LOKEPAL FARCE

Many people never expect or expected a strong Lokpal Bill to be ever passed as it has not been passed in nearly forty years since it has beendebated in India. No democracy in the world has such a bill and will not have. A day before the debate in the Rajya Sabha was to be taken up, the Telegraph came out with a report which gave enough indication of the coming events. Read some extract from that report.

The Telegraph Thursday , December 29 , 2011 |THE TELEGRAPH

Crowd-pleasers nurse an unwanted baby “Nehru didn’t do it, Indiraji did not, Vajpayee did not and they must have had good reason. And we have now convinced ourselves we have greater wisdom than all of them put together? What travesty!”.........  “The terrible problem is,” one member of Parliament said, again strictly off the record, “we are having to applaud the birth of a demon in our midst, we are having to celebrate a  damned charter of no-confidence in our- selves.”......

This was a baby nobody seemed to want, but now that it has been forced into fullness, nobody wants to be seen forsaking it. They are competing to wish upon it greater health and vigour, but secretly they are all wishing it dead without, of course, having to take the blame for it; best if it can be blamed on the other.........
Bar a few exceptions like Lalu Prasad, who is himself so politically anaemic he has ceased to effect anything but the odd round of laughter. But give it to Lalu. He stood and said for the record what the rest of Parliament is only able to express in anonymous whispers: “This is a dangerous move, you are signing the death warrant of elected democracy, history will not forgive you for this.”

Well-timed walkouts brokered in the backrooms, mock battles devised by rival political managers, amendments inserted last-hour, deals struck between allies and adversaries alike, a whole choreography of pretexts and subtexts aimed at securing one common end: turn the death of the Lokpal into a bewildering whodunit. Kill it, let no one take the blame..... Does it say something that the petulant midwives of the Lokpal inexplicably suspended the chaotic delivery rituals today, leaving the emaciated entity huffed out of the Lok Sabha on the gurney, waiting to be patted to life by the Upper House?

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The credit for making a national movement and forcing the government to bring in the bill goes to Anna Hazare as rightly said by Ram Jethmalani in his speech in the Rajya Sabha.

Saturn and Jupiter influencing the eighth house of both the Indian Independence horoscope and of the Congress Party is not the time of glory though the Congress Party may do better in the coming elections in some northern states as the tenth house too is influenced. I have said this many times now.

I noticed, when the mid night of 29 December was approaching and the debate in the Rajya Sabha was becoming cumbersome, inconclusive with voting appearing elusive. Dashas were unhelpful.

In the horoscope of the Congress it was the prana dasha of Venus, the eighth lord while in the national horoscope of Indian Independence, it was Sun-Jupiter (the eight lord again)-Mer-Ketu-Jupiter when the disrupted Rajya Sabha adjourned sine die with no vote taking place. I have applied this technique to watch and sometimes predict the outcome of cricket matches. Watching the proceedings of the Rajya Sabha, I applied this technique for the first time.

The claim of CNN IBN
Anyway, before further discussion is done let what was said in the Rajya Sabha be recounted. CNN IBN news channel claims that it had reported first that RJD, SP and BSP would disrupt the parliament and the bill would not be put to vote in Rajya Sabha where the Congress party is in a minority and would not succeed in passing the Lokepal Bill. (It is correct as I heard whole day.)

Having failed in the Lok Sabha to get passed the constitution amendment bill, the Congress has disgraced itself and failed on two counts. Was it a choreographed drama as CNN IBN says and was it an understanding between RJD and the Congress, as a reporter of a news channels claims he had suspected, when he saw Lalu Prasad Yadav and some Congress leaders getting into a huddle frequently, that the debate was going on in the Rajya Sabha ?

Yes, it is the murder of democracy in a way as BJP is describing it, but worse is it is a chapter of disgrace in the constitutional history.

Some people in the media had anticipated and it was discussed around 11 pm and I found it difficult to believe till it happened. It was the worst kept secret says Arnab Goswami of Times Now television.

