Parliamentary democracy everywhere runs on a premise that the ruling party has to take one step extra. Then there is a pressure on the opposition that if the ruling party has taken a step we must respond. That one step was conspicuously missing, giving a kind of feeling that probably the government in the winter session didn’t want the parliament to function.Q. Why was there a deadlock over the suspension of 12 MPs.A. The chairman (Rajya Sabha) was very keen to resolve the issue and he kept on giving direction to both the ruling party and the opposition. He even gave a basic tutorial as to how it can be resolved giving instances of the past. The chair depends on a thread of connectivity between the ruling party and the opposition. If that thread is conspicuously missing or the parties have decided not to care for that thread, the chair can’t do much.Q. The onus to some extent is also on the opposition parties.A. As an opposition party we could have done it differently and resolved it. People don’t send us to the parliament to see that the deadlock continues for days together. While the greater responsibility is of the ruling party but at same time the opposition also should not take disruption as a valid parliament strategy. It could have been valid in 2011-12 but not now. When you have a government which is not willing to jettison its arrogance, you should utilise whatever space available to you to expose the government.Q. A division was visible in the opposition camp too.A. When the parliament was envisaged, the idea was the passion outside the house shouldn’t have any reflection in the house. Right now, the division outside has led to division within the house. There used to be certain points of contradiction between the political parties, which one can understand. There were contractions within political parties and those contradictions were much more visible on certain days.Q. The opposition seemed to be divided into two camps led by Congress and Trinamool Congress.A. Every political party has the right and prerogative to enhance its footprints. But your idea of enhancing the footprints shouldn’t result in a situation where the best footprints in parliamentary discourse are lost. You might fight outside and contest elections against each other. But never allow that politics to disturb the political rhythm of unity inside the house. In oneupmanship in this kind of competitive environment, let’s not ruin whatever shades of democratic discourse are available to us.Q. You mean to say it was Trinamool Congress which was more responsible for the division in the opposition camp.A. I wouldn’t like to name any political party. It is a responsibility of all the parties in opposition, even those which are currently comfortable with the BJP but the discomfort is slowly emerging whether it is Telangana or Andhra. For larger parliamentary discourse you must set aside your outside politics and come to the house with a sense of unity.Q. There were important bills like the Election Amendment Bill, linking Voter ID to Aadhar, where the opposition should have participated in the debate.A. This is one bill that might lead to compromise in our electoral process. We know the biggest beneficiary of the electoral bonds is BJP. Now data shall be the monopoly and we all know the importance of this data. It invades privacy. These issues we could have raised but we couldn’t. Disruptions made a headline the day after the government passed the bill and the opposition boycotted. People didn’t get to know what the opposition view was. A larger message to the ruling party, but a smaller message is also to the opposition that we are passing through a very difficult time, a kind of dark tunnel and in a dark tunnel if we all must always work hard to have a source of light. If we choke the source of light that is parliament, we don’t have much option left.Q. Where do smaller parties like RJD stand in this big opposition divide?A. We are a small party with five members in the Rajya Sabha. But we are the single largest party in Bihar. There have been very important issues particularly, caste-based census. A huge majority of people and their socioeconomic status is not known. We needed parliament as a platform to raise those issues. We also were keen to debate the grant of special status to Bihar. Smaller parties like us get very little time and if that is also lost, we feel helpless.
Source: Economic Times