Today,
August 15, we are celebrating 69th anniversary of our
The
current political scenario in the country is not encouraging. The temple of
parliamentary democracy i.e. Parliament is not allowed to function. The level
and tenor of political discourse in the parliament and otherwise has been
reduced to almost zero. Political propriety and morality which are essential unwritten fundamentals of democracy have
been completely forgotten by our politicians and political parties. Our
fore-fathers particularly Dr. B.R. Ambedkar gave full weightage to these lofty
ideals in the functioning of parliamentary democracy and said”The education can
hardly be the sole qualification for membership of the parliament. If I may use
the words of Buddha he said that man requires two things: one is Gyan and other
is Sheel. Gyan without sheel is very dangerous. It must be accompanied by sheel
by which we mean character, moral courage, ability to be independent of any
kind of temptation, truthful to ones ideals. I am very keen to see that no
member enters this august assembly who does not possess Sheel in adequate
degree.” We need to think over and follow these great ideas of our leaders.
The recent stand-off in the parliament
between the opposition led by the Congress Party and the NDA government led by
the BJP is a case in point. The entire session was washed off because of
unrelenting approaches both by the opposition and the government. The net result
of this is legislative standstill and avoidable wastage of huge money. I am
reminded of the phraseology of “Grammar of Anarchy” used in his closing speech
in the Constituent Assembly on November 25, 1949. He said, “If we wish to
maintain democracy not merely in form, but also in fact, what must we do? The
first thing in my judgement we must do is to hold fast to constitutional methods
of achieving our social and economic objectives. It means we must abandon the
bloody methods of revolution. It means that we must abandon the method of
civil-disobedience, non-co-operation and satyagraha. When there was no way left
for constitutional methods for achieving economic and social objectives, there
was a great deal of justification for unconstitutional methods. But where
constitutional methods are open, there can be no justification for
unconstitutional methods. These methods are nothing but the Grammar of Anarchy
and the sooner they are abandoned, the better for us.”It was the warning given
by the father of the Indian constitution. Now we shall assess and judge
ourselves as to where do we stand. I think we failed ourselves.
On the political front, our political
forces could not polarize themselves on the basis of ideology and programme. The
society is still divided on the basis of caste and religion. The gains of
development and progress could not trickle down to the poor and weaker sections
of the society. The political democracy could not transform itself into
economic and social democracy as envisaged by Babasaheb B.R. Ambedkar. These
are some of the points which are a matter of concern and worry. But on the
other side, it is gratifying to note that common man cherish and uphold the
democratic values. The awareness is increasing. The governments are changed
through the ballot and not by bullet. The social security net is getting root.
The hope and scope of economic well-being is getting strong. I this way, India have
come a long way in its 69th year of Independence but it has still to
go a long way. It can happen with a strong political will and a strong moral
sense with Gyan and Sheel as stipulated by Dr. B.R. Ambedkar
Let us rededicate ourselves today to
redeem the pledge which PM Jawaharlal gave us at the dawn of Independence on
the mid-night of August 14, 1947.
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