Category: India

With the resignation of Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath yesterday after a mass resignation of 22 MLAs of his party, we are fast approaching a place where it becomes imperative for the constitutional experts to rethink the ‘Anti-Defection Law’ as an antithesis to the subterfuge of the mandate given by the electorate.

In 1967, the phrase ‘Aaya Ram Gaya Ram’ attained widespread circulation in Indian politics after a Haryana MLA Gaya Lal changed his party thrice within the same day!

The anti-defection law sought to prevent such political defections which may be due to the reward of office or other similar considerations.

The Tenth Schedule was inserted into the Constitution in 1985. It lays down the process by which legislators may be disqualified on grounds of defection by the Presiding Officer of a legislature based on a petition by any other member of the House.

A legislator is deemed to have defected if he either voluntarily gives up the membership of his party or disobeys the directives of the party leadership on a vote.

This implies that a legislator defying (abstaining or voting against) the party whip on any issue can lose his membership of the House.  The law applies to both Parliament and state assemblies.

There are exceptions under the law: The law allows a party to merge with or into another party provided that at least two-thirds of its legislators are in favour of the merger. In such a scenario, neither the members who decide to merge nor the ones who stay with the original party will face disqualification.

But, as illustrated yesterday in MP and earlier in Karnataka, the law proves inadequate in achieving its principal mission when the MLAs simply resign — thereby achieving the purpose of defection without defecting per se.

And yet, can any law ever stop an MLA from resigning? The query, of course, is rhetorical.

And what about instances like Maharashtra, when one part of the winning alliance breaks the alliance — an entity that does not have any constitutional validity —and joins hands with the opposing alliance to form a government? There is pretty much nothing that can be done about it constitutionally. It is, at the current juncture, merely a moral issue.

The subject of morality, however, opens another debate related to the issue.

The anti-defection law seeks to ensure the stability of the government of the day by making sure that the legislators do not switch sides (at their whims).

However, this law also restricts a legislator from voting in line with his conscience, judgment and interests of his electorate.

This, in essence, forces the members to vote based on the decisions taken by the party leadership, and not what their constituents would like them to vote for.

What, then, about the moral issue of doing what the constituents demand from their (individual) representatives?

There are no easy answers to these questions. Therefore, it becomes mandatory that representatives of all the stakeholders in the Indian democracy begin an urgent, earnest dialogue on the issue.

 

Akshay Thakur, 31, Pawan Gupta, 25, Vinay Sharma, 26, and Mukesh Singh, 32, were hanged at 05:30 AM on March 20, 2020, giving closure to the family of a young medical student who was gang-raped and tortured on a moving bus in Delhi in 2012.

Recollect what happened on that appalling night on December 16, 2012, to realize how the culmination of the justice process was a just one:

“[…] drunk men dragged Nirbhaya to the rear of the moving bus and took turns to rape her. As she fought back, one of the attackers – a juvenile – inserted a rusted, L-shaped rod – used with a wheel jack – into her private parts, pulling and ripping her intestines apart. Her medical reports later revealed that she had septic injuries on her abdomen and genital organs also.

Done with the savagery, the attackers then threw her out of the moving bus and even tried to run the vehicle over the half-naked blood-soaked woman…”

Appalling as it may sound, and while we completely agree with their hanging, the crime —in the current context — can barely be considered “rarest of rare”.

As per the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data, if more than 68 girls and women were raped every day in 2012, the number increased to 91.38 in 2018.

In other words, such cases are no longer ‘rare’ because these gruesome crimes are happening all through the year, every year.

As statistics point out, during that long period (2012-18), while the number of girls raped in India jumped by 33%, India’s most talked-about case kept dragging on under the weight of the sorry state of affairs of the judicial system in India.

No wonder then that celebrities like Preity Zinta took to social media to not only welcome the hanging but also point out that if the hanging was carried out in 2012 itself, the rising cases of murder might have been kept in check.

There, of course, cannot be any method of arriving at that conclusion. However, it is human nature to avoid getting on the wrong side of a ruthless law-enforcing agency/administration. Test the theory in Singapore, if you must.