The Pioneer says: “The debate on Lokpal Bill was tonight disrupted when several members in the Rajya Sabha, particularly Left parties, created uproar, wanting to know whether the proceedings would continue after midnight as the extension of the Winter Session was till only December 29.”

No wonder Sitaram Yechury of the Communist Party calls it the moral defeat of the government. Each party will justify its own stand, give its own opinion and we can draw our own conclusion.

Double defeat
What is clear is that it was a disgrace. The UPA  led by the Congress suffered double defeat, first its failure to muster a simple majority to get passed the constitutional amendment bill in the Loksabha and failure to put to vote the Lokpal bill in the Rajya  Sabha.

But in the heated debate in the Rajya Sabha, some speakers reached heights of brilliance, both lawyers, Arun Jaitly (BJP) and Manu Singhvi (Congress) but it was Ram Jethmalani who was vitriolic as some of his utterances, as reported, were:

RAM JETHMALANI IN RAJYA SABHA (rediff.com  web) December 29, 2011

19:04 PM - MS Aiyar and Narayanswamy says how can Jethmalani raise of corruption and black money in the house when he's appearing as a counsel in a blackmoney case. Says it's a conflict of interest.

Jaitley, the lawyer, rises to Jethmalani's defence: It is not conflict of interest, it is a consistency of his interest.

19:01- PM  Mani Shankar Aiyar objects to Jethmalani's references to Swiss banks.

Jethmalani said: The govt of India's protocol with Switzerland says that India will not ask for any information about the past, but only about the future (from the date of the protocol).

18:59 PM - Jethmalani says the government has deceived the people in the context of the ratification of the UN convention and under no condition or under any circumstances, will he support the bill Remember however, that Jethmalani did not name Rajiv Gandhi, just alluded to him as an ex-PM with charges filed by the Swiss court on black money.

18:55 PM - Jethmalani asks the Chair to please continue.

And another gem: Jethmalani to Chair: Please ask these trash to stop behaving like trash.

18:51 PM - Jethmalani: A fraud has been made by the government by signing a protocol with the Swiss government on double taxation.

Uproar again. Mani Shankar Aiyar says un-Parliamentary language cannot be allowed. The chair expunges the word 'fraud; as unparliamentary. Jethmalani also uses the word 'dacoit', which is expunged as well.

18:47 - PM  Jethmalani tells Congress' ManiShankar Aiyar:  Sue me outside if you have the courage. You don't even have the courage to reply. I will give you evidence outside.

And go back to Saturn-Jupiter axis along the two-eight axis of the Congress party to understand this , what Siraram Yechury, calls moral defeat.

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Democracy in India has vitality and is thriving to some extent at least is the inevitable impression one gets from these debates and shown in television channels. See for instance what Chandan Mitra, the editor of the Pioneer and a member of the Rajya Sabha said.

21:17 - rediff.com  web - Live! Chandan Mitra calls ALL Cong PMs except Shastri corrupt Chair refuses to give Mitra more time saying he has run out of time. Mitra enraged, says, this is not right, this is not right.

21:26 - Chandan Mitra: Corruption runs in the genes of the Congress party. Apart from Lal Bahadur Shastri every single PM has had corruption charges against them.

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I had said in an earlier piece that the UPA will bring in a watered down bill which it did, and, in the budget session it will introduce it also again as both in the horoscopes of the Congress Party, the antardasha of Saturn is the dasha of the eleventh house as well and in the Indian Independence horoscope it is Jupiter’s antardasha which is also the eleventh lord.

The bill will be a weak bill, as the present one is: with no independent investigative wing with Lokpal, with class C and D employees out of its ambit etc. Karnataka Lokayukta has it and it could punish Yedurappa.  And the CBI will continue to be under the control of the government.

Finally Rajniti Prasad of RJD said that it was a “dirty bill” which would hold MPs in thrall and create fright. He may have echoed what all MPs feel but dare not give expression to.

(30 Dec 2011)