10. The Super Cabinet and the Inner Mind of Mr. A.B. Vajpayee

10

THE FALL OF THE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA

Mr. S.P. Puruvar, Finance Director of the Re. 68000 crore BSNL, quit his position on 1 April 2002.

 The exit of Mr. Puruwar was linked to the quick closure of the negotiations with the vendors, who supplied certain equipment to the BSNL.

On the same day, a hurriedly convened meeting of the Union Cabinet decided to bar the Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs) from buying anything exceeding Re.5 crore from any foreign company without the clearance from the Union Cabinet. Mr. Manohar Josi of Siva Sena Party announced it. He stumbled for words while announcing this to the newsmen. The print media, for obvious reasons, did not publish it.

The above developments confirmed that the system was engaged in large-scale manipulations through all possible ways.

Protesting against privatization almost all employees of all PSUs - including banks and insurance- went on a nationwide strike on 16April 2002. On the next day, the letter No.9 was sent to Mr. K.R. Narayanan, His Excellency the President of India.

The above letter pointed out the existence of an unknown Super Cabinet at New Delhi. The reason for this conclusion was that the public sector Hindustan Zinc Limited (HZL) was given to the Sterlite, which had been disqualified by the Union Cabinet based on the letter dated 1-6-2002 (First letter) of this writer.

The copy of this letter was not sent to Mr. A.B. Vajpayee, Prime Minister of India, as Mr. K.R.Narayanan had been transmitting the letters to him. The practice of sending the letters to the Chief Ministers and the learned judges of the Supreme Court was also discontinued for some time due to practical difficulties. The letter follows.

From

          V. Sabarimuthu,

          Thattankonam,

          Vellicode, Mulagumoodu, 629167.

To

          Mr. K.R. Naraynan

      His Excellency the President of India,

Presidential Palace,

          New Delhi.

Your Excellency,

    Kindly consider the REASONS FOR THE FALL OF OUR CONSTITUTION.

1. The Supreme Court has extinguished socialism from the Constitution. The shoulders of the learned judges of the Supreme Court must be broad enough to accept our Constitution even if they cannot relish it. Sovereignty, Socialism, Secularism and Democracy cannot be destroyed by any judgment even if it is reinforced by 100 other judgments. In other words, the Constitution is supreme and not the judgments. Whether the Supreme Court has any power to annihilate socialism and, therefore, the Preamble through its judgments is the crucial question, which remains unanswered. 

2. The words socialism and secularism were included in the Constitution because of great foresight and political will that stemmed from due democratic process. Therefore, destruction of socialism amounts to destruction of democracy through the back door.

3. Several cases pending against big economic offenders had been brought to the notice of the President of India, Chief Justice of India, many learned judges of the Supreme Court and the CBI. Nevertheless, no effort has been taken by anyone to bring anyone to justice. This included the cases that the Supreme Court had threatened to monitor directly. It was the Supreme Court, which showed to the common man that the cases against big economic offenders too could be pursued without much bias. Naturally, the common man expects the Supreme Court to implement its own observations in the open court.

4. On September 9, 1996, Justice Y.K. Sabbarwal and Justice D.K. Jain of the High Court, Delhi observed, “Considering the very nature of the allegation, this seems to be the most important case, (i.e. JMM case), the nation is facing. There can be no other case in Parliamentary Democracy more important than this”. People believed what the learned judges said. Now they anticipate the verdict of the Supreme Court in this case. The JMM money is still in the bank. The CBI has not filed an appeal in this case and in some other cases presumably because the critical energy badly needed to file an appeal is not forthcoming from the President, Prime Minister or the Supreme Court.

5. The High Courts were not allowed to hear the BALCO case. The Chief Justice S.P.Bharucha did not allow the High Court, Chennai to hear the ITDC case.  Justice B.N. Kirpal-this is considered as the most important point- was asked to head the benches that heard the BALCO case at least twice. Taking cases from the High Courts, in good faith, is common. However, this should not appear as something done in bad faith. Not all the safety valves available to the affected people should be firmly shut. The logical extension of this trend is that the Chief Justices and Judges of the High Courts would be appointed with an eye on acquitting the accused. Therefore, the people all over India fear that the days are not far off when all big offenders would be coming out with flying colours and added glory.                                                                    

6. It is well known that Mr. Tata, who had been spending Re. hundred of crore for Keten Parek related activities, took Re.850 crore from the BoI to purchase the VSNL. The matter was informed to the President of India, the Chief Justice of India and the CBI. The CBI has not denied the allegation.  The CBI has not caught the culprits partly because the CBI-it appears- is not purely independent in its functioning and partly because of the present environment. It is strange that a solid complaint against him involving Re.850 crore is sidelined. The public servants, who influenced the BoI to pay the money to Mr. Tata have the last laugh. Absence of rule of law is evident.