The most common and largely rational argument against capital punishment is that sooner or later, innocent people will get killed, because of “mistakes or flaws in the justice system”; and that where capital punishment is used such mistakes cannot be put right.

But then, while long processes like that in the Nirbhaya case invariably take every possible precaution, “mistakes or flaws in the justice system” can also result in the most brutal rapist and/or killer to escape the clutches of law — and even get a sewing machine and cash from a slimy chief minister.

The idea should be to get a Nirbhaya Case justice process done as early as possible.

Every step that was taken in this extremely thorough process needs to be fast-tracked. Of course, some steps can’t happen any faster. But most can be. And that’s what needs to be done. Today.

Else, be prepared for either the number of rapes crossing 100 per day or people showering flowers on Hyderabad police after they eliminate the brutal rapists “who were trying to run away from the police custody”.

Or both.

Again, we wholeheartedly support the hanging of the four in the Nirbhaya case. It was a just culmination of the process of law.

MUMBAI (Maharashtra): Amid the high-voltage political drama going on with regards formation of the next government, the most likely scenario emerging is that of a Shiv Sena (SS) and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) alliance government that is ‘supported from outside’ by Congress.

Congress abstaining would save both itself and Shiv Sena the blushes of making an ‘opportunistic alliance that goes severely against their stated and steady ideologies‘.

The magic figure of 145 rests on the assumption that all 288 legislators will take part in the trust vote. But if the 44 Congress MLAs decide to abstain from the trust vote, preferring to stay neutral, the effective strength of the Assembly will diminish to 244.

In this scenario, the ruling coalition will need the support of just 123 legislators. The Shiv Sena and NCP have 110 MLAs have of their own — while the rest of the numbers can be gained through enticing the many independents and smaller parties.

If that happens, Congress can loudly claim that it did not support the Sena-NCP combine — because of the presence of Shiv Sena — and yet ensure that the BJP is kept outside the power corridor.

More importantly, for Congress, it would give out the message — or, at least the Congress would like to believe and tell the world that it gives the message, to its largely minority-sensitive vote bank — that it did not support the ‘communal Shiv Sena’, even when its ally NCP did, and chose to sit in the opposition.

Therefore, it would be in power while sitting in the opposition benches; allying with a ‘rabid Hindu outfit’ while keeping the Muslims in good humour. It would be the quintessentially slick Congress style of ‘having the cake and eating it too‘.

The smaller parties include the Bahujan Vikas Aghadi (3 MLAs), MIM (2), Samajwadi Party (2 ), Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghatna, Maharashtra Navnirman Sena and the CPI(M) with one legislator each.

It has already been reported that the Shiv Sena has secured the support of eight independent legislators.

In any case, the thumb rule in Indian politics is that independents and smaller parties almost inevitably support the power gravy trail, or, whichever formation is more likely to form the government.

If, as per my belief, the NCP and Shiv Sena do come together to stake a claim, the first task would be the election of the speaker.

Since the entire exercise is because the Shiv Sena wants its chief minister, the Sena would most certainly give the post the NCP — a choice that would readily be supported by the Congress.

Remember, the elected speaker of the Assembly will conduct the trust vote in the house.

JODHPUR (Rajasthan): In a battle that has at stake the prestige of Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, sitting MP from Jodhpur and Union minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat is pitted against the former’s son Vaibhav Gehlot.

A loss for his son — in his debut — in the CM’s home turf, which he has nurtured for decades, would take the sheen off Congress’ victory in the recent assembly elections.

Himself a five-time MP from Jodhpur and currently a sitting MLA from Sardarpura here, CM Gehlot is heard playing on people’s emotions to see Vaibhav through.

But the kind of effort and attention that CM Gehlot is investing in Jodhpur to ensure his son’s victory is causing discontent in the Rajasthan unit of Congress.

And this can be seen via ground-level assessment from both the Congress and BJP ‘camps’ (respectively):

Some disquiet in the cong .. most cabinet ministers of rajasthan, senior cong leaders making a beeline to campaign for gehlot’s son .. is it jeopardising chances of others ?

