China can be anything and everything depending on how it sees its own strategic interests at a given time. This is how the Pentagon seemed to view China’s status at the time of Defence Secretary Robert M. Gates’ two-day China visit early in November. Obviously, the United States is keen to enlist China on its side to deal with Iran and North Korea and their nuclear ambitions. But that doesn’t mean that China has become a benign and cooperative force in international relations. Even though the US realises this, it nevertheless seems keen to underplay it. According to Mr Gates, “I don’t consider China at this point a military threat to the United States.” But “I have concerns with a variety of military programmes that they have under way.” The US is worried about the lack of transparency over a whole range of China’s military programmes, like the growing size of its defence budget, expansion of its war-machine to include more submarines, surface warships and combat aircraft, its strategic doctrine and goals, and its anti-satellite weapons programme when it destroyed an aging Chinese weather satellite to demonstrate a capability for space warfare. Mr Gates doesn’t seem to have got any satisfactory answers to the US queries and their concerns on this matter. On the question of anti-satellite test, for instance, he frankly acknowledged that he made no headway in getting answers from the Chinese. To quote him, “I raised our concerns about it, and there was no further discussion.” And the US wasn’t any the wiser on other matters. In the absence of satisfactory answers on a whole range of issues concerning China’s military machine, it is puzzling that Mr Gates should feel that China, at the present, doesn’t pose a military threat to the United States. Because even if it doesn’t directly threaten the United States, its increasing military capability does pose a threat to regional countries like, for instance, Taiwan and Japan. It is not that the US is not aware of regional concerns on this score. Mr Gates was at pains, during his recent Japan trip (after his China visit), to reiterate US commitments to its regional allies. He said, “The commitment (to US regional allies) is no less strong today, regardless of the challenges we face in the Middle-East and elsewhere.” But somehow it seems to lack a sense of urgency for two reasons. First, of course, is the US preoccupation with the Middle-East (as Mr Gates implicitly acknowledged), leaving it very little time and energy to focus on Asia. Second, largely because the US is mired in Iraq and Afghanistan, it is increasingly looking to China for political support on issues like North Korea and, increasingly, Iran. According to Prof Robert Sutter, “Currently, China endeavours to deal with US power and influence by, among other methods, employing multilateral and cooperative approaches designed to steer US policy and actions in directions not adverse to core Chinese interests.” Furthermore, “They also seem anxious to find ways that China’s rising influence in Asia and world affairs can be seen as no challenge to US power and influence, for challenging the United States would not be in China’s interest because of the great difference in the power and influence of the two countries.” The US was, therefore, surprised when Beijing recently refused access to Hong Kong port for its two minesweepers and, a few days later, its aircraft carrier, Kitty Hawk. The first two had sought permission for fuelling and sheltering from an emerging major storm. This was, therefore, a distress call of sorts which is usually complied. In the second case, the aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk had been granted permission and they were heading to Hong Kong for a Thanksgiving holiday visit, when the permission was suddenly withdrawn (though later reinstituted, the carrier had already turned back). Which doesn’t say much about the quality of the new relationship. And not surprisingly, the US naval commanders have expressed
concern about it. Even as China pursues its great power role, Beijing continues to promote its professed “peaceful rise”. In a Foreign Affairs article, Zheng Bijian wrote, “China does not seek hegemony or predominance in world affairs. It advocates a new international political and economic order, one that can be achieved through incremental reforms and the democratisation of international relations. China’s development depends on world peace — a peace that its development will in turn reinforce.” And because China is committed to “peaceful rise”, argues Zheng, it “will not follow the path of Germany leading up to World War I or those of Germany and Japan leading to World War II when these countries violently plundered resources and pursued hegemony. Neither will China follow the path of the great powers vying for global domination during Cold War. Instead, China will transcend ideological differences to strive for peace, development and cooperation with all countries of the world.” Of course, this is a lot of self-serving crap which, in effect, means that if the world follows China’s strategic path and let it have its way, everything will be peaceful under the Middle Kingdom. But this is not how the world works as Germany and Japan found out in the two world wars when they tried to have their way at the cost of other nations. Therefore, the notion that China will be a peaceful power, unlike any before, is a dangerous
illusion.