7. In July 2001, the Union Cabinet - in good faith - decided to disqualify the companies that committed grave offences from bidding for the PSUs. The grave offence was defined as one, which outrages the moral sense of the community. Based on this definition the then bidders of Air India and HZL were totally disqualified.  Obviously, this definition could be reversed only in bad faith. The Constitution could be defied. The President of India could be defied. The common man could be defied.  How can the Union Cabinet defy its own decision? It is possible because, it appears, that a “Super Cabinet” is functioning somewhere in Delhi. The members of this Super Cabinet periodically decide to divide the PSUs among themselves as if they were their family properties.  If it were not true, HZL would not have been given to the Sterlite, a company disqualified by the Union Cabinet for the above reason. It was the reason why the Chief Justice of India was requested not to follow the crowd.  The Chief Justice of India could have stayed the disinvestments for the violation of these guidelines, if not based on the Constitution. In fact, these companies committed offences, which outraged the moral sense of not only the community but also the Government. One must make money honestly to make the nation rich. It is evident that the nation is under the clutches of the economic offenders. The Supreme Court could have contributed its share to extricate the nation from their hands.

8. The President of India has not given any reply to not less than five letters written to him on Constitutional matters. The President of India, it appears, paid a visit to the Supreme Court in vain.  The President of India must be always pleased to certify that the learned judges of the Supreme Court and High Courts enjoy his pleasure because the Preamble of the Constitution is safe in their hands.

9. If the learned judges of the Supreme Court and the High Courts  act in good faith, there would be no threat to socialism, democracy, rule of law or to the life and security of the people. On the contrary, if they begin to act in bad faith, there would be a real threat to socialism, democracy, and secularism, rule of law and life and security of the people. Absence of a reply from the President of India indicates that the latter is happening.

10.If a judicial blunder is pointed out, the Supreme Court must come out of it with necessary corrections without wasting time. What is important is the Constitution and not the procedures and technicalities.  There is a new hope that all the privatized PSUs would be taken back to meet the demands of the Constitution.  The Chief Justice of India would agree wholeheartedly our people must enjoy the benefits of the Preamble as a matter of unfettered right and not as gratis. Therefore, this letter may kindly be treated as a writ petition to restore the status quo ante of the Constitution. Alternatively, the President of India or the Supreme Court may find out a mechanism to undo the harm inadvertently done to the Constitution. The Chief Justice of India would earn the goodwill of our people if he could restore socialism to its pre-eminent   position before his retirement.

Vellicode,                                                                                                 Yours faithfully,

V.SABARIMUTHU

17-4-2002.

V.SABARIMUTHU.

            On April 18, 2002, the Government of Andra Pradesh decided to split the State Electricity Board into four autonomous Corporations. This was consistent with the suggestions already given.

              The Union Minister for Civil Aviation, Mr. Syed Shahnawaz Hussain, on 18 April  2002 ruled out disinvestments in Air India and Indian Airlines saying that the immediate priority was to put them on firm footing. This showed that the Prime Minister, mainly because of these letters, did not prevail upon him to encourage the privatization of the AI and the IA.

       Mr. Ram Vilas Paswan too, on the same day, allayed fears that the National Aluminium Company, Nalco,- a PSU-  would be privatized on the lines of  the BALCO. This writer had sent a few letters to Mr. Ram Vilas Paswan.

          Presumably based on the letter dated 17-4-2002, the President of India invited the Prime Minister for talks on 19 April 2002. The meeting lasted for 45 minutes. Door Dharshan –the public sector TV channel- called DD- reported it. The newspapers did not report this matter at all.

       On 20 April 2002, there was a closed door meeting of Mr. Vajpayee with the Home Minister Mr. L.K.Advani, External Affairs Minister Mr. Jaswant Singh,  Law Minister, Mr