— pallavi ghosh (@_pallavighosh) April 24, 2019

CM and ex-CM both in Rajasthan wants to defeat one man in Jodhpur. For that one is not stepping out of Jodhpur and one is not stepping in Jodhpur. But looks like Jodhpur Janta wants to ensure that man becomes future CM. Let us see who wins. #GSS

— Chowkidaar Arvind Jain (@arvind_barmer) April 24, 2019

The latter observer can be explained thus:

For Shekhawat, who had fought and won his first election in 2014, another victory would enhance his stature within BJP and make him a direct challenger of his vocal critic, former chief minister Vasundhara Raje.

And to ensure that, Shekhawat is campaigning across the length of the constituency, addressing every segment of the constituency.

Jodhpur Lok Sabha constituency consists of eight assembly segments which are Phalodi, Lohawat, Shergarh, Sardapura, Jodhpur, Soorsagar, Luni, Pokaran. The constituency has a presence of Rajput community at large who are likely to play a major role in deciding the mandate in 2019.

Jodhpur constituency holds historical importance. It’s of the urban cities in Rajasthan and has a say in defining state politics.

BJP’s Gajendra Singh Shekhawat is the sitting MP in Jodhpur who defeated Chandresh Kumari of the Congress by a margin of almost 4 lakh votes in 2014.

The arrival of Hanuman Beniwal into the NDA fold is an added factor in favour of the BJP candidate.

Jat leader Beniwal is a former BJP leader who was ousted from the party after his differences with former chief minister Vasundhara Raje.  A sitting MLA in the Rajasthan Assembly from Nagaur, he then launched a political outfit called Rashtriya Loktantrik Party (RLP) in October 2018.

However, after the 2018 assembly election results, which led the BJP to lose the state to Congress, it recently decided to align with the RLP.

Looking at Beniwal’s cloud on the ground in some regions, BJP may encash benefit in districts like Ajmer, Pali, Barmer, and Jodhpur. The results are currently being seen on the ground:

#जोधपुर लोकसभा के #कलाउ में @BJP4India के प्रत्याशी श्री गजेंद्र सिंह जी शेखावत के समर्थन में विशाल जन सभा को संबोधित किया !@gssjodhpur @BJP4Rajasthan @PrakashJavdekar @AmitShah @narendramodi @1stIndiaNews @pantlp @babulalsharma19 pic.twitter.com/AoJUDPE6tf

— HANUMAN BENIWAL (@hanumanbeniwal) April 24, 2019

The trouble does not end there for the Congress. As per figures available through local media, the BJP candidate spent more on the day of the nomination day than what his Congress rival spent in a week after filing his nomination. It is not about money alone, which the Gehlots too would have in bagfuls, it is about the ability of a candidate to fight tooth-for-tooth against the ‘incumbent establishment’.

If the well-oiled (and well-funded) BJP machinery needed any more than ‘mere campaigning budget’, the party has the nation’s ultimate star-power to back its candidate.

PM Narendra Modi held his maiden poll rally in Rajasthan here earlier this week drawing his usual huge crowd.

“The CM is running from street to street trying to save his son,” Modi told the gathering.

Already rattled by an increasingly uphill task, Gehlot retorted with a rather below-the-belt statement:  “Which father would not slog for his son? But how would Modi know? He doesn’t even have a family!”

The utterance from such a seasoned politician, most experts believe, betrayed his nervousness.

To add to that nervousness, BJP President Amit Shah is going to hold a roadshow in Jodhpur today — apart from addressing a rally in Jalore.

Amid the unprecedented attention from both the parties, the locals seem a little confused. It’s a case of Hobson’s choice for them: A majority of those interviewed by the local Rajasthan media — especially of those belonging the CM Gehlot’s Mali caste — say that they want both Narendra Modi and “our chief minister’s son” to win.

That ‘caste pride association’ with the incumbent chief minister is something that Shekhawat seems to be mindful of. Therefore, and taking a cue from the national leadership of his party, he is striving hard to make people look beyond caste considerations and look at the issue of nationalism. Remember, Rajasthan borders Pakistan and the Balakot and Wg. Cdr. Abhinandan Warthaman issues have not completely died down.