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Long-lost friends
Azizur
Rahman and I were the best of friends when we were about eleven year olds. This was at Gaya in Bihar, where my father, a banker, was then posted. Azizur was a local boy, son of a doctor. We went to the same school, the Nazareth Academy, and were classmates. Our school was run by American Irish nuns and although I studied in the school for only about two years, the grounding I received there has withstood me over a lifetime. Azizur expresses the same sentiments, which obviously carry more weight, as he had studied there for a longer period. Azizur and I had parted company in 1953, when our family moved out from Gaya. We lost contact thereafter, as happens under such circumstances. It was only a couple of months back that I received a phone call from a stranger, who enquired whether I was the same Vijay Oberoi who was at Gaya in the early fifties. The moment he said this, I thought of Azizur and enquired whether I was right. On his confirmation, contact was established and we are now in touch. Azizur is an ophthalmologist and now lives at Patna. He used to teach in the medical college there, but is now retired. After our telephonic conversation, we both sat down to pen our memories and tell each other about our lives. Fiftyfour years is a long time and hence the first letters, long that they were, could barely cover important milestones of each other’s lives and careers. Compared to me, Azizur has a phenomenal memory. His letter was full of details about our classmates and other friends, important episodes that I no longer remembered, experiences of the school and our teachers and many other aspects. Frankly, I had forgotten most of these, including names and events. I suppose the phrase “out of sight out of mind” applies more to me than to my friend Azizur! Azizur mentioned how he managed to track me down. Apparently, when we were together in the fourth standard I had mentioned to him that I wanted to join the army. While I had quite forgotten this, he had not, so when he read a quote from me in some newspaper article, he thought it could be the same boy of nearly 55 years back! With these two somewhat flimsy clues, he went to work. He contacted the nearest army establishment and requested an officer for his assistance in tracking me down and the latter did oblige. The rest, as they say, is history. Now that we have made contact, we are obviously very keen to get together and “chew the cud”, as they say. For, although contact has been established after over 54 years, the consummation of this long-lost friendship would only be when we meet. That would undoubtedly be a memorable affair.
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Sen and parliamentary sensibility Ambassador
Ronen Sen’s remarks on August 20, 2007 about “running around like headless chicken” attracted the attention of both Houses of Parliament, notwithstanding his and his Minister’s clarification that the remark concerned some of his media friends and not the MPs, and the subsequent expressions of regret. Based on the notices received from the Members (which perhaps raised not only the headless chicken remark, but also his alleged statements criticising a political party for its views on the Indo-US nuclear deal etc.), both Houses referred the matter to the respective Committee on Privileges which summoned the Ambassador. According to newspaper reports, the Ambassador has again reiterated his position and expressed his regrets. The case made out against him is one of a contempt of Parliament and from reports appearing in the media its appears that the Lok Sabha Committee on Privileges, in its Report to the House on November 22, 2007, has stated that no breach of privilege or contempt of the House is involved in the matter, since the phrase ‘headless chicken’ was used in relation to media persons and not MPs . The House is yet to formally adopt the report, and technically, a motion to discuss it is possible. A casual observer may conclude that Parliament is perhaps unduly sensitive on the issue, but that would not quite be the truth. Historically, it has been the assertion and zealous guarding of privileges that have protected the system of parliamentary democracy. Privilege has its origins in the privilege of freedom from arrest enjoyed by the Servants of the King, and which was claimed by the House of Commons of the United Kingdom after a prolonged struggle. It was extended to include the freedom of speech in debate (in the House) and freedom of access to the Sovereign. The Indian Parliament (including the Committees and individual Members) draws its claim to privilege from article 105 of the Constitution which grants freedom of speech in Parliament and states that in other respects the powers, privileges and immunities shall be as defined by Parliament by law, and till so defined, shall be that available immediately before the coming into force of Section 15 of the Constitution (Forty-fourth) Amendment Act ,1978. The provision as it stands is a bit of a subterfuge, since originally the constitutional provision claimed the same powers and privileges as was available to the House of Commons of Parliament of the United Kingdom at the commencement of the Constitution and the provision of Section 15 of the Forty-fourth amendment was intended to delete the reference to the House of Commons. It would be noticed that Ambassador Sen’s comments even if they had been directed at MPs does not appear to directly breach the privilege of the House, its Committees or its Members in terms of freedom of speech. The two other main privileges of the House of Commons namely, freedom from arrest (in all civil actions or suits, when Parliament is in Session or when the Member is journeying to or from Parliament) and access to the Sovereign, as applicable to the Indian Parliament, are not even remotely breached. However, over the centuries, in association with the process of protection of parliamentary privilege, there has grown a body of principles which extends beyond ‘breach of privilege’ to include acts which constitute ‘contempt of Parliament’ and this forms part and parcel of the powers and privileges and immunities which being available to the Members of the House of Commons, became available to the Indian Parliament under article 105 of the Constitution in its original form and therefore, as a result of the Constitution (Forty-fourth) Amendment Act , in its present form. Generally any act or omission which obstructs or impedes Parliament (including its Committees and Members or any officer of Parliament) in the performance of functions directly or indirectly