Last
week we celebrated Constitution day. Every body was all praise for
that document. We are executing our democratic obligations in
accordance to the dictates given in that document. Many suggested
that the document is all perfect and our present Prime Minister Mr.
Modi said that his government shall keep that document as it is and
that; it is the source of inspiration to all Indians. A lot of praise
was bestowed on that and they all accepted that the document is very
unique and no better document can be prepared for our country.
If
my readers remember I had written about our constitution and in that
I had quoted that our constitution is a document primarily prepared
originally by the British imperial office in London in early
twentieth century and it was supposed to help the ruler class to
control the masses the way empire builders do. Eventually, that same
document was adopted by our committee which was prepare to give our
new country a fresh constitution that may be able to guide the
governments in future management of the government. I am reminding my
readers about it because in this post I want to elaborate on the
aspect of our constitution that helps ruler class more than the
ordinary people of this country. Since it helps more the ruler class
and not the voter class they are obviously all praise for that
document!
What
is presumed while preparing this document is important to note. This
document presumes that the elected people are sincere to the voters,
honest with the country, they are patriotic, they are in every way
competent, intelligent and also that they are thorough gentlemen.
These presumptions were made, I believe from the way then political
workers with the then National Congress were found to be.
Similarly
the constitution seems to be presuming that the bureaucrats are
sincere to the commitments they have to make during their service,
they are patriotic, they are intelligent to do the task entrusted to
them, they are gentle with the people with whom they have to deal
during their duties, they are utmost efficient in performing the task
given to them. They will not give excuses to cover up for their
shortcomings, they will not indulge in corrupt practices under any
circumstance. And finally that they are patriotic in their dealing
with the affairs of the country.
The
constitution also seems to have taken for granted that the Judiciary
is competent in understanding the problems of the people brought to
them for scrutiny and they will be sincere to the basics of human
well being to which every law is supposed to manage. They are honest
with the principle of justice and in that capable to construe the law
so that human justice is given out to the concerned parties without
any iniquity. They are superbly intelligent and fully aware for their
duties to the nation and human justice. Generally all laws are
primarily prepared to help common man and so all laws should first of
all see that it helps the end man.
Our
constitution does not take into consideration, if these three
principle pillars of the government are not as per above given
expectation what should be done? The failure of our democracy lies in
this presupposition that every thing is OK. While actually every
thing is not OK!
In
our last almost sixty years of experience we have enough evidence to
say that these presumptions of our constitution writer were not
correct. Therefore, our constitution has actually failed us in
attaining the real democracy in our country. I wonder if such a
failing document deserves any celebration at all.
What
it should have incorporated in it as per my thinking I want to give
here for my readers so that they may give me further improvement in
them if they need. We are supposed to discuss our problems due to a
wrongly written document, since it is based on wrong presuppositions,
such as our constitution.
As
for elected people the constitution does not consider in it the
formation of any political party. It had presumed that each member of
the House will be elected as an independent but today we find that
most elected members belong to some or the other party. We should
introduce a new chapter in our constitution and in that it will give
guideline to how a political party should be and what are the
expectations thereof by the people of India. If that guideline is
fixed in the constitution itself, it may help us in controlling
behavior of these political parties. The scope of such political
party and its limitations, behavior of the controlling members, what
is called high commands, of these parties should also be controlled
by different provisions in that chapter in the constitution. If these
limits are fixed we can control the misbehavior of many such
political parties when they behave as if they own the country when
they get elected. Today we do not have any such control on the high
command of these parties who work more like remote control element
where constitution has no control on them. Therefore, they continue
to misbehave with the people and that is one of the problems we face
when working with these political parties. A type of dictatorship
gets into the system of what we see when we study behavior of many
parties as if they are family run companies. We have to put an end to
it by such provisions introduced in the constitution itself.
We
noted during our long experience that our elected members are not as
the constitution had envisaged while preparing this document. They
are dishonest with the voters, they are not sincere to the job they
are entrusted with, they are mostly incompetent in delivering the
results while they are mostly corrupt in their ways. Voters do not
feel safe with them, they have many criminal records and in most
cases they are convicted also in criminal as well as civic law suits.
