Speaker’s Role
By Poonam I Kaushish
The theatre of the absurd or the comedy of errors? How should one describe the shameful, unparallel and violence witnessed last week in the J&K Assembly. All over the Speaker disallowing the Opposition PDP’s adjournment motion on an NC worker’s “mysterious death” resulting in senior PDP leaders hurling abuses and a pedestal fan at the Speaker. Worse, an angry Speaker retaliated by accusing the Opposition leader of being a traitor and hurling invectives, only to apologies later. But the damage was done.
The Goa Assembly too witnessed unsavory scenes when the Speaker refused to allow table the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) report on the Rs 4000 crore illegal mining scam in the Assembly on the facetious plea, “I have not read it.” The report indicts several Congress MLAs’ including the Chief Minister.
Importantly, these incidents once again highlight falling standards in conducting legislative business in Assemblies and portray a serious danger to the future of the Parliamentary democracy in the country. They also bring into sharp focus the Speaker’s role and powers both in the Lok Sabha and Assemblies. And, the need to clearly define these.
Especially against the backdrop that these occurrences are nothing new. Times out of number over the past six decades instances of a Speaker being deeply involved in active and playing partisan politics is more a rule rather than an exception. In 1975, Mrs. Gandhi brought the Lok Sabha stature down by appointing Speaker G.S. Dhillon, a Minister in her Cabinet, undermining both the prestige and the independence of the Chair.
Today, no eyebrows are raised at the Centre and States when MP-MLAs-Speaker roles are inter-changed at a drop of a hat. Whereby, ruling Party Ministers and MPs accept Speakership only to exploit the office for richer political dividends. Think. The present Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar was a Congress MP and Minister in UPA I. As were her erstwhile predecessors, Shivraj Patil, Sangma, Balram Jhakar et al.
More scandalous is the situation in the States. Whereby, it is increasingly difficult to keep track of Minister’s becoming Speaker’s and vice versa. In Goa former Chief Minister Pratap Rane is the Speaker and in J&K Lone, a confidant of Chief Minister Omar Abdullah presides over the Assembly.
Confided a former Lok Sabha Speaker: “We are elected on Party tickets with Party funds. How can we claim independence? Moreover, even if we resign on becoming the Speaker, we would still have to go back to the same Party for sponsorship for the next election.” The recent exception being Somnath Chatterjee. After the CPM withdrew support to the Congress-led UPA I over the Indo-US nuclear deal, Chatterjee refused to vacate the Speaker’s chair and vote against the Government.
Bringing things to such a pass that the Speaker seems to have acquired a “larger than life image and role”, so like a school teacher whereby he has become the primus entre peri. A kind of a demi-God who can do no wrong, and whose actions are unquestionable. Forgotten in the quintessential position, is the fact that the Speaker who is essentially the servant of the House has fast become its master, thanks to the rules of procedure.
True, the rules of procedure give the Speaker absolute discretion to decide on all issues, be it deciding the admissibility of a question, admitting an adjournment motion, deciding on Committee reports or mundane things like who should speak and for how long etc. In fact, he enjoys greater power than any other Speaker world-wide.
Sadly, the Speakers’ approach to important issues ignores much that is expected of him in accordance with time-honoured conventions. Recall, his extraordinary power was given by the founding fathers of the Constitution to guide the proceedings of the House effectively in the formative period and to help build healthy conventions and a strong Opposition in the best national interest without whom, according to Erskine May, “the House has no Constitutional existence.”
Added Nehru in 1958: “The Speaker represents the House, its dignity and freedom….because the House represents the nation, in a particular way the Speaker becomes the symbol of the nation’s freedom and liberty. …his should be an honoured and free position occupied always by men of outstanding ability and impartiality.”
India’s first Speaker Mavalankar set the tone. He not only was strict in admitting adjournment motions but he once allowed an adjournment motion against then Home Minister Sardar Patel to discuss Hyderabad Prime Minister Mir Naik Ali’s escape from India. Unimaginable today.
If truth be told, we have not understood the basic concept of Parliamentary democracy which is Government by discussion in Parliament to serve the best interest of the nation, not any one Party. Whereby, both Government and Opposition have to compromise and accommodate. The Government’s prerogative is to bring legislation but the Opposition has the right to initiate discussions of its choice and forward bills. In UK, this right is conceded fully to the Opposition and exercised by it.
Pertinently, the power of adjournment vests in the House of Commons and not in the Speaker as in India who enjoys total discretion to admit a motion. The Commons consequently adjourns on a formal motion at the end of each sitting. This provides the Opposition an opportunity to bring forward an adjournment motion every day, if it so chooses, through a simple motion to the effect: “The House adjourns to discuss… Indeed, it was viewed as an effective device for the Opposition to raise discussions on urgent issues agitating the public.
Interestingly, the Commons chequered history is a saga of struggle between the House and the Speaker, once the nominee of the King, who went all out to oblige his Lord and master. As far back in 1642, the Commons witnessed extraordinary scenes which settled once and for all the supremacy of the House.
When King Charles I entered the House to search and arrest five members for high treason he asked the Speaker if he knew of the location of these members, the Speaker, William Lenthall, replied: “May it please your Majesty, I have neither eyes to see nor tongue to speak in this place but as the House is pleased to direct me, whose servant I am here.”
Clearly, as India’s Parliamentary system is based on the Westminster model our Speakers need to learn a lesson and adopt the Commons approach. Unquestionably, the House is the master of its own procedure and the Speaker no more than its spokesman subject to its control. Article 212 provides: “The validity of any proceedings in the legislature shall not be called in question on the ground of any alleged irregularity of procedure. In the absence of the Speaker, business could always be transacted either with the Deputy Speaker in the Chair or by electing a Chairman.”
Undeniably, this leads to physical violence especially when the ruling Party Assembly backs the Speaker. But there appears to be no alternative, so long as the Speaker’s powers are not strictly defined and no scope left for any illusion on the part of the Presiding officers.
Where does one go from here? Time to look afresh at the Speaker’s powers establish the supremacy of the House. Not many are aware the Speaker has “no right” to expunge anything other than what is unparliamentary or to direct that “this will not go on record”. As it strikes at the freedom of speech guaranteed to members. The Speaker is the servant of the House not its master! After all. —INFA