THE obstinacy of the UPA on not having the Joint Parliamentary Committee for probing the Rs 1.76 lakh crore 2G scam has stalled parliamentary proceedings for the last two weeks.
The Opposition led by the BJP has exemplified rare unity with the Left, AIADMK, Samajwadi and other parties joining the issue of unravelling the mystery that involves large corporate groups. The CAG has done the basics to point out how the government has been deprived of the funds that could have easily come to the exchequer.
The Congress has made the stalling of the houses an issue of “ethics”. Its members are trying to denigrate the Opposition by posturing that the Congress MPs would forego the measly daily allowances. The Congress is also trying to emphasise that every day the nation is losing massive sums as the House proceedings are not allowed to be held.
They are good arguments. There is only mistake in the calculations. Parliament spends every day massive sums to run its offices in salaries to the staff, security, library and other paraphernalia whether the houses are in session or not. Many house committees meet during the recess. The offices of Speaker, Deputy Speaker of Lok Sabha, Vice-President and Deputy Chairman of the Rajya Sabha, Prime Minister?s, and Leaders of the Opposition continue to function uninterrupted. So do the offices of chairmen of various house committees.
The campaign on Parliament expenses tries to portray as if Parliament does not spend any money when the houses are not in session. That is not the truth. During the session what Parliament spends in addition is on the allowances of the members. But MPs, who are members of various committees, are also paid sitting allowances at the same rate.
So why this shrill cry on an issue which is not really the truth. Besides, how is the cost of the session per day calculated. It is virtually the gross annual parliamentary expenditure divided by 365. It is a very inappropriate way of calculation.
Virtually the cost of a session is minimal if the expenditures, which are normal, are seen in perspective. This misleads the nation.
There is nothing abnormal in disrupting the houses. The rules provide for it. There are clear provisions for walk-out to mark the protest. Stalling the houses is a democratic method to air grievances when the authorities remain oblivious to the realities. It is a parliamentary practice and is a method to draw attention of the authorities and the nation to some grave issues like the 2G scam. It is far inexpensive to stall the house proceedings than blocking roads and rail traffic across the nation to force it to adopt the path of probity.
Some television and newspapers without studying the parliamentary practices join the raucous dishing out inappropriate figures to malign the politicians. The Press needs to realise that its job is to inform appropriately and not digress. Unfortunately, a large section of the Press is doing only that. The Press needs to strengthen the process of protest against issues that rock the nation and drain its coffers.
The Press needs to know that statistics on Parliament do not make the democracy. The Press needs to ask who is responsible for what they tout as 114 hours lost during winter session costing Rs 25 crore. Some newspapers have raised the bogey that MPs “should spend time devoting debating bills brought by the government”. The approach is demeaning the office of the MP. An MP is not a servant of the government. He has a more onerous duty to question and put the authorities on the dock for the betterment of democracy as well as making it functioning. The protest makes that possible.
The Press has become partner in another disinformation campaign. It has been trying to float the idea that Public Accounts Committee headed by a senior opposition MP, presently Dr Murli Manohar Joshi of BJP, can do a detailed inquiry.
The PAC is the apex auditing body. The CAG reports are vetted by it. It has the right to accept, reject or settle the objections raised by the CAG. But its investigative powers are outlined by the CAG report. It has to move on the lines of the audit report done by it. Some digression and some additional inquiries are possible but beyond that there are limitations.
Besides, the CAG reports suffer from a basic infirmity. Its mandate is limited to auditing government organisations. In the process, if some private organisations come in the way the CAG can mention that in its reports. But it does not have the powers to investigate the operations, functions and the modus operandi of the private corporate or any other organisation.
This is the job of the criminal investigating agencies, which presently CBI is doing. This is not part of the CAG report.
The PAC cannot jump the gun. The basic CAG report sets its contours. This means a wider investigation beyond the government or public sector organisations is not in its ambit.
This is the objection of the Opposition. The JPC on Harshad Mehta stock scam was accepted primarily to unravel the modus operandi of different public and private sector organisations, loopholes in rules, the lack of regulator, lax banking sector rules and the free-for-all stock market operations. The JPC report established certain norms and led to the setting up of the stock market regulator SEBI. It has been able to streamline stock market functions to an extent.
This is what the Opposition is demanding. There is nothing in the demand to suggest it is against the government. The demand is to set the rules of the game for the telecom sector. The technology is changing and each of it has severe monetary ramifications. It is a grey area that requires insight.
The limited PAC probe cannot set that path.
It is difficult to understand why the government should take the demand for JPC as an onslaught against it. The government needs more transparency and probity than the Opposition requires. The government has to run the show. The Opposition merely helps it. The demand for JPC is aimed at that.
Would the government specify how the PAC would probe the role of many of the corporate giants who ostensibly have made big money? Some of them are known to have resold the spectrum at prices many times higher than they had purchased from the Telecom Ministry. Even if PAC goes beyond its mandate to do so its constitutional power may be questioned.
It is time the government decides to accept the Opposition demand for setting up the JPC. Its mandate is set by the government and opposition with parliamentary authority. The JPC enjoys wider powers to summon anybody from anywhere and investigate the involvement and modus operandi of the largest corporate groups. Every delay is likely to help the culprit wipe off the pug-marks. The government had not lost anything in any of the previous JPCs. But every JPC helps strengthen the process of governance.
The debates should not be restricted to scoring brownie points in the Press, which is often neither properly informed nor educated. The issue is much graver and needs a solution at national level. The JPC alone can set those rules and not the PAC. Let us go for it.
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