Mumbai: Congress MP Shashi Tharoor has hit out at the way Parliamentary proceedings are being disrupted.
Political parties have a constitutional right to protest outside the House but should use Parliament for debate, scrutiny and reasoned argument, he said.
Tharoor was speaking at an interaction at the India International Model United Nations (IIMUN), and said the distinction between street protest and Parliamentary business needed to be restored, as reported by The Tribune.
“Sadak ka kaam aap sadak pe kijiye, sadan ka kaam aap sadan pe kijiye. Sadak ka kaam sadan mat le jaiye,” he said.
Demonstrations, dharnas, slogan-shouting and protests were legitimate forms of democratic expression when conducted within the Constitutional framework, the Thiruvananthapuram MP said.
Parliament, he argued, had a different purpose.
“The temple of our democracy is a place where you go for prayer in the form of argument, debate and reasoned thinking,” he said.
Disruption was particularly damaging to Opposition parties because they depended more heavily on Parliament to question ministers, raise constituency concerns and scrutinise legislation, Tharoor said.
“It is actually we, the Opposition, who benefit the most from Parliament,” he said, pointing to Question Hour, Zero Hour and other parliamentary mechanisms through which Opposition MPs can put ministers on the spot and raise issues affecting their constituencies.
Repeatedly washing out parliamentary proceedings meant the Opposition was effectively depriving itself of its own most important tools, he said.
“We’re cheating ourselves of both the Question Hour principle and the constituency matters or any matters of national importance we wanted to raise,” Tharoor said.
Disruption could have consequences beyond the immediate political confrontation, he pointed out.
He recalled a High Court judge questioning how courts were expected to understand the legislative intent behind a law when there had been no meaningful Parliamentary debate before its passage.
The former diplomat also invoked former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s observation that the Opposition may have the arguments while the government has the votes.
“The Opposition must have its say even if the government will have its way,” Tharoor said.
The fundamental purpose of Parliament was not to guarantee that the Opposition would win every argument but to ensure that its arguments were heard and placed on record, the MP said.
He also said that demonstrations outside the Prime Minister’s residence could be legitimate, provided security arrangements and the functioning of government were not obstructed.
“That’s part of democracy,” he said.
Democracy, he added, could not be reduced to voting once every five years. “The stuff of democracy happens between elections,” Tharoor said.
