A cover-up bid

Union Home Minister L.K. Advani's call for a national debate on Article 356 of the Constitution shows how piqued the ruling party is at i...

Union Home Minister L.K. Advani8217;s call for a national debate on Article 356 of the Constitution shows how piqued the ruling party is at its failure to dismiss the Rabri Devi government. He and several other leaders of the party have reiterated that Bihar is a fit case for invoking this Article. If they are so convinced about their stand, does anything prevent them from going ahead with their plan? After all, the President is constitutionally bound to dismiss the Bihar government if the Cabinet persists in its recommendation.

Those who presumed that the BJP had gracefully accepted the President8217;s advice have been proved wrong. It is now clear that it is the lack of consensus within the ruling coalition that has forced the BJP to give up its plan to send the Rabri Devi government packing. All its exercises since then have been directed at covering up its discomfiture. Little does the party realise that in doing so it is only compounding its mistake. Advani8217;s plan to initiate a debate is unlikely to carryconviction for the simple reason that such a debate will not help evolve a consensus. It is worth recalling that few other provisions of the Constitution have evoked as intense a debate as Article 356 during the last 50 years.

As recently as a year ago, the subject was discussed thoroughly by the Inter-State Council but it too failed to reach a consensus. A noteworthy aspect of the debate is that political parties which are opposed to the Article turn into its votaries the moment they come to power at the Centre. The BJP has proved that it is no exception. Barring the Akali Dal, which incidentally is an ally of the BJP, and the DMK, most of the parties do not want its abrogation. All that they want is to prevent its misuse.

BJP chief Kushabhau Thakre and others have questioned the very relevance of the Article if it cannot be used against the RJD government. But they forget that it is not the Article as such that has become contentious. The President has turned down the Cabinet8217;s recommendation because ofits failure to provide a foolproof case for such a decision. Reports have it that the President has specified the grounds on which he found the recommendation wholly unacceptable.

In other words, if the Cabinet had done its homework and if the alliance partners had not spoken in different voices, the President8217;s decision could have been entirely different.

The Constitution has spelled out some of the steps the Centre should have taken before it thought of Article 356. But no such step was taken in this case. Instead, BJP and Samata Party leaders have been shouting day in and day out that Bihar represented the worst in administration. In fact, the allegedly incompetent Rabri government was wise enough to think of presenting the President with crime figures to show that the law and order situation was worse in states ruled by the BJP. It is true that Article 356 was wantonly misused in the past by parties like the Congress but that is no justification for its further misuse.

Fortunately, there are nowcase laws and precedents set by the President which will prevent governments from using it for partisan purposes. This is certainly a welcome change, whatever Advani and company may think in their present state of pique.