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Journalism of Courage
Legal solutions to political problems are usually too blunt to be useful
The Supreme Court has decided that legislators who have been convicted must resign,rather than be allowed to sit through their terms as they appeal their cases. The Representation of the People Act gives serving MPs and MLAs a pass,if they are in the process of appealing which can take years,given the slow and overburdened judicial system. Since convicted candidates are prohibited from contesting elections anyway,this move would bring sitting MPs and MLAs on par with them. In the aftermath of the courts order,many have suggested that it signals a great clean-up of democracy. That optimism may be naive and somewhat premature.
On Thursday,the Allahabad High Court called a halt to caste-based rallies in Uttar Pradesh. While the court may be motivated by the desire to encourage democracy to transcend narrow identity concerns,it also seems to fundamentally misunderstand the nature of parties and partisanship,and the realities in which democratic politics is embedded in India. Caste-based mobilisations are based on legitimate sectional appeals. Caste has changed politics and it has itself been transformed and secularised by it. Caste politics has evolved,as is visible in UP,with most parties straining beyond their core constituencies,soldering together broader combinations. Both the Supreme Court judgment and the Allahabad High Courts order reflect a measure of impatience with the untidiness and imperfections of democracy. But the flaws in the political arena cannot all be fixed by an overzealous court. The best solutions can only come from within democratic politics,even if they take longer and seem less perfect.