Many are not enlightened enough to understand their duties as a
member of the House. Family members of many of them take disadvantage
of their position and create problem for the rival parties, using
their special position to impress upon police and such controlling
agencies to harass their opponents; this shows that they do not
deserves to be members of the House. Their honesty with people and
the nation and also patriotism are all doubtful. Most are illiterate
and from doubtful background or upbringing. A provision in our
constitution may be brought about to eliminate such members. Many are
far from being gentlemen. We see a criminal can contest an election
and by that wrong element enters the House that is supposed to have
the best of the talent in the country. I was told that there are some
provision in the law of contesting for election prepared by our
election commission but that is an indirect attempt to control these
bad elements from entering the Houses; I do not think that is right
way to bring discipline in these people. If constitution covers this
very important topic in its main text it will make a big difference.
We see that all presumptions while preparing this document have been
wrong and so we need amend this document or prepare a totally new
paper to replace it.
Next
is about our bureaucrats, they are not as expected by the
constitution particularly when a large number is being recruited from
lesser intelligent portion of our society due to over pressure of
reservation policy. Many incompetent people are holding top positions
while they are not in position to deliver the results purely because
they are simply not capable of understanding the problem they are
supposed to solve! We see that our bureaucrats are not sincere to the
responsibility untrusted to them. Their patriotism is in most cases
is doubtful. Their intelligence is also doubtful. Many cannot
understand the issue and as that happens they are either keeping the
files pending or simply the files are lost! Most are so arrogant that
it becomes very difficult to work with them. In many cases these
bureaucrats are arrogant with even members of the House and they show
aptness in finding excuses to avoid work, they are too good in
shifting blame to others mostly to ordinary citizen for their faults
and mistakes. We also see that in many cases one failing incompetent
bureaucrat helps other bureaucrats in covering up the issues where
they have failed. Files are piling up as we do not have really good
officers in position, that is one important reason why our government
has failed people's expectations. Many behave as if they own the
country. Many openly tell that nothing can harm them, what at the
most ministers may do is transfer, that is no punishment to them as
their perks and increments and seniorities are all protected by the
different provisions in our constitution. Many are protected from
punitive action by this constitution. Because of all these pampering
that our constitution offers to this class of employees they have
become a problem to all sincere political members in all Houses.
Corruption is at the highest level amongst these bureaucrats and to
that, callous businessmen add and make therm more corrupt as it is
always easy to manage a corrupt officer than a sincere one. Most are
addicted to corruption and they have no shame for it as it is
bureaucratic culture today. My suggestion is that unless we introduce
punishments such as whipping and demotion these criminal minded
bureaucrats will never improve, however, I doubt if both these will
ever be introduced in our constitution. Since these bureaucrats are
soft skin criminals, physical punishments like whipping will deter
them and may bring about improvement in our system. Demotion can
pressurize them to be better behaved. Our Hindu code of practices,
Manusmruti, has mentioned many such punitive actions when a
government officer indulges in any wrong doing. Constitution should
include efficiency code to improve the work of these bureaucrats. Our
present document does not have any such provision that can be used to
discipline these arrogant officers. Who are one important cause for
the failure of our system. Writer of this document never expected
that he bureaucrat will be so knave. We need a better constitution
that will not allow any such person to get in that position.
I
wish in our constitution, it mentions that the possibility of these
officers of being danger to common man or citizen and to provide
punitive action against such an officer. All punitive arrangements
are derived by interpretation of other acts and there is no direct
mention of that provision; that I feel is the lacuna in our document.
I
wish we have a direct guideline that will automatically make the law
officers vigilant and for that there should be a rule that will check
the IQ of our judges. Most judges are having low IQ. Many do not have
simple common sense while delivering their order. For example, I take
the case of illegal constructions in cities such as Thane and
Ulhasnager. The constructions were demolished due to order by the SC
or HC. The order to demolish was issued on the basis of simple rules
given in the log book however, these were special cases of corruption
in the concerned bureaucrats and politicians. The concerned builder
had to make these constructions to avoid corruption of officers
concerned and so these structures were built without their NOC and
such other clarifications. In the process the simple innocent people
have suffered. This shows that the judge of these courts lacked the
simple common sense and even though the ruling is correct on the
basis of rules it was not correct from simple common sense thinking.
Many judges argue that their judgment is as per provisions of the
constitution and there the matter seems to end but actually that
shows that our constitution is not capable of handling such
complicated situations. Many laws are designed to keep loose ends so
that the law can be twisted to get the desired ruling. If any
situation is causing hardships to innocent people and appear to be
suffering due to improper rules in the constitution wise judges are
not in a position to give a ruling that shall help the common person
who is at the end suffering due to such improper laws. If
constitution accepts that concerned officers could be corrupt and
they are very much so the judge could have given judgment that would
not have caused demolition of the buildings and cause hardship to
these innocent citizens. One more point I want to put here and it is
about the level of honesty that our Judiciary shows towards people.
