Fixing AAP

THE alacrity with which the President of India (read the Modi government) endorsed the Election Commission of India’s opinion that 20 Aam Aadmi Party MLAs stand disqualified for holding “an office of profit” carries with it a distinct odour of political maliciousness. The Election Commission of India has, once again, left itself open to a charge of unfairness, if not outright partisanship, when it decreed the 20 MLAs as guilty, without giving them a hearing, in total disregard of its own June 23, 2017 speaking order. Norms of natural justice stand flouted. Underperforming institutions undermine the democratic quotient of our constitutional architecture.

The 20 MLAs are in the soup because they were appointed as parliamentary secretaries, a device used by all political parties to get around the constitutional ceiling on the number of ministers as a percentage of the total strength of the Assembly in a state. The ceiling has been unevenly observed. Parliamentary secretaries’ appointments had been struck down in Himachal Pradesh (2005), Goa (2009), West Bengal and Telengana (2015). In a number of states the laws have been amended to exempt the position of parliamentary secretary from the “office of profit” clause, but this precaution was not operative in Delhi. The AAP leadership was cavalier towards the established procedures. An amendment to the Delhi Members of Legislative Assembly (Removal of Disqualification) Act, 1997, which sought exemption, did not receive presidential assent and thus the 20 MLAs remained vulnerable to disqualification.

The AAP government faces no threat to its parliamentary majority. If the party does not get relief from the higher judiciary, the Kejriwal regime will find itself subjected to a substantive referendum in 20 Assembly constituencies. The massive majority that the AAP carved up in 2015 was widely seen as an expression of the disenchantment with the established political parties, the Congress and the BJP. These  two parties have remained relentless in their opposition to the AAP; perhaps the AAP, too, disappointed all those who had high hopes from the new party. But its political stupidities cannot be seen as a licence for misuse of constitutional muscle by its rivals.