Opinion 282 and insecure

This election has thrown up an unambiguous result. The BJP alone occupies more than half of the Lok Sabha and the Congress has been reduced to less than a sixth of its rival’s numbers. There has not been such a stark power differential between government and opposition in the last three decades. And yet, for weeks now, the Congress has been petitioning for the right to nominate an official leader of the opposition in Parliament, a request that has been met with stalling. It has now formally requested the Lok Sabha speaker, Sumitra Mahajan, to make the decision, citing the 1977 law. The Salaries and Allowances of Leaders of Opposition in Parliament Act says that the single largest opposition party is eligible for the LOP’s post. The BJP, for its part, has cited subordinate rules and previous convention, according to which a party needs a minimal 10 per cent of the seats (which the Congress is short of), to demand that status. It also points out that there was no formal leader of the opposition when Indira Gandhi was PM and when Rajiv Gandhi had a steamroller majority. But the point remains that a bad precedent should not be perpetrated when the chance is available, and the law clearly gives the largest opposition party, however small, the right to declare a leader of opposition.

The question is not one of the Congress’s claim, or whether the BJP is entitled to rub in a defeat. It is about parliamentary oversight and the tenets of our constitutional democracy. The leader of the opposition is on the selection committees for statutory posts like the chief vigilance commissioner, CBI director and Lokpal, and this is an important safeguard against unchecked executive privilege. In the UPA years, Sushma Swaraj, for instance, was a robust participant in these panels, expressing her dissent on the selection of the CVC, blocking the then-government’s Lokpal nominees, and making sure that the final choice was one of consensus. Given the unusual strength of this government and the centralisation of command, it is particularly vital that there be a formal counter within Parliament.

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The Modi government has a mandate like no other in recent years. It should not let petty rancour stop the necessary appointment of a leader of opposition. Given the virtual sidelining of his cabinet and glimmers of judicial intimidation in the Gopal Subramanium case, Modi now has to counter the perception that he brooks no opposition. One way would be to gracefully accept what the law demands, on the question of parliamentary roles.