may be treated as contempt. Since the 1700s, printing or publishing any books or libel reflecting on the proceedings of the House of Commons has been held to constitute constructive contempt on the principle that such acts tend to obstruct the House in the performance of its functions by diminishing the respect due to it. Speaking words defamatory to the House or its proceedings have been held to constitute contempt for similar reasons. Of course, in order to constitute contempt, a libel relating to a Member of Parliament must be based on matters arising from the actual transaction of the business of the House. There have been cases in the past where use of strong language in the heat of a public controversy have not been treated as a contempt. At the same time the standing of the person making a statement allegedly contemptuous has been recognised as a relevant factor. The position held by Ambassador Sen was clearly a factor in the minds of the Honorouble Members who raised the question of privilege. All this leads to an obvious question. Why are the privileges of Parliament not codified into law as suggested in article 105 of the Constitution? This issue has actually been discussed a number of times, but the considered view has been that to do so would open up the matter to scrutiny of the Courts in terms of article 13 of the Constitution which prohibits the making of laws which take away or abridge or any Fundamental Right of a citizen enumerated in Part III of the Constitution. The issue of protecting Parliament has to be balanced with great delicacy and flexibility against the protection afforded to the individual citizen. And that is perhaps why Parliamentary Committees on Privileges, while constantly asserting the claim to privileges also forebear, with great maturity, from taking severe penal action unless the circumstances of the contempt are extreme. The writer was Joint Secretary, Rajya Sabha, from 1998 to 2002.
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Putin’s surprise endorsement
MOSCOW — President Vladimir V. Putin has now backed First Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev as a candidate to succeed him, abruptly snatching away the shroud of secrecy that has obscured the hunt for a new Russian leader. The country has been waiting anxiously for Putin, who finishes his second term in office next year, to anoint a successor. Conventional wisdom in Moscow has long taken it for granted that whomever Putin tapped would be elected president. Still, news of Putin’s surprise endorsement startled many analysts. Medvedev, an ambitious young Kremlin bureaucrat with strong business ties, earlier had been seen as a likely successor to Putin. But in recent weeks, as an increasingly strident Putin railed against foreign influence and basked in the naked adoration of the Russian masses, Medvedev’s name was hardly heard, and his chances seemed to have dimmed. Putin himself remains the greatest source of uncertainty shadowing Russia’s immediate future. The president has made it clear in recent weeks that he’s not ready to relinquish power. Parliamentary elections last week, which his party swept, were widely seen as a referendum on his rule, and he sat back while his followers filled the country with the slogan “The glory of Putin is the glory of Russia.” Unlike Putin, who rose quietly through the ranks of the KGB and was still a virtual unknown when he ascended to the presidency, Medvedev hails from the less hawkish faction of the Kremlin. A law professor and St. Petersburg bureaucrat in Soviet times, he is chairman of the board at Gazprom, the world’s biggest natural gas company. “The role of Mr. Putin is the most important issue: How these two will get along, whether Putin wants to have a formal position for himself,” said Andrei Kortunov, president of the New Eurasia Foundation. “This will define a lot of the opportunities and restrictions Medvedev might face.” “We would like to propose to you the candidacy which we all supported: The candidacy of first deputy premier of the Russian Federation, Dmitry Medvedev,” said Boris Gryzlov, head of Putin’s United Russia party. “We think he is a most socially oriented candidate. ... We think the next four years should go under the slogan of improving living standards.” Putin commended the men for coming to a consensus, pointing out that the parties represented various layers of Russian society. And then, calmly and deliberately, he gave the signal the country has been waiting for: “As for the candidacy of Dmitry Anatolyevich Medvedev, I can say that I have been acquainted with him for over 17 years,” Putin said. “We have been working very closely with him all these years, and I entirely support this choice.” The statement from Putin shoves Russia into a new, uncertain era, analysts said. “The moment when Putin points his finger and says, ‘I support this guy,’ this moment means a lot,” said Lilya Shvetsova, an analyst with the Carnegie Foundation in Moscow. “The elite, the observers, the business community will all be rushing towards this new leader.” Many Russians have theorised that Putin will find a roost as prime minister, head of the ruling United Russia party or as some sort of ill-defined “national leader.” But by declaring his support for Medvedev publicly, Putin has proved that he’s willing to relinquish power, Shvetsova said. The idea that Putin could linger as an omnipotent force once he’s stripped of his Kremlin powers is unrealistic, she argued. “The Kremlin role is such that, sooner or later, Medvedev will be forced to form his own team, his own political regime,” she said. “Whether or not he wants to, he’ll be forced to become independent.” It’s a measure of the dense doubt that pervades discussion of Russian politics that no two analysts seemed to agree on the meaning of the unexpected endorsement. In the twilight of his presidency, Putin has surprised everybody by tapping a candidate approved by business interests and the West, showing himself as “bourgeois, big business, thinking about money,” argued Stanislav Belkovsky, president of the National Strategy Institute in Moscow. “I call on Western analysts and journalists to understand Medvedev properly,” Belkovsky said. “He could be glorified as a liberal, but he’s just a very weak person belonging to the same philosophy as Putin.” Earlier Monday, Moscow buzzed with rumours that Puting was plotting to revive a long-shelved proposal to unify Russia and Belarus in order to install himself as president of the newly created country. “With Putin, we might still have some surprises,” Kortunov said. “I’m not sure he has a master plan in hand. I think he’s improvising.”