Here I want to give example of my own experience with Bombay High
Court; in one case (about twenty years ago) after I won the suit
Court ordered that my payment to the court (4000/-Rs.) be refunded to
me however I have as yet not received that refund! On inquiry with
the court office I was told by the clerk there that often High Court
gives such orders but they are not to be taken seriously and actually
Court never returns the money! This my experience has developed a
feeling of disgust for the office of High Court. Why they give such
orders if they really do not want to honor it? One other point worth
mention here is that about payments to advocates, Court gives certain
limit but actually advocates charge far more money; on inquiry I came
to know that the recommendation is of pre-independence period and it
has not been updated till now. Why such sluggishness at the High
Court? All these things must be brought forward to make this august
body more reliable and dependable. Court sells many stationary items
such as stamp paper; they do not issue payment receipt, why? There is
no reply to it as if we citizens have no right to know why our court
works in such a shabby manner. I feel some times that this court
thinks that they are above all. In real democracy no body is above
citizens rights. In new constitution it must be clearly mentioned
that all judges and their office must respect citizens and know for
all times that they are appointed to serve the people of India and
boss over them under many excuses. They expect that people respect
court but they forget that if they continue to misbehave with people
in many such ways, they have no right to expect that people will care
to respect a fraud institute like our judiciary.
Our
constitution's measure defect as per my reading is that it continues
to hold citizens responsible for every wrong that happens in this
country. For example, provisions in our constitution which Indira
Gandhi used to proclaim emergency were in our constitution. She
declared emergency as per those provisions and we have seen how
things turned against the people. Their life had become miserable due
to it and for that I blame our constitution. This document presumes
that all politicians, bureaucrats and judges are honest and only
people are always wrong! Had it had provisions to look into what
wrong these three pillars of our government were doing; that
emergency would not have been proclaimed. Today I see BJP minister
blames Indira Gandhi for declaration of that emergency but never
bothered to see that it was wrong provisions in the document that
made it possible and so it is our wrongly written constitution that
we have to hold responsible for whatever wrong these three pillars
are doing to our country. There should be provisions for declaration
of emergency against bureaucrats, politician to keep them from
indulging and misusing their powers. Our police is a special case for
study as it makes a different type of a (corrupt) bureaucratic
system. Constitution should discuss in details about how to manage
different types of nexuses amongst vested interests of different
types with these three pillars and how to save innocent citizens from
getting exploited by such nexuses. They say our Indian law is a
donkey; that means those who make these laws are also donkeys! We
want reason-ability in our laws and for that we should them made by
persons who have hat sense of responsibility. Our laws are prepared
with many loose ends deliberately kept so that the law can be twisted
to interpret in the style and manner vested interest can be saved.
That should not be possible. We
should also note that the justice propounded by our constitution is
not absolute but only relative to available
evidence, proof and witness. By twisting these three one can
manipulate and twist the ruling also. I suggest that in constitution
this limitation should be clearly mentioned which present
constitution does not have.
I
want to conclude this long running post by saying that all the people
from these three pillars namely, politicians, bureaucrats and judges
will always praise this wrongly written document as it is helpful to
them and we as citizens of this country should always condemn this
document as a curse to our democracy and always denounce it. I would
also suggest that we as citizens of this country should not fall pray
to the praise made by people from these three pillars of our present
constitution and accept that is an ideal constitution. It may be
ideal for them but not for citizens. It must be modified to include
the changes I have recommended. A public debate may be undertaken to
enlighten people about how our present constitution is not good for
them the citizens.
You
may contact me on my Email ID given below,
You
are invited to visit my other blogs
Ashok
Kothare,
http://ashokkotharesblog.blogspot.com/
for
stories
I
reckon,
http://kotharesviews.blogspot.com/
for philosophy
You
may visit blog, Ideas
and tips on any subject,
http://kotharay.blogspot.in/
for intelligent discussions.
Freedom
of Expression, http://Blogs.siliconindia.com/kothare
for intelligent discussions.
My
New Marathi Blog, http://kothare-marathi.blogspot.in/
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