Parliament, Not As We Know It

As Parliament reconvenes today, the nation is watching to see whether it will function or be drowned as usual in cacophony and adjournments. In its entire history, the British House of Commons has not been adjourned once. We are fast reaching the situation when we can claim the opposite: there is not a single day when our Parliament is not adjourned!

    There was a time when debates in Parliament were of very high calibre, with the right mix of oratory, substance, decorum and wit. Today, shoes, mikes, chairs and any other movable objects are routinely thrown by legislators at each other; abuse is exchanged; and the well of the House is regularly trespassed. A disgusted nation – and especially its young – watches these proceedings, aware that each minute of Parliament wasted costs the exchequer Rs 2.5 lakh.

    Can nothing be done about such a state of affairs? Most people are not aware that the Speaker of the Lok Sabha is invested with wide-ranging disciplinary powers. She decides when a member speaks and for how long; she can ask a member to discontinue his or her speech; she decides what should not go on the record; she can direct a member to withdraw from the House for a specific period; any member who flouts the Speaker’s orders or directions can be named by the Speaker, and in such cases may have to withdraw from the House; she is the guardian of the rights and privileges of the House.

    It is the Speaker’s sole discretion to refer any question of privilege to the committee of privileges for examination, investigation and report; she can issue warrants to execute the orders of the House; she decides points of order; the Speaker’s rulings regarding interpretation of constitutional provisions relating to the House or rules of procedure are binding; the security of the tenure of the Speaker’s office is protected; the Speaker’s salary and allowances are not voted upon but are charged to the Consolidated Fund of India.

    In short, she represents the honour and dignity of the House, and has the powers to enforce them. The powers of the chairperson of the Rajya Sabha, and of the presiding officers of state chambers, are similar.

    With such powers at hand, why do presiding officers not exercise them firmly to maintain the discipline and decorum of the House? Perhaps the slide into parliamentary chaos over the years is due to the lack of any presiding officer taking a resolute stand to stem it. Democratic disagreement is the template of a parliamentary democracy, and must be allowed to be voiced, but must entire sessions go by without business of any worth being enacted? A change is necessary, and here are a few suggestions.

    Any member who flouts the rules or breaks the decorum of the House should, after being warned, be named by the presiding officer and asked to withdraw from the House. Any member, who has been asked to withdraw from the House on three occasions at any time in the course of the life of the House, should be suspended from the House.

    The duration of suspension would be for the balance period of the session, during which the suspended member would not be entitled to any allowances or benefits that would otherwise have accrued to him or her as a member of the House. If a member who has been suspended, again infringes the rules or established decorum of the House, she should be disqualified from membership of the House for the balance period of the life of the House, or three years, whichever is more.

    No member shall enter the well of the House. Any member who violates this absolute injunction should be expelled for the balance period of the life of the House. Any act of vandalism or physical violence in the House must invite immediate expulsion for the immediate balance period of the House or three years, whichever is more.

    The House should never be adjourned, for the norm is that Parliament is only ever adjourned in the event of a major crisis. If members wish to walk out of the House they are welcome to do so, but they cannot disrupt the proceedings to force an adjournment.

    The sanctity of Question Hour should be maintained at all times unless there are pressing reasons to suspend it, for which the leader of the House and the opposition leader should have approached the presiding officer in advance. Leaders of all political parties must give an assurance to the presiding officer at the commencement of every legislative session that they will try and ensure that their members behave in conformity to the rules and decorum of the institution.

    The above is doable, and within the powers of presiding officers. Political leaders and MPs must themselves fully cooperate to work out a mandatory code of conduct, because a nonfunctioning Parliament cannot become the norm of the world’s largest democracy. The faith of the people in the highest temple of democracy cannot be eroded, whatever the compulsions of transitory politics. The onus for this rests on both the treasury benches and those on the other side. The nation is watching.

   

~ Pavan K Varma