Campaigning across the length of the constituency, addressing every segment of the constituency, he sticks basically to one issue: “I want you to remember the sacrifice of our jawans.” It is an emotive issue like no other — especially for the young and the first-time voters, irrespective of their castes.

He is ably supported by the state BJP leadership in that strategy.

“The fight in Jodhpur is between Gehlot’s son Vaibhav on one side and nation’s “vaibhav” on the other,” said BJP vice-president and Rajasthan in charge Avinash Rai Khanna recently to media persons.

Shekhawat is also good at thinking on the feet: Recently, in a locality called Sursagar, a Ram Navami procession was allegedly pelted with stones when it passed through a Muslim-dominated area. He spent the rest of the night outside the police station with his supporters demanding the release of some Hindu youths picked up for questioning.

Will those ‘gestures’ help? The jury is still out on that one.

For an incident or two might not be able to counter what indeed is CM Gehlot’s personal connect with the people considering Jodhpur, his political workspace over decades.

It is a tough one to call. But there seems to be a more wide-ranging effort from the BJP. If they are able to convince the nation that “it is not about Jodhpur, it is about the nation”, then Shekhawat would definitely be returning from Jodhpur.

In any case, imagine a state’s chief minister overlooking 24 constituencies because his son is contesting from the remaining one. As stated in the beginning, there is an undercurrent of unhappiness among the Congress party about the aspect. It promises to hurt the party really bad.

Some of the party’s most ardent supporters too are saying that aloud now:

Cowards. What a Bhasmasuri party!Has no vision. No guts. Messed it up in Delhi. A very rude shock awaits them in Rajasthan as Gehlot just campaigning for his son and diverting all resources there. The regional satraps dont listen to Rahul or he doesnt have the authority. https://t.co/XSXGXmq0gU

— Abhisar Sharma (@abhisar_sharma) April 25, 2019

Fortunately, only for CM Gehlot, the party had anyway lost all the 25 seats in 2014. It can’t do much worse than that, can it?

IN BRIEF:

Rajasthan has a total of 25 parliamentary seats which will go to polls in two phases. Here is the seat-wise break-up in which phase, the election will be held in Rajasthan constituencies.

13 out of 25 Rajasthan constituencies will go to polls in Lok Sabha election 4th phase, April 29:

Tonk-Sawai Madhopur, Ajmer, Pali, Jodhpur, Barmer, Jalore, Udaipur, Banswara, Chittorgarh, Rajsamand, Bhilwara, Kota, Jhalawar-Baran.

Remaining 12 Rajasthan constituencies will go to polls in Lok Sabha election 5th phase, May 06:

Ganganagar, Bikaner, Churu, Jhunjhunu, Sikar, Jaipur Rural, Jaipur, Alwar, Bharatpur, Karauli-Dholpur, Dausa, Nagaur

BJP’s Partners in Rajasthan: One

The BJP is contesting polls in alliance with Rashtriya Loktantrik Party (RLP), which had won Khinvsar, Merta and Bhopalgarh seats in 2018 Rajasthan Assembly elections.

Congress’ Partners in Rajasthan: None

Unlike its alliance with Ajit Singh’s Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD), Sharad Pawar’s Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and Sharad Yadav’s Loktantrik Janata Dal (LJD) in the 2018 Assembly Elections, the Congress is going alone on all the 25 seats in this election.

In the last 100-odd hours, since facing one of the world’s deadliest terrorist attacks against security forces in recent history, India has lost 40 CRPF personnel, two Indian Army Majors, two Indian Army Sepoys and one Indian Army Hawaldar. Also, one DIG of J&K Police and a Brigadier, a Lt. Colonel, a Major and a Captain of the Indian Army are critically injured in the latest encounter with Pakistan-sponsored terrorists. The nation is boiling over with cries of revenge, and the enemy is alert and mobilised at the border expecting precisely that.

India is at war currently.

BUT, you would be excused for believing that the pressing issues of the moment for our besieged nation are stray — and mostly imaginary — attacks against Kashmiri students in some parts of ‘the Indian mainland’, a plebiscite in Kashmir, and, hold your breath, a certain curiously excited male genitalia.

That forced misplaced focus, unfortunately, is merely a continued manifestation of the inimical forces that have been hindering the Indian story.

