Power Shifts To The NDA In The Rajya Sabha: Will Enable Reform

Power Shifts To The NDA In The Rajya  Sabha: Will Enable Reform

The possibilities of a parliamentary majority at 40 months in both Houses,  tending towards an absolute of  80%, through 2019 and beyond, are both transformative and dynamic.

This momentum is foremost in describing a spectacular political consolidation, and enormous personal popularity of the Prime Minister, with polls giving him over 70% approval ratings.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President, Narendra Modi's trusted engine-room strategist, the Chairman of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), and now a Rajya Sabha MP, has  not only delivered electoral wins in spades, but also grown tremendously in stature.

And looking at the Union Cabinet and Senior Bureaucracy, there are still no corruption scandals from high places at all. This is in sharp contrast to the decade of the  United Progressive Alliance (UPA).

Simultaneously, in the Treasury, not only do we have around $ 300 billlion in hard currency reserves, India is witnessing the early stages of strong, unprecedented, dollar inflows.

It is coming in, both as embedded direct investment, and into the bourses.

This is a well-earned endorsement and approval in an economically troubled world, with very few bright spots. The Ease of Doing Business Reforms will determine if this can grow exponentially from here.

The Rupee, consolidating towards Rs. 62 to the US dollar, is helping international confidence. Particularly, given GDP growth statistics of over 7% annually.

But  this currency strength needs to be  sustained by determined policy measures. Ones that emphasise the virtues of cheaper imports over other considerations, important for a country hungry to catch up with the developed world, and likely to be building itself up for 30 years going forward.

The rupee should be encouraged to keep strengthening, to Rs. 30 to the dollar by 2024, and if the Modi Government has its way, it will be.

This is, of course, emblematic of an approach that is a sharp departure from the economic thinking of the past.

But it is precisely such departures from the established policy thinking of many years that are, and will continue to make, the difference.

The large pool of IT talent could do much domestically to digitise the Government, Defence, spawn Start-Ups, and develop Cyber Security.

Our international diplomacy, conducted personally by the Prime Minister in the lead, is yielding unprecedented cooperation and understanding from other nations.

More than ever before, the time may have come when we can dare to address the larger pending questions towards nation-building, going back much further than 40 months of this administration.

These are indeed about second-stage structural reforms. But not just concerning the economy.

These are reforms crying out to be made constitutionally, in the judiciary, to the bureaucracy, and the executive,as much as to the legislature.

But of course, Parliament being supreme, though the Judiciary should perhaps read the 42nd Amendment  to remind itself, it is legislation that can be the greatest single driver of change and betterment.

Still, with the advent of a proper "hanging judge", Dipak Mishra, as the new  Chief Justice of India (CJI) at month-end, we may see a new era dawning there too.

Electoral funding reforms, implemented recently with the cooperation of the Election Commission (EC), point the way forward in just one vital area, throwing up, in turn, a plethora of questions in other places.

What is the point of making laws that can't be implemented due to the paucity of enforcers?
Of depending on Courts, with millions of pending cases clogging the system? With a shortage of judges and opaque, nepotistic, cabalistic, selection procedures to the Upper Judiciary?

Knowing that a both-Houses Parliamentary majority is imminent, will the  Supreme Court (SC), and the new, apparently like-minded CJI, cooperate in flushing the judicial selection system?

The last time Parliament legislated painstakingly on this, the SC threw it out on a technical weakness. And the Opposition let Parliament be snubbed rather than cooperate with the Government.

Elsewhere, when we are being militarily challenged by two of our most well-armed neighbors, where is the security in being under-manned, under-equipped, technologically backward and cyber-security challenged?

We are still abjectly dependent on imports, because of a poor defence manufacturing infrastructure, but this Government seems determined to accelerate this beyond recognition.

When are we going to set right the general infrastructure and logistics for that matter, in order to turn Indian industry into a power house?

Is the emphasis on electrification, water, and the building of roads, highways, bridges, tunnels, ports, dams, working hard enough towards this?

Are we going to see the implementation of simultaneous elections, at least to the 29 States  and the Centre, if not the Municipalities and Panchayats too?

This is a vital need for consistent governance, but interrupted presently by a  system in perpetual election mode. But those who think they will lose are not in favour. They do not want to be left out in the cold in a situation  where the ruling combine has an overwhelming advantage. But can they stop it any more?

There has been constant bloodshed and turmoil in the Kashmir Valley from 1947 itself.  But now, are we in touching distance of getting at the root causes?

