In
more than a dozen judgments, the Supreme Court has crystallized ‘Public Trust Doctrine’ and ruled that people are the owners of natural
resources and the government exercises control over these resources as a
trustee to achieve the greater common good.
Four years ago, dispute over division of
family assets between the Ambani brothers boiled down to the KG basin and the
matter came for adjudication before the SC. The Centre had argued that “natural resources are vested in the
government, as a matter of trust, in the name of the people of India and it was
the solemn duty of the state to protect the national interest”.
In its judgment in the case, the SC picked
the thread from the government’s arguments had held that natural resources were
in fact national assets. It had said, “In a constitutional democracy like
ours, the national assets belong to the people. The government holds such
natural resources in trust.”
This means, we the people are real owners
of natural resources — coal, minerals, petroleum, natural gas, spectrum,
forests, land and water. We allow our elected representatives to hold our
property, the natural resources, in trust to enable them to utilize them
scrupulously for the greater common good.
When the Prime Minister, as the head of the
government, distributes portfolios among his trusted lieutenants, he transfers
with it the trusteeship over natural resources. The PM himself held trusteeship
over coal when he held charge of the coal ministry during 2006-09.
The Comptroller and Auditor General reported that irregular allotment
of coal blocks to big players cost lakhs of crores of rupees to the exchequer.
The CAG report raised a massive stink even before the one left behind by the
alleged irregular allotment of 2G spectrum had died down.
Like the spectrum scam, the coal
controversy too landed in the Supreme Court, which is monitoring the CBI
investigation into the allotments. But even before the court could appraise
itself of the details of the inquiries conducted by the agency, an ever itching
government was caught red-handed tinkering with the probe status report.
The court ordered the CBI to insulate
itself from political interference and scrupulously examine each and every file
relating to allocation of coal blocks, with a direction to the coal ministry to
hand them over to the agency. The ministry audaciously said many important
files relating to coal block allocations were missing from its closets.
As the coal-washed black water breached the
gates of the government and threatened to smear it, the PM nonchalantly told
Parliament that he was not the custodian of the coal files.
This is akin to a situation where, you and
I — the people — entrust our property in trusteeship to another person to deal
with it in the best possible manner to benefit us. But the trustee, who is
responsible to keep records of all dealings relating to the property, tells us
that he is not the custodian of the files which contain details of the dealings
and that many of these files have gone missing!
The PM as coal minister says he is not the
custodian of the files. The coal ministry says it does not have the files and
has constituted a high-powered committee, the proven panacea for all
controversies, to locate them.
The PM’s “I am not the custodian of files” excuse must have brought smiles
on the faces of many ministers, who tomorrow can give the same excuse about
files relating to allocation of licence to exploit natural resources like
petroleum, natural gas, spectrum, iron ore and many other important natural
resources which could go missing.
The government, with the PM’s statement
about missing files, stands at a crossroad — one gets guidance from SC
enunciated public trust doctrine holding the government to be trustees of
natural resources, and the other that meanders through dingy bylanes crowded by
unscrupulous elements ever ready to drain the country for private gain. Would
it not have been a momentous occasion for a democracy like ours, if the PM had
said “I am responsible for the coal files and it will be my government’s
business to find them and hand them over to the CBI for a through probe?”
This would also have done the PM and his
party a great service instead of his cahoots parroting the ‘clean image’ of the
PM forgetting that muddied waters seldom reflect a clean image, howsoever
beautiful the face might be.
There is no one to own responsibility for
the missing coal files as majority from the ruling political class lack the humility
of an elected representative. Instead, intoxication of power has made them
display brazen arrogance.
They can take a lesson or two from Abraham
Lincoln who on his election as president of the US had said, “I have been selected to fill an
important office for a brief period, and am now, in your eyes, invested with an
influence which will pass away. But should my administration prove to be a very
wicked one, or what is more probable, a very foolish one, if you the people are
true to ourselves and the Constitution, there is but little harm I can do,
thank god.”
The unfeigned innocence reflected in
Lincoln’s speech is quite a contrast to the feigned innocence over the files
reflected in the PM’s speech.
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