The conscience of the king

Pratap Bhanu Mehta8217;s article 8216;Justice by Law8217;, IE March 25, 2005, while trying to present a balanced view of the issue, fin...

Pratap Bhanu Mehta8217;s article 8216;Justice by Law8217;, IE March 25, 2005, while trying to present a balanced view of the issue, finally slips into a formal view, the one adopted by PM Manmohan Singh, that Modi being an elected representative of the people, should have been given the visa by the US, and not doing so is an affront to India.

Needless to say, the issue cannot be taken as black and white. There are shades of grey and even in a democracy, those areas need to be respected and upheld. Democracy is not a static process and we are aware that the likes of Modi have used democracy to usurp democracy itself, Hitler being the prime example of this phenomenon.

In the ongoing debate, the major issue is neither the nature of the US or formal legal positions. What we have witnessed is a gross violation of democratic norms, the massive carnage, which in turn was cleverly maneuvered to polarise the community and to come back to power. It was precisely because of the power of the Hindu right that this pogrom was unleashed and it delivered the desired result for the Hindu Right, i.e. its return to power in Gujarat and to hold the existing and create a new vote bank for itself. During the pogrom, we helplessly witnessed a President urging the Prime Minister to act, a Prime Minister who swung like a pendulum from 8220;Raj dharma should be followed8221; to 8220;what face will I show to the world8221;, to even contemplating the dismissal of Modi. We witnessed multiplespeak by the ruling establishment.

Power should not be the only criterion of legality8212;as Modi has been flaunting shamelessly I represent five crore Gujaratis!. What if he had been sacked by the Central government during the carnage as was being contemplated? While Manmohan Singh does take a legal position, the deeper question is what is the litmus test of democratic ethos? What do we do of the Supreme Court8217;s verdict that it is not possible to get justice in Gujarat? What do we do of the reports of the National Human Rights commission? No doubt, the answers are not easy. The issue is not about applauding the decision of the US; the issue is to look at the grey zones of democracy. Also, it is quite likely that the US might not have denied the visa had the human rights groups there not campaigned systematically using the provisions of US law itself. The choice for us is to either surrender to formalism, like Pratap Bhanu Mehta does, or sustain a democratic pressure as a possible check on the authoritarian arrogance disguised as democracy for the sake of convenience, of Modi and his ilk.

The writer is a human rights activist