The ratification of the Government of National Capital Territory Delhi (Amendment) Bill in Lok Sabha (GNCTD) is the true face of BJP led Government of India (GoI) and the bill is by far the purest manifestation of what purpose this force actually has in India- to demolish democracy to its core.
As I understand it, few things are irreversible and one such thing is establishing democracy. Once you have adopted it, you cannot go back to any other form of government other than that because that will be regressive, oppressive, and dismissive. Once you embrace democracy, any form of permanent curtailment to its operation will amount to going back in time and containing human progress.
Of course, there can be temporary arrangements to handle exceptional circumstances which find expression in the constitution of India itself in the form of the President’s rule but the provision requires a democratic government to be installed as soon as the crises mitigate. However, a full-fledged reversal in the way of how to rule once you shake hands with democracy; at its minimum, calls for a war against whoever tries to do so.
It’s dispiriting to witness how an attempt is made to reduce an elected government as a subsidiary to a nominated individual. They say Delhi is a Union Territory and the Lieutenant Governor should have a say in the day-to-day affairs. However, they completely miss the point that Union Territories are made Union Territories for effective administration at the time when they were made a part of India because at that time installing legislative assemblies in those areas was not in favour of the integrity of India due to prevailing socio-economic-political scenarios back in time.
But as they assimilated in the land and culture of India with time, it is the responsibility of GoI that these lands should either be made part of states or independent assemblies should be installed in such territories enabling them to function as federal units too and with time they should be tractioned towards complete statehood. That should and must be an eventuality in a democratic nation.
And hence we did that, we installed assemblies in two of these territories and NCT Delhi is one of them while Puducherry is another. Of course, now we have J&K also having an assembly but that is another menace to be discussed separately because BJP has got many loopholes citing instability of the region and devoid a state of its statehood creating two UTs out of it and people found cunningly manufactured reasons to be logical but then as I mentioned, what is happening this time in the case of Delhi is the most transparent form of nuisance that could be orchestrated by BJP led GOI of the day.
The central government has ruthlessly insulted the political aspirations of the people of Delhi to the core of it by making null a government that is elected by such huge margins and has a full-fledged mandate to rule. Reducing the stature of the elected government of Delhi vis-a-vis a nominated individual and using UT administrative principles as the rotten logic behind it is such a perfect illustration of what happens when uneducated goons come to power at the centre and when illogic is sold forcefully.
While the demand to impart statehood to Delhi is now quite old yet this government completely refuses to pay heed even to the present design of how the people of Delhi will express themselves politically. The phrase “for all purposes government of Delhi will mean Lieutenant Governor” is an utter disregard to everything that can be said under the word democracy. Delhi is being taken back to the days when the British crown appointed viceroy and vested him with all what can be called government.
It was a similar situation back then for the whole of British India. Even in those days, there were elected representatives in the council but they were merely puppets with no power to make important laws or to execute them freely. We fought a long battle to free ourselves from that oppressive rule and today we stand in a similar situation while the oppressor is now standing stronger than the past as we only have elected him.
It is quite painful to observe the feeble political understanding, rationale, awareness, motive, and intelligence of this society that I am a part of, a society witness to its own persecution, insult by an elected government. What an absurd case of one elected government refusing another to exist.
The BJP to its core is a subverting force and the GNCTD bill reflects the true motive of what it wants the nation to be.
They just don’t like the democratic arrangement. The BJP and the BJP led NDA government have chronologically acted to demean and reduce the democratic institutions to function at its whims and fancies. If we don’t understand the purpose now, were deemed to be doomed at the hands of this autocratic force.
In that case, some of you who resonate with me must be thinking of giving power to an alternative party but I personally don’t like the idea of alternatives. Why are we so innocent as citizens that we just have to look for alternatives after we are looted, betrayed, and persecuted every 5 years?
Why cannot we instil a sense of duty, service, commitment, and accountability in the government of the day? I don’t like the idea of a government holding the carrot and a stick, I feel it should be the other way round! We as a society have immense potential to have that control in our hands while the government really works for the people, we just need to be a little insensitive and indifferent towards who is in the government and focus on what we want from them not what they have to offer us.
Today, we vote after assessing the INTENT of a party or leader of doing social justice and development if it comes to power and it never pays. Public opinion, public awareness, and public fear should be such that the intent of political parties and leaders shall only be social justice and empowerment, and only those who really find their expression of life in serving the society should choose politics as a career.
Then, it will be a scenario where we have to vote on the competence of such entities, that who will achieve more of what he says. Even if we go wrong in judging on the competence to deliver good and receive partial fulfilment of promises, we will receive social justice and development nonetheless. It has to move from INTENT to COMPETENCE or all our lives we will continue looking for alternatives while living in a fool’s paradise.
The society needs to raise its voice against this bill, the citizens need to show the authority.