A more perfect Union

We are faced with much the same dilemmas that confronted Lincoln. There may not be a civil war looming up, but we too need to take hard decisions if the Union our Union is to be preserved. And, at the risk of contradicting some of the highest in the land, it will be necessary to review the Constitution if we too seek to create 8220;a more perfect Union8221;.

Why is it necessary to effect changes in the Constitution? The best answer to that is to point to two separate incidents in the last month. Both involve the Congress, which opposes reviewing the Constitution today. During the Emergency, Congress-dominated legislatures in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, and Haryana demanded not just a re-evaluation but the installation of a new Constituent Assembly! The first was the creation of a mammoth ministry in Bihar. The second was the scandalous purchase of votes in the Rajya Sabha elections.

Thirty years ago the Administrative Reforms Commission recommended that the strength of a ministry should not exceed 10 per cent of the size of the directly-elected House, 11 per cent in the event of a bicameral legislature. I cannot think of any counsel that has been ignored quite as persistently, though never quite so blatantly perhaps as in the Rabri Devi ministry. Eighty-four ministers from a House with a strength of 324 and the Chief Minister still managed to retain the Home and Finance portfolios? Uttar Pradesh may have more ministers, but in percentile terms Bihar wins hands down. If T. Anjaiah8217;s government in Andhra Pradesh was mocked as a 8220;jumbo ministry8221;, Rabri Devi8217;s outfit is an 8220;aircraft carrier cabinet8221;.

How about the Rajya Sabha polls? Short of hanging up For Sale8217; banners outside their offices, some legislators did everything they could to make a mockery of the process. All I can say is that the voting for the Upper House was a perfect counterpart to that for the Lower House money dominated the first as muscle did the latter.

We need legal barriers to put an end to this nonsense. It is unrealistic to expect that our beloved lords and masters shall suddenly cease hankering for the perks of office, or stop creating new ones. There are no less than ten ministers looking after agriculture in Bihar; in the long run these could prove more expensive than the fodder scam itself. Nor can we expect our elections to be free and fair; if polling for the Rajya Sabha invites such vulgar purchases, can the Election Commission control malpractices given the gigantic scale of a General Election?

I do not think any citizen would seriously object to amending the Constitution to bar this kind of idiocy. After all, it is we who must pay for all those ministers and legislators. But having gone so far, should we be content to tinker with the Constitution? Isn8217;t it time to take a holistic look?

May I compare our experience with that of the United States? The American Constitution came into effect on the March 4, 1789 in 211 years it has been necessary to amend it just 27 times. What is our record? Our Constitution went into force on January 26, 1950; assuming the Women8217;s Reservation Bill finally goes through, it will be the 84th amendment. In other words, we have found it necessary to amend the Constitution thrice as much in less than a quarter of the time!

I would not dream of tearing down a house just because of a leaky roof. But I would definitely check for structural damage if the walls must be propped up almost twice every year.

There is another area of concern. Looking at the American document, I am struck at the general tenor of the amendments they protect or extend the rights of citizens from the State. The first ten are, in fact, collectively called the Bill of Rights, mandating freedom of speech, the right to bear arms, trial by jury, and so on. The only amendment to curtail individual choice, Prohibition, was hastily withdrawn. In fact, the only limits that still exist are those banning anyone from enjoying more than two terms in office as President and setting a limit on a legislature8217;s right to give more money to itself not bad ideas for the Indian context either!.

How does the Indian Constitution stand the comparison? It is a dismal tale: from Jawaharlal Nehru8217;s down, every government has tried to limit individual liberties. Where the American First Am-endment established freedom of speech, our First Amendment permitted 8220;reasonable restrictions8221; on freedom of expression. Believe me, it has been downhill all the way from there. The Third Amendment permitted the Central Government to control production of certain items, the Fourth removed the State8217;s seizure of private property from judicial scrutiny, the Sixteenth enabled governments to place 8220;reasonable restrictions8221; on a citizen8217;s exercise of Fundamental Rights8230; It is a long and depressing list of horrors.

It is often said that the Constitution is supreme. Wrong! It is the people who are supreme, and if we should choose to change it, not even the highest in the land can stand in the way. Isn8217;t that what the Constitution itself says?