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Inside Pakistan PML (N) leader Nawaz Sharif is a practitioner of realpolitik. That is why he has decided to participate in the January 8 elections in the absence of a consensus among all the major opposition parties to boycott the polls. He discussed with PPP leader Benazir Bhutto the boycott idea under pressure from a section of his own party and some All Parties Democratic Movement (APDM) constituents like the Jamaat Islami and the Tehrik-e-Insaaf of Mr Imran Khan, but, perhaps, not as seriously as expected. Mr Sharif must have been thinking that staying away from the polls will take him nowhere. The decision of the PML (N) and PPP leaders to try their luck in the elections has, in fact, prevented them from falling into President Pervez Musharraf’s trap to ensure victory for the PML (Q), the party he has been patronising. What has been known as the King’s party is “shell-shocked” today, according to The News. Though both Mr Nawaz Sharif and his brother Shahbaz Sharif will not be contesting the polls as their nomination papers have been rejected by the Election Commission, “they are determined to spearhead their party’s campaign for the forthcoming elections so as not to leave the field open to the Chaudharys of Gujarat ( PML-Q chief Shujaat Hussain and former Punjab Chief Minister Pervaiz Elahi)”, The News (Dec 10) said. According to a write-up by Nadeem Syed, carried in The Nation (Dec 10), “It seems Mr Nawaz Sharif has thwarted their (the Chaudharys’) entire game plan, which they prepared with the support of their backers in the Establishment.” The idea was to ensure that Chaudhary Pervaiz Elahi became the next elected Prime Minister of Pakistan. That was not impossible if the PML (Q) had no such formidable challenger as the PML (N), the most popular party in Punjab. MMA biggest loser The failed election boycott drive of the opposition parties has caused the maximum harm to the alliance of the religious parties, the MMA. It is difficult to believe if the MMA will remain intact after the elections. There is no love last between its two prominent leaders – Maulana Fazl-ur-Rehman of the Jamiat-ul-Ulema-e-Islam and Qazi Hussain Ahmed of the Jamaat-e-Islami. “The two clerical parties are completely estranged and may themselves be cancelling out each other’s strength if the Jamaat-e-Islami finally decides to contest”, as Daily Times (Dec 11) pointed out. The other casualty of the politics of boycott may be the APDM. As The Nation said, “With every APDM component free to decide the matter (of contesting the elections) on its own, the APDM is dead for all practical purposes despite the desire of Mian Nawaz Sharif to keep it alive”. The movement led by the lawyers for the reinstatement of the judges who refused to take the oath under the ‘Provisional Constitutional Order’ may also get weakened. It may merely remain a “slogan”, as The Nation added. Towards a hung assembly The election scene is becoming interesting with the opposition parties now busy finalising their poll strategy. Whether they will be able to effectively prevent the Musharraf-backed PML (Q) from recapturing power remains to be seen. But political analysts are sure that Pakistan is moving towards a hung assembly. The PML (Q) is not as popular as the PPP or the PML (N) of Mr Sharif, but it has the advantage of having a helpful caretaker administration everywhere. It is bound to make use of this factor even after the emergency is lifted before the elections. Of course, its leaders must be feeling a little nervous with the entry of Mr Sharif’s party in the battle of the ballot. But the PML (Q) is “expected to perform well in Punjab’s rural areas”, according to The News. “How the participating parties fare in the elections now depends on numerous factors such as their ability to enter into seat-sharing arrangements, the position they adopt on the pre-PCO judiciary in their election campaign, and their success in mobilising the voters who have been depoliticised over the years and are, by and large, apathetic and cynical vis-ŕ-vis the game of politics…” Dawn said in an editorial on December 11. It will not be easy for the opposition parties to coordinate their activities because of the bitterness in their relations as a result recent developments. And if they do not put up a joint fight in the elections, they will indirectly be helping the pro-Musharraf alliance to recapture power in Islamabad and the provinces.
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