'Democracy is dying' in India, says Yashwant Sinha attacking BJP

Describing the Presidential contest as not of individuals but of two ideologies, he said the President should not be the one person who can be controlled by the govt

Opposition Presidential candidate Yashwant Sinha on Monday launched an attack on the BJP, claiming that "democracy is dying" in the country where Opposition leaders are "humiliated" through central agencies even as elected governments are overthrown to capture power with the “latest conspiracy” happening in Maharashtra.

Insisting that internal democracy in the BJP has collapsed under the present leadership, Sinha told a press conference that he would reach out to his "former colleagues" in the saffron party in which he was there till 2018 even as he described his rival Droupadi Murmu's candidature as "politics of symbolism".

The former Union Minister said he would raise the track record of the government under Narendra Modi, who he had endorsed as a Prime Ministerial candidate before 2014 but fell out with later after he was sidelined. Sinha sought to discount the talks on the tribal identity of his rival candidate, saying the incumbent President represents a community (Dalit) and one has to examine whether it has benefitted them.

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Describing the Presidential contest as not of individuals but of two ideologies, he said the President should not be the one person who can be controlled by the government.

He said that India has a history of “rubber stand” presidents in some instances while charging the Modi government guilty of not trying to bring about a consensus for the President's post.

“The President is part of the whole checks and balances of the Indian system…We need a person who is not controlled by the government. Those who are under the control of the government will not have the guts to counter the government. History shows that we had some Presidents who acted like rubber stamps,” he said.

Referring to the Maharashtra developments, he said that the Vajpayee government fell in 1998 by one vote which they could have bought but did not. “Can we dream now that a government can fall by one vote,” he added.

In a statement, Sinha said, “this (Modi) government has made it a habit to break duly elected governments to capture power at all costs. The latest conspiracy to topple the Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress government represents political immorality at its worst.”

Targeting the Modi government, he said an Opposition leader was questioned for about 50 hours and the intention was not to investigate the matter but to “humiliate”, which is a “very sad development”. He was referring to the questioning of top Congress leader Rahul Gandhi by the Enforcement Directorate recently.

People do not have recourse to anything, including the judiciary. “The hearings on Article 370 and the CAA have not started yet,” he said.

He also questioned certain decisions like the implementation of the Goods and Service Tax (GST), which Modi had opposed as Gujarat Chief Minister, as well as demonetisation, which he claimed was the “biggest scam of the century”.