Campaign injustice

Mulayam pledges to free a history-sheeter,undermines electoral promise on law and order

Mulayam pledges to free a history-sheeter,undermines electoral promise on law and order

Mulayam Singh Yadav has an odd way of staying on message. When Mayawati led the Bahujan Samaj Party to a majority in the Uttar Pradesh assembly five years ago,a key anti-incumbency plank was the promise of better law and order. It is not surprising,therefore,that opposition parties are lingering pointedly on the BSP governments record to put in sharp relief their own electoral promises. Mulayam says that should the Samajwadi Party come to power,it would enforce zero tolerance of criminals. Making the point graphically this weekend,he said: Goons and criminals will either leave criminal activities or leave the state or they will be put behind bars. Yet,that overarching rhetoric crumbles too often when it comes to specifics,as illustrated by Mulayams statement that an SP government would release from jail Vijay Mishra,a party colleague accused in a bomb blast. Put together with Mulayams odd commitment to providing jobs for educated rape victims,it points to a system of political patronage that has handicapped UPs development.

Mishra,who is seeking re-election from Gyanpur,leads his campaign from a Meerut jail. Mishra is a history-sheeter and the case that keeps him there involves a bomb blast outside a BSP ministers house in Allahabad in July 2010,in which The Indian Express reporter Vijay Pratap Singh lost his life. Mulayams contention is that the BSP government has lodged false cases against Mishra,and whether he is right or not,the tenability of the cases should be determined through due process. But by proclaiming that an SP government would release Mishra,Mulayam betrays the kind of impatience with due process and the politicisation of the administration that he accuses the state government of.

Establishment of law and order is an essential compact between the state and the people it presumes the absence of prejudice and whim in establishing the writ of the state. From political leaders,in government and in opposition,it demands a sustained defence of liberty. By failing to anchor his advocacy of Mishra in a deeper framework for quick delivery of justice indeed,by failing to hitch Mishras presumed innocence to the outcome of an impartial inquiry Mulayam undermines his own campaign. Rule of law is crucial to enabling the aspirations for betterment that is keeping afloat a forward-looking politics across the country. By refusing to disentangle this aspiration from a politics of patronage,Mulayam would keep the SP behind the curve.