Will the vexed question of the modification of Article 35A of the Indian Constitution that grants special residency and property rights to J&K, as of 1954, be taken up in Parliament?

The Valley politicians are threatening blue murder, but what more can they throw into the fray without foreign help of a sizeable order? The Hurriyat is also under the lash now.

Will Article 370 under which J&K is run, be abolished at last after 70 years?

Will India adopt the Gregorian Calendar year for fiscal and budgetary  purposes, in line with most of the world today?

Will the Ram Temple at Ram Janmabhoomi at Ayodhya, on the site of the erstwhile Babri Mosque, hanging fire, tangled in litigation, and  pending since 1992,finally be built?

Will Labour reform, a political hot potato for over 25 years if not all 70 years since Independence, now go through?  We are, after all, contemplating the privatisation of Air India, despite the looming battles with its entrenched Trade Unions.

The Land Acquisition Act modification was a progenitor, though the Opposition successfully blew substantial holes in it, rendering it less than ideal.

Everywhere, there is a Trojan  Horse of this Government's courage in the face off adversity.

It managed to put the teeth into the Benami Properties Act, and has nabbed a large number of culprits, Lalu Yadav and family being amongst the most celebrated - confiscating their properties for the first time.

But, every such move; casting a drag net around "shell companies" is another instance, is portrayed as stuntmanship by those affected, and mindless disruption  from a direction-less Government.

The Opposition is in a particularly unforgiving mood as it contemplates its growing irrelevance and powerlessness, having been caught by surprise and badly done by in their cash hoards by the blitzkreig of Demonetisation.

But the number of tax payers has grown by 25%.

The bureaucracy, converted into accomplices and handmaidens of the political class from the days of Indira Gandhi, are most startled at being held accountable for their performance.

The rules of the nexus between political over-bosses and the bureaucracy have been thrown out in an attack on corruption.

A number of civil servants have been prosecuted. More of the same is expected.    

Still, the Modi Administration, determined to usher in the much ridiculed "Acche Din", has been hamstrung on its legislative  department from the very start. But now, from every direction, the straws in the wind indicate this is about to change.

Earlier the table was set, but not the stage.

Important legislation, other than "money bills" that do not need Rajya Sabha concurrence, could be and were routinely blocked and sent back to the Lower House for further consideration, or deflected to the limbo of long-winded Parliamentary Committees.

So much so, that the Government has had to resort to ordinances in several instances to get the ball rolling.

And this has been happening on a more or less confrontationist and partisan basis, albeit with diminishing success as Opposition unity has unraveled, and the Government's persuasion and point-of-view gained traction.

The GST Law is indeed a prime example of this Government success before it had anything like a majority in the Upper House.

Held up for over a decade, it was passed  at last, and  in the face of trenchant filibustering, disruption and cries of foul play.

Through it all, the Government whittled and nibbled at  the rickety Opposition unity.

It managed, by appeals to each State in turn, including J&K, pointing out its peculiar costs and benefits, to garner, in the end, the requisite two-thirds majority in both Houses.

And this, after securing unanimous agreement between all the Finance Ministers from all the States in the GST Council first.

But barring this single great achievement, and a few lesser, but significant acts such as the bankruptcy law, other Bills have been opposed or deflected to Committee, irrespective of the legislation's merit.

Blocking legislation and disrupting the functioning of both houses of Parliament using slogan-shouting, rushing to the Well of the House, disrespecting the Speaker, throwing paper missiles have all been widely used in place of parliamentary debate and process.

So much so, that there have been calls to take away its veto powers, or even abolish the Upper House altogether,  or failing this, to make it directly elected and accountable to the people.

The big point now however, is that there will most likely be a majority in the Rajya Sabha by April 2018. It will be presided over very shortly by a pugnacious Rashtriya  Swayamvak Sevak (RSS)/BJP stalwart  Muppavarapu Venkaiah Naidu, as Vice President and ex officio Chairman of the Rajya Sabha.

Naidu will probably not brook gratuitous indiscipline of an unparliamentary nature. And Amit Shah's presence there will likely help focus the minds of the BJP flock in the Upper House too.

Narendra Modi will have, on his part, another RSS/BJP  pillar in Ram Nath Kovind at Rashtrapati Bhavan.

The stage may therefore be well set for 2019.

For: The Sunday Guardian
August 10th, 2017
Gautam Mukherjee