Edits

Editorials

India Today
September 7,1998

Resigned to the Unreal

Democracy doesn't exist to facilitate elections, Mr Gill

Edits There must be something in Nirvachan Sadan which reduces even perfectly reasonable chief election commissioners (CECs) to pontiffs. The CEC's brief is to regulate elections and shield them from malpractice -- not sermonise from the mount. Evidently, T.N. Seshan (CEC, 1990-96) didn't agree. Nor, it seems, does the incumbent, M.S. Gill. Gill's most recent brainwave is to ask chief ministers to relinquish office six weeks prior to assembly elections. The poll process can then take place under "neutral" President's rule. Gill has erred on two counts -- in modalities and in content. The promised constitutional reforms commission may have been a more appropriate forum for the proposal than a press interview. That apart, Gill's idea itself is flawed. A political party (or alliance) is elected to govern for five years. To ask it to truncate its term by a month and a half is unfair. Next, there is no guarantee that the governor who will take charge of the administration will be non-partisan. In collusion with the ruling party at the Centre, he may well subvert the elections -- and nullify Gill's intentions.

One of the legacies of the Seshan syndrome is the presumption that democracy exists only to facilitate elections. This is a mindset which revels at election time -- banning television programmes, prohibiting opinion polls and generally bringing governance to a standstill. Such absurdity reached its pinnacle when, just before the 1998 Lok Sabha elections, the Maharashtra Government was prevented from relaxing eligibility rules for a state-specific medical fund. This is not to suggest that the CEC should do nothing. As Seshan -- despite his penchant for going overboard -- made clear, a strict enforcement of the code of conduct is enough to preserve the essential sanctity of the poll process. Rather than advocate systemic changes, Gill should just do his job. That is all India wants from him.

Plateful of Poison
Is adulterated food part of India's tryst with destiny?

Water in milk. Kerosene in petrol. Fungus in life-saving intravenous fluid. And now poisonous Argemone oil in mustard oil. Another adulteration scandal, another death toll. India has seen it all before: a public health disaster caused by the abject failure of a system of checks and balances built precisely to prevent such tragedies. But inspectors look the other way for a price, and politicians governing them simply aren't interested in matters as mundane as public health. There is little point in fulminating against a western media bias against Indians, of crying aloud about how outsiders tarnish India's image. It is all true, the stereotype of a so-called nuclear and scientific power that isn't yet mature enough to look after its own. Recurrent public health disasters make India look like a jester in the court of nations. It is scandalous that people are dying of a long-forgotten affliction, dropsy, in the capital of a country striving for a place on the world stage.

India has seen this before too, in 1994, when the medieval plague panicked the country. These are national shames, reflections of a growing debasement, perversion and corruption -- all are incidentally synonyms of the word adulteration -- of Indian society. The time has come for tough correctives. Adulteration of any kind must not be allowed. No longer can committees and officials act as apologists for money-pinching merchants. One such committee in Delhi actually had the gall to say it was all right to allow a marginal amount of rodent hair and excreta in products like flour. No longer can excuses be made for primitive production methods. Instead of meaningless fines, imprison those who poison food. If there's a failure in checking such adulteration, imprison the officials who allow this outrage. These may sound like harsh solutions. But then, these are harsh times.

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