Minister is Out/In

The health of coalition governments is routinely assessed through external signs of stability. By current evidence, the Manmohan Singh government would appear to be extremely healthy. The little ceremony in Rashtrapati Bhavan on Saturday to swear in Shibu Soren marked the first expansion in the Union cabinet in six months. And then, too, it was only the return of someone who had been in the original team, back now to reclaim his coal portfolio. With assembly elections in Jharkhand coming up, in fact, the JMM MP’s re-induction is extremely timely.

Questions, however, swirl in the stillness secured on Saturday afternoon. Shibu Soren’s exit from the Council was Ministers was preceded by high drama. A police team from Jharkhand, remember, arrived at his New Delhi residence only to find the the minister had gone AWOL. The cops posted a copy of the non-bailable arrest warrant for a 20-year-old murder case against him, and left. Thereupon, he may have acted somewhat late, but Prime Minister Manmohan Singh ultimately did the right thing. He sought Soren’s resignation from the Union cabinet. Now, as the prime minister reopens the case by accommodating Soren back in the cabinet, he must know that he has to answer a question: what’s changed between the resignation/dismissal and the re-induction? Yes, in that interim Soren has won bail. Yet, if that is the only change, it would beg another question. Can it be the government’s case that a person must cease to be part of the Council of Ministers only for the time while he is under arrest? That after getting bail, but before his guilt or innocence is established in a court of law, he can simply revert to his official status and responsibilities as if nothing happened?

There is no denying an overall lowering of the bar in constituting a Cabinet. Norms once discarded get consigned to the dust heap. The prime minister now presides over a new test case. He must know that any compromise made here could simply become a precedent.