THE Speaker of the outgoing 14th Lok Sabha, Somnath Chatterjee is not only an angry old man, but very sad one too. The Lok Sabha he presided over for the past five years has disillusioned him. He describes those members of the Parliament who have been either unruly, corrupt or have made no contribution to the debate and proceedings were worthless duds. “I am very sad and upset the way the members conduct themselves. The way they disrupt the house and indulge in unparliamentarily tactics are shameful. You are totally a waste and I wish people do not elect you again”, he declared in parliament. 51 MPs did not participate or ask any questions including the actor Dharmendra. The Speaker is not wrong in his observations.

Chatterjee who has been in parliament since the 5th Lok Sabha and has lead the radical leftist party, the CPM has tried his best to lift the standard of the debate. But finds himself badly mauled. While he has upheld the high tradition of neutrality and independence even risked being thrown out by the CPM, he has earned great respect across different spectrum of political opinion and the general public.

The two houses of parliament and state are the basic pillars of Indian democracy as are the state legislatures. The whole edifice of democracy stands on these institutions. But most of these are working in a chaotic and cavalier fashion. There is a clear hollowing out of the parliament.

India holds the ritual of elections every five years or even earlier if so required, and spends huge sums of money. This year is it going to cost Rs 10,000 crore or more. But if one observes these bodies even casually, one is disappointed. They either meet for short durations, mostly to fulfill constitutional obligations or are mired by shouting, walk outs and fracas. Sometime the members beat each other and sometimes the staff. Ruling parties behave like dictators and throw out whole lot of opposition or their leaders for a full term.

The 14th Lok Sabha met for just for 46 days during 2008. It set another dubious record of passing eight important bills in just five minutes. No debate and no information for the public, the master that elected the parliament. The first Lok Sabha had met for on average each year for 150 days. The legislative work done by the parliament during the first decade was on an average 68 bills. Now it has come down less than 50. Parliaments across countries do much better.

There is surely time to think that a weak parliamentary system would hard Indian democracy and gradually there would be no difference between democracy and dictatorship. Our leaders are cutting the tree on which they sit.

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