Rajya Sabha’s Members’ Intolerance Exposed

Rajya Sabha MPs Mohsina Kidwai (Congress), K C Tyagi (JD-U), Naresh Agrawal (SP), T K Rangarajan (CPI-M), D Raja (CPI) and Derek O ‘Brien (Trinamool Congress) had given a notice to Chairman of the Rajya Sabha Hamid Ansari accusing Mr.Panda of breach of privilege and contempt of the Upper House.

What were the reasons for such an extreme action by the section of Rajya Sabha Members?

These Rajya Sabha Members were outraged due to an article written by Mr. Jay Panda in the Times of India wherein he opined that reforms should be to reduce Rajya Sabha’s power to block the popular mandate and suggested favouring a rethink on veto power of Rajya Sabha.

The extracted relevant portions of the said article are reproduced here in brief:

1. Nowhere else in the world are there as many legislative checks against the popular mandate of the electorate. Joint sessions of Parliament are no solution as they are impractical to convene frequently and cannot pass constitutional amendments. And structuring major legislation as money bills solely to bypass the Rajya Sabha is undesirable.

2. The reality is that the Rajya Sabha’s indirect elections are, indeed, akin to party nominations. This has been reinforced in recent years by two significant developments. The anti-defection law, while doing away with the ills of horse-trading, has had the unintended consequence of making party whips all-encompassing. This, in conjunction with the 2003 amendment that did away with secret voting by MLAs for Rajya Sabha candidates, has all but ensured that only party-nominated candidates win.

3. In theory, Rajya Sabha is supposed to represent the interests of states as a whole. But in practice, what it thus represents are the interests of parties, in fact of party leaderships.

On the face of it, one can easily conclude without an iota of doubt that our honourable Rajya Sabha members are unnecessarily worried as if their privileges are being questioned and thereby accusing the author of the article for the contempt of the upper house. 

This shows their utter Intolerant Mind set of the members concerned, as they want to throttle discussions and debates for abolition of Rajya Sabha or reducing its powers. The notice and resolution by the members of Rajya Sabha are just to kill such discussions and debates thereby crushing the freedom of speech which is the foundation stone on which the democracy rests.

Let us ponder over the past records in respect of this issue and also the composition of Rajya Sabha.

Rajya Sabha or Council of States can have maximum of 250 members of whom except 12 members, all the rest are indirectly elected by state and territorial legislatures using single transferable votes and the remaining 12 members will be appointed by the President of India from the eminent personalities from art, literature, science and social services. At present, Rajya Sabha has 245 members - NDA with 63 - BJP with 48 and UPA with 69 - Congress with 67. Other Major representations are Samajwadi Party - 15 and JDU, AADMK, TMC - 12 each, BSP - 10, CPI M - 9, BJD - 7, NCP - 6, DMK - 4 and remaining from other parties.

Rajya Sabha is a permanent body which cannot be dissolved like Lok Sabha and membership of  indirectly elected members of Rajya Sabha will be 6 years with one third of the sitting members retiring every two years. The perks and facilities are similar to Lok Sabha members.  But, alas, their members’ tenures are 6 years as against Lok Sabha’s tenure of 5 years or even less, in case of its dissolution. Hence once elected to Rajya Sabha, every member is safe to enjoy the perks, privileges and safety for full 6 years term.

The past records show:

1. In 1954 and 1973, resolutions were moved in the Lok Sabha seeking to abolish the Rajya Sabha.  Both these resolutions were unsuccessful.  Attempts to abolish the Rajya Sabha have also been made by introducing private member bills in the Lok Sabha seeking constitutional amendment in 1971, 1972, 1975 and 1981.  None of these Bills was passed by the Lok Sabha.

2. Even in the Constituent Assembly debates whether to have two houses or not, Professor Shibban Lal Saksena said: “In this motion, we have been asked to vote for two Houses, the Lower House and the Upper House. I wish to point out that our experience has been that the Upper House acts as a clog in the wheel of progress. I think that everywhere in the world the experience about Upper Houses has been the same. It has always acted as a sort of hindrance to quick progress.”

3. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, speaking as the first chairman of the Rajya Sabha, said, “There is a general impression that this House cannot make or unmake governments and, therefore, it is a superfluous body. But there are functions, which a revising chamber can fulfil fruitfully. Parliament is not only a legislative but a deliberative body. So far as its deliberative functions are concerned, it will be open to us to make very valuable contributions, and it will depend on our work whether we justify this two chamber system, which is now an integral part of our Constitution.”

4. Recently Arun Jaitley, Finance Minister of India, had voiced his contempt for the non-functioning of Rajya Sabha thus: Peoples Popular Mandate has been put to captivity. 

As per B.R.Ambedkar, the principal author of India’s constitution, it is quite unwarranted and undemocratic to scuttle any new ideas: “Men are mortal. So are ideas. An idea needs propagation as much as a plant needs watering. Otherwise both will wither and die.”

Hence one should not be shy to hear and debate new ideas - more so those who are occupying the seat of powers to make laws. Let us have a look on the changes that were initiated in developed Western countries like Italy, UK and US.

Very recently, Italy’s upper house of Parliament, the Senate, voted to drastically reduce its own powers, including its number of members and its power to block constitutional amendments and other key legislation. Similarly, in UK, till 1911, its House of Lords just like our Rajya Sabha, could reject all bills except money bills. But, through an amendment in 1911, UK’s House of Lords could delay the passage of legislation up to 2 years which were further diluted so that it can delay legislation up to 1 year only.

Let us have a look on the changes initiated by US in respect of US Senate which the Rajya Sabha resembles in its members’ terms of six years, with one-third retiring every two years.  Originally, the US Senate was also indirectly elected from state legislatures, just like the Rajya Sabha. But in 1913, during the so-called Progressive Era in the US that saw many political reforms, the constitution was amended to make Senators directly elected by the public of each state. The effect was dramatic. It broke the hold of party bosses to nominate cronies with no alignment with public interest. And by requiring candidates to seek a plurality of votes all across a state, instead of just cosying up to party bosses, it forced eventual winners to reject fringe concerns in favour of centrist, broad-based campaigns.

The above are the observations of Jay Panda and he had finally suggested the following solutions:

India needs to choose one of two paths to break its systemic legislative gridlock. Emulating the UK or Italy would leave the Rajya Sabha electoral process intact, but reduce its powers. It would still have the ability to slow down the passage of bills, to ensure that those who win elections don’t ride roughshod over the losers. But it would no longer have the power to indefinitely block legislation, thus ensuring that those who lose elections don’t have a veto either.

Pursuing the American example would leave the Rajya Sabha’s veto powers intact, but make election to it direct, by the public. That would make its members’ agendas much less insular, and more broadly aligned with public interest.

But, alas, such salient ideas and voices are not being tolerated by the above members of Rajya Sabha and their Intolerance was quite well displayed. And they had once again betrayed their obstructionist political agenda by moving the privilege notice at a time when a number of bills of the government are stuck in Rajya Sabha. Simply it is not only their Intolerance but also their Political Vendetta.

Recent happenings and disruptions were graphically summarised by none other than Mohammad Hamid Ansari, Chairman of Rajya Sabha: Every single rule in the book, every single etiquette is violated. Rajya Sabha has become a federation of anarchists.

To remedy this, Rajya Sabha should ponder itself whether it is time to abolish or to mend itself. Choice is theirs and the people of India are watching.

Think India Think.