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TidBits .011 India's Judiciary scores over the self-centered Legislature on Electoral Reforms. Yet again, the Judiciary has struck down the Legislature in restoring its place as the watch-dog and the custodian of the Indian Constitution by rejecting the sham that the parliament had concocted to protect the criminal antecedents of its constituent membership and to keep the line of criminals getting into the highest offices of the democratic system of governance to sabotage its very foundation. It all started wittingly or unwittingly with the office of the first Prime Minister of India, Mr. Jawaharlal Nehru. If he had to bring to book his then defence minister, Krishna Menon, for the massive fraud in defence orders, a clear precedent would have been set. How could he? He himself was the root cause of the partition of India for his selfish intentions of becoming the first majority (hindu) prime minister of free India. Mahatma Gandhi must be turning in his grave, or wherever , for agreeing to this massively unpatriotic misdeed. The end of the short righteous stint by Lal Bahadur Shastri is indeed a misfortune for India. Things would have been different today if the wicked arm of selfish and criminal politics hadn't reached to take him out prematurely. Then followed the draconian rule of the Nehru dynasty with Indira Gandhi in place, who not only relied on sycophants and yes-men to advise her, she literally destroyed the backbone of the nation's watchdog, the judiciary, by placing her stooges in highest positions. Again, Rajiv Gandhi excelled himself in the kickback formula of Krishna Menon with the Bofors scandal. Only this time he had some inventory to show for it. And since then, the fountain of criminality which has been creeping into the democratic polity of the nation has increased to a massively flowing river which now threatens to flood the nation to the extent of drowning it. Look at the way our enterprising chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, Ms. Mayawati is going about. She has been a parliamentarian for a long time. If she was not herself siphoning the MP's funds allocated to her, she wouldn't have been bold enough to preach this doctrine to her fellow MPs. Look at Jayalalithaa, a criminal in the Tansi land deal scam. Look at Advani, the master-brain in the demolition of the Babri Masjid. These are only some of the epitomes of evil who have been compensated by the people of India for doing what they should not have been doing, and who should have been punished and banned from entering into the democratic polity of the governance of the nation. Our nation has set a serious precedent whereby a criminal having gotten enough support from his followers, well wishers and even opponents, through strong arms tactics, have been able to climb the ladders of political success to foster the stream of criminality which is aping the positions of power itself. By all means Mayawati should have been history by now. Jayalalithaa should have never been allowed into politics again. Laloo Prasad Yadav along with Lal Krishna Advani should have been enjoying the comfort of the four wall of Tihar jail. Narashima Rao, Sukram, Bangaru Laxman and many others like them should have been moving around with blackened faces for corrupting our national politics. Nay, like prostitutes, who put up the boldest and arrogant faces in the public, these political criminals have been encouraged to retain their self respect and even revered for their acts of omissions and commissions. Morality has never been the criteria for people to enter into Indian politics. In the U.S.A. we see that morality is the main criterion for running for any public office. To this day, Senator Edward Kennedy has not been able to run for the office of the President of the United States because of his involvement in the ' Chappadaquick' drowning case. The Presidential candidate Gary Hart had to forego his ambitions to become the President of the United States because some peeping tom photographer had him on a photograph with a female model on his lap on his private yatch. If the same moral yardstick is applied to choosing our political leaders in India, we will have to go around with a powerful torch light, searching, and would still be unsuccessful, given the rot that has set into our present political scenario. If some could be found to be non corrupt and morally sound, they will be found wanting in secular credentials, like in the case of our Prime Minister, Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee. The very fact that he has openly professed that he is the Swayamsevak of the RSS, goes to show that we in India have our criteria wrong in allowing people to get into the stream of national politics in the first place. RSS is a branded communal organization which can never support the secular constitution of India. A national ban should have been placed on it after the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi. We have not only not banned it, but have allowed it to creep up to surreptitiously occupy the highest positions of power in this country to the point that the very constituent ingredient of our constitution which is secularism is being re-defined. There is only one thing that will result from it. EVIL. And the nation as a whole will pay the brunt for this condonation. The Supreme Court must be hailed for its latest Order in overriding the shaming Act of Parliament on electoral reforms and to stick to its guns that any candidate filing his/her nomination papers must declare his/her criminal antecedents, all assets and financial liabilities, including educational qualifications. But it must not end there. The Supreme Court and the Election Commission of India have greater tasks ahead of them if our democratic system of governance is to be exorcised of the criminality in public offices. These tasks would be : � A minimum educational qualification for MLAs and MPs whereby the MPs need to be better or higher educated than the MLAs. � Automatic bar if convicted of any serious crimes like murder, cheating, bribing, extortion, financial irregularities etc. � Communal organizations such as RSS, Bajrang Dal, Shiv Sena, BJP, VHP etc must be banned from registering as political parties, with automatic bar on members of such organizations from contesting elections , even as independents. � Legislature must be barred from independently enacting Bills, Laws, Rules etc which further advances the salaries, perks and other amenities of its own members. Such Bills, Laws, Rules etc. must be vetted by the Judiciary and the Election Commission. It has been seen that such Bills, Laws, Rules etc. are passed through the floor of the Houses in no time at all whereas other Bills that will benefit the common people of the country drag on for years and years with no consensus reached from the Houses of the people. Example Lok Pal Bill, Women's Empowerment Bill, etc. etc. � A retirement age must be fixed so that senior politicians retire to make way for younger and more dynamic blood into the political stream of the nation. If these measures are not incorporated, our democracy, which is being steered towards the cliff end, will surely plunge into the depths of darkness and the nation doomed for ever. Morality must play a dominant compulsory roll rather than a desirable roll in our electoral system if we are going to place the reins of our nation in the hands of our political leaders. Political compulsions which is strangling our democracy must end forthwith. And it is necessary that our Supreme Court and the Election Commission activate their roll as the no-nonsense watch-dog of the electoral reforms that will bite off the limbs of scoundrels in the Legislature who write and pass Acts and Laws to safeguard their own vested interests and those of their criminal cronies and kin. Cheers Floriano Lobo _______________________________________________ Goanet mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.goanet.org/mailman/listinfo/goanet