And it’s time we discuss the issue a little, aloud.

We are not too fond of jargon, but for this particular exercise, we would take refuge in one to keep this note short and sharp.

Though borne out of a marketing slogan, the term ‘fifth-generation warfare’ has become a favourite of ‘strategy analysts’, especially of the types that talk of defence and security.

Dr Peter Layton, the winner of the US Secretary of Defense’s Exceptional Public Service Medal for his work at the Pentagon on force structure matters, defines ‘fifth-generation warfare’ as “a dynamic way of war, constantly evolving as the context changes and new demands arise”.

He says that it involves four approaches viz., ‘networks’, ‘combat cloud’, ‘multi-domain battle’ and ‘fusion warfare’ functioning together as “an integrated, interdependent ‘system of systems’ whose whole is greater than the sum of its parts”.

What we are seeing right at this moment in India is straight out of that projected theory of ‘fifth generation warfare’.
India, this week, under the siege of a large, interconnected army of ‘network(er)s’ led by, among other minions of the oil and salvation-led deep state, a discredited journalist, a deranged lawyer-activist, a failed dancer-actor, a forever-student religious bigot, a virtue-signalling foreign news company, a fraud-accused ‘human rights group’, and a couple of blatantly biased technology platforms.

Their ‘operational theatre’ involves (spreading (mis))’information’, ‘sensing’ (the mood of the polity),  (studying the) ‘effects’ (of facts and their misinformation) and (setting up) ‘command’ (and command structures).

For close to 36 hours now, they are telling you that a slap here or a kick there (at worst, if at all) is a more worrying event than the bodies of our heroes being blown apart (apology).
Following their lead are thousands of such ‘networkers’ telling you that precise thing. At the same time. All the time. And they would not stop till that is the only thing in your subconscious.

That is front #1.

Front #2, the ‘combat cloud’, is ‘shared backroom storage’ (on, for example, Facebook, Twitter and indeed both on local intranets and the wide internet) from which the networkers pull and add data as necessary.

That space is being used by the said nefarious individuals to brainstorm, strategise and execute command control instructions. Instructions like, “the moment someone says ‘We want revenge for the killing of our soldiers’, swarm the timeline, all you 5+ million followers of, say, the discredited journalist, with statements like, ‘Yes, we all want it. But let’s not attack, innocent and peaceful Kashmiri students. Beating up Kashmiris across India (a fictitious scale, if not the event itself) is precisely what Pakistan wants us to do'”.

Front # 3, ‘multi-domain battle’ is self-explanatory. Why, aren’t you forced to read the same lies ad nauseam via social media, print media, television news, WhatsApp, public seminars and, hell, even your neighbourhood uncle who suffers from Stockholm Syndrome.

The final approach, the ‘fusion warfare’, is front # 4 for our tainted ‘networks’. It involves, as per Dr Layton’s study, “command and control concerns arising from additional information flows, software incompatibilities and intrinsic vulnerabilities to attack and deception”.

Something like, “Hey, the report from the ground suggests that the Kashmiri students lie has started going against us (it even got an FIR registered against one of us), so we’ll have to change the narrative. How about us being targetted, harassed, threatened with rape/murder etc? Maybe throw in a picture of a ******sized p****?” And voila, they succeed in getting a grip on the narrative again! Give or take a few plausible versions of it.

When the ‘corrupt forces’ open up all the four fronts simultaneously, as they have done currently, it becomes fifth-generation warfare.
Worryingly, the current ‘networks’, like many before them, might just be the pawns in the hands of, again, the oil and salvation-led deep state; they might just be useful idiots who are excelling in carrying out the tasks mentioned in their pay cheques, but they are useful — mighty useful, for and on behalf of the forces that we are fighting.

On one level, it is a difficult battle. But on the other, we just have to pay back in kind.

We would NOT have the support of platforms like Twitter, Facebook etc that have attained a far-reaching impact on the human psyche. The support we shan’t have, but use them we will, for our advantage. Along with the telephone, paper, and that good old thing called personal interactions.

It is going to be a long battle that requires unpaid services, the formation of many interconnected networks with the same purpose, and, most of all, clarity of action.