Buck stops with UPA

As an exercise in ensuring ideological rigidity, it has been perfected in totalitarian regimes. A tract would be published in the party journal, every nuance and inflection laden with ominous tidings for government appointees in the realm. Harkishen Singh Surjeet’s laundry list of men and women deemed to be “pro-RSS” — therefore qualified for dismissal — is not so subtle. In an article in the CPI(M)’s house publication, People’s Democracy, the party general secretary has been unequivocal about his demands. However, it’s not just the transparency of agenda that separates his prose from those opaque hints of purges. Comrade Surjeet’s article also need not be that ominous for integrity of the procedures that must guide appointments in a democracy. That is, if the Congress, being the dominant party in the UPA government, takes ownership of official decisions and sits out this particular dance.

A very dangerous tendency has accompanied the rapid turnover of governments in states and at the Centre. A grey area in effecting appointments is being increasingly exploited to extend patronage and instal like-minded men and women in cultural organisations and academic institutions, on adivisory panels and assorted boards. Summary dismissals must be avoided not because of any sense of injustice to the involved persons. The danger is larger. Firing appointees of ousted governments — thereby strengthening the precedent for a future government to do the same — makes over our institutions into politically contested terrain. Instead, institutions charged with writing textbooks and supporting culture must be freed of ideological and political agendas. This is best achieved by insulating them from electoral arithmetic.

However, if the electoral arithmetic has vaulted the Left into a position where it feels empowered to issue shrill diktats, coalitional specifics leave the Congress as solely responsible for any action that may stem from these demands. To state the obvious, it is the Congress that leads the government in New Delhi; the Left is merely offering outside support. Therefore, for the damage done to institutions and procedures due to possible purges, it alone would be liable to be called to account.