What was wrong then is wrong today

If Sonia Gandhi could express sorrow even now, she would do a good deed to the party which has not been able to live down the reputation of being authoritarian. She would not be denouncing Indira Gandhi but telling the nation that she (Sonia Gandhi), for one, would never condone the misuse of power.

When she criticizes the BJP-led government, justifiably, for making inroads into the field of people's rights and freedom, it sounds one-sided. During the emergency, the Congress government had extinguished all freedoms, personal, judicial and the media's. It is an irony that many BJP ministers, who suffered during the emergency, should be copying Indira Gandhi's methods. They are changing the concept of liberty itself as she did and they are concentrating power in the hands of bureaucrats and the police.

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Pliable as they are to carry out the errands of ministers, they have made the system increasingly intolerant and oppressive. The Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA), like MISA during Indira Gandhi's regime, is being misused. One wonders whether any case has been referred to the much-publicised RS Saharya committee for review. A large number of officials -- District Magistrates and Commissioners of Police -- who had appeared before the Shah Commission admitted they carried out the instructions emanating from politicians and administrative heads obediently. Orders were issued on personal and political considerations. What is happening now is not very different. The police and officials at the centre and in the states are at the other end of the telephone to implement the fiat. Their stock explanation is that in the circumstances which prevail, they have no alternative. A similar plea was made by the errant police and other officials before the Shah Commission. Recently when I talked to the State Chief Secretary and the Home Secretary at Gandhinagar within a few days of the Gujarat carnage, they did not hide the laxity and even the complicity of the administration and police. But both of them expressed helplessness. The Sri Krishna report on the Mumbai riots even named the guilty officers. But no action was taken. Only now, nearly a decade later, has some movement taken place. Gujarat is under the BJP and the action on the Sri Krishna report was stalled by the Shiv Sena-BJP coalition in Maharashtra. These instances are no different from what happened during the emergency. They too reflect the bias, prejudice and disrespect of law. Scores of inquiry reports remain unimplemented.

In fact, from the days of the emergency, a new culture has developed whereby public servants, particularly the police, anticipate the wishes of rulers and act. Whenever there is an uproar against the state's excesses or complicity, the rulers, their godfathers, see to it that none in the administration or police is punished. The rule of law has become a relative term.

It is apparent from the manner in which the Lok Sabha has passed a bill on the Central Vigilance Commission that all political parties are riding the same boat. They favour prior government permission even to initiate an inquiry, let alone acting against officials of the rank of joint secretary and above. This is despite the Supreme Court's judgment which struck down the prior permission part.

One can understand steps to immunise public servants from pressures or threats. But one cannot understand a law which will throw them to the whims and fancies of the ministers. Those who do not display courage to face the truth when they are under pressure, they simply do not have the character to face the truth. Safeguards can be given to officers against wrong proceedings. How can a minister, primarily a politician, say whether action should be taken or not?

Why pick on the officials alone? What happened during the emergency was the subversion of the system. It was not excesses committed by a few individuals. It was a general erosion of democratic values. It was a takeover by a few who enjoyed extra-constitutional authority. Democracy was assaulted then. Now secularism faces the same danger. The ruling BJP is saffronising every aspect of life and every tier of the administration. For example, Human Resource Development Minister Murli Manohar Joshi is not only rewriting history but selecting the Gandhian institutions for his attack because they still teach the truth.

Take the attack on the Gandhian Institute of Studies at Varanasi which represents an attempt to link Gandhian pluralism with social sciences. Indira Gandhi too attacked during the emergency the Gandhi institutions like the Gandhi Peace Foundation at Delhi. Had those who derailed the democratic structure between 1975 and 1977 been punished, both politicians and civil servants would have learnt a lesson. There might have been a serious thinking on why the administration collapsed. The distortions in the system might have been sought to be corrected. Instead, Indira Gandhi withdrew every case of complaint of excess when she returned to power in 1980. The few officials who had done a spot of honest work and had resisted political pressure were hounded and harassed. Every trace of resistance to the emergency was effaced. What was wrong then is wrong today. Both politicians and officials have to confine the operation to their acknowledged fields. They must know the limits which they cannot cross. Otherwise, the nation cannot be safe. Nor can the working of a democratic system. Without the awareness of what is right and a desire to act according to what is right, there may be no realisation of what is wrong.

This consciousness has to permeate all strata of our society. Otherwise, even with the best of intentions, the recurrence of the type of tragedy like the emergency may not be prevented. The first thing is to restore the institutions. They were beginning to recover from the trauma of authoritarian rule during the emergency. But the BJP, which had fought against the rule, is not letting the recovery take place. Leaders like Home Minister LK Advani and Joshi love to wield power to the detriment of institutions.

Imagine the height to which the institutions would have risen if the two had resigned from the government when the CBI had filed the charge sheet against them on the demolition of the Babri Masjid. They should have quit at least when a supplementary charge sheet was submitted before the Special Court a few days ago.

The moral is that those in power do not respect any norm or value when it comes to them or their party. It is all the more necessary for Sonia Gandhi to say at least "sorry" so that the process of owning responsibility begins. The BJP may learn from her example. Let me tell them what Martin Luther King said: "The day we see the truth and cease to speak is the day we begin to die."

Kuldip Nayar is an eminent Indian columnist.