Let us think and Act with an Open Mind to Develop
a Vibrant Democracy- Article 27
Mad rush for reforms leads to unsystematic planning, implementation
and evaluation of schemes and disrespect to Parliament
After
a new government came up in 2014, many
reforms were started in such a quick
succession that it resulted in a mad rush for reforms. Repeated disrespect
to Parliament was obvious because prior approval
of Parliament (or subsequent ratification by it) was not even sought for these
important reforms with serious national implications.
Speed thrills but kills. This is a caution for drivers of vehicles. It
applies for drivers of governance also. Policies implemented in a hurry can
result in damaging failures and/or setting the clock back.
First
of these recent reforms within a short
period of less than three years was abolition of Planning Commission which
questions whether the government had lost interest in planning programmes
properly. This was followed by Swatch Bharat Mission, Make in India, Skill
Development and Digital India. Despite inability to give sufficient
attention to these important schemes in progress, currency notes for Rs.500
and Rs.1,000 were demonetized. While
this also was in progress it was followed
by repetition of Digital India, “cash less India” and “less cash India”
schemes. This jumping from one scheme to another within a short period
without proper planning, implementation and evaluation of these schemes has
highlighted the fickle nature of government and failure of
democracy. It is well known that the government machinery is quite
sluggish in implementing projects. Thrusting of so many additional schemes on
it in a hurry, that too without adequate discussions with those who have to
execute these, showed lack of
understanding that these schemes were bound to face problems in
implementation, besides slow progress because of lack of capacity of this
management machinery.
A
glaring mistake common to all these reforms is that these were planned
and implemented without adequate discussion and debate. Parliament was
bypassed so often that disrespect to Parliament was obviously intentional.
These lapses can be illustrated further by a discussion about
demonetization of currency.
It was well known that
three attempts had been made earlier for demonetization of currency. First
mistake was ignoring the lessons from these attempts which did not succeed.
While the first two attempts had failed, the third was abandoned because a high
power committee set up by the government in 2013 recommended against it. If the
present government felt that the situation has changed even within the short
period, it should have set up another high power committee to make a deep study
and make confidential recommendations to ensure secrecy. The government did not
do so because it was in a hurry to make reforms. For the same reason,
the government did not seek the prior approval of Parliament or its ratification
later which would have ensured secrecy. Ignoring the lessons from past attempts
and disrespecting Parliament are serious blows to democracy and should be
condemned outright.
Only about 6% of black money was stocked in cash and demonization can at best get rid of only
this negligible part of black money. The government ought to have taken cognizance of this and abandoned the
scheme which is not cost effective and likely to cause hardship for people.
This was the second mistake.
Spreading misinformation that the government had planned demonetization
of currency to get rid of all black
money while it was only attempting to get rid of 6% of black money was the
third mistake which was anti-democratic (misleading people).
The above facts were enough to decide that demonization
should not be done. If the
government was still keen to go ahead this miss adventure, it should have
carefully studied about problems which might come up and taken precautionary
steps. For example:
About 86% of
currency in the country was in denominations of Rs.500 and Rs.1000.
Withdrawing these will create a huge cash
vacuum and create chaos in the economy unless adequate number of new notes
were printed and supplied before withdrawing the old notes. Ignoring this need in
a hurry was the fourth mistake which has caused misery for people. This was
another blow to democracy.
For some
unexplained reasons a new currency of Rs.2000 was introduced.
This posed problems for vast majority of people who need smaller denominations
for daily use. Lakhs of workers who are
paid daily wages also find problems in receiving wages
and spending money for needs. Government did not use this information to decide on the type and
number of currency notes to be printed.
This is the fifth mistake in planning to meet the needs of people which
is paramount in a democracy.
The above
example illustrates a tendency among ambitious politicians to attempt a spate
of refoms in a hurry ignoring whether these are justified and without proper
planning and development of the proper infrastructure to implement these. The
fact that these were done ignoring the checks provided under democracy
such as discussions with experts and within the management machinery and
debates in both houses of Parliament shows a serious weakness of the system.
Moreover, the above tendency is another serious disqualification for a
political leader besides those pointed out in Article 19.
On the
other hand, Articles 15 had pointed out that Parliament
brought disgrace on itself due to lack of dignity by spinelessly tolerating
disrespect thousands of times and lack of guts to punish government for
breaking promises so often. Not acting against planning
of multiple schemes bypassing Parliament
in a hurry is another example of Parliament ignoring a series of disrespects,
that too within a short period of time.
These important aspects
constitute the thirty-second (may be a most serious) obstacle which
resulted in a distorted and ineffective democracy.
To overcome
this obstacle, steps should be taken to ensure that (a) ambitious politicians
do not ignore the checks and act against the interests of the country and (b)
Parliament exerts its position to curb actions which cause disrespect to it. However,
these additional checks also can be discarded if those who have to
ensure their compliance become silent spectators to whimsical actions by
autocratic politicians. An alternate
system which can overcome this deficiency is discussed in a later article.