Political virus fells Kamal Nath govt

The political virus that became virulent in Karnataka last year and brought down the HD Kumaraswamy government has travelled to Madhya Pradesh and laid low the Congress government led by Kamal Nath. The Kamal Nath government had no option but to resign as it became clear that it had no majority in the Assembly after 22 of the Congress party’s MLAs who owe allegiance to Jyotiraditya Scindia resigned. The Speaker had to finally accept their resignations after some dillydallying. Kamal Nath had tried to hold on to power by delaying a floor test with help from the Speaker who adjourned the House till March 26 citing the coronavirus threat, but there was no doubt about the government’s loss of majority. With the Supreme Court rejecting the ruse and ordering a floor test on Friday, Kamal Nath had to call it quits without even going to the House.

None of the players in the fortnight long drama in Madhya Pradesh can claim political morality and propriety. The BJP’s strategy of inducing the resignation of a sizeable number of Congress MLAs so that a government loses its majority in the Assembly amounts to undermining the anti-defection law. It is also a violation of the popular mandate expressed through elections. Elections, which are basic to democracy, lose their sanctity and become meaningless if their results are stolen by the losing party. Governors and Speakers do not play their right constitutional roles and act with bias and partisanship by favouring one or the other party. Madhya Pradesh Governor Lalji Tandon and Speaker NP Prajapati conducted themselves as representatives of their respective parties, the BJP and the Congress, as in fact some others in their positions did in their states. Parties, their leaders and their representatives do not realise the damage they are doing to democracy by putting their narrow interests above those of a principled polity. In the case of Madhya Pradesh, the Congress has to take some blame for its loss of power, because there was no effective central leadership to deal with the crisis. The leadership was also responsible for Scindia’s defection, which triggered the whole chain of events.

The legislators who resigned are defectors who betrayed their voters for money, power or other considerations. We live in dangerous times and it is strange how the politics of the day reflects the world of the virus that is sweeping across the country now. The MLAs had to be quarantined and isolated after they were ‘infected’, and the virus is still in the air. It may have moved to Rajasthan, though the Ashok Gehlot government there is still asymptomatic. Will Congress be able to find a vaccine in time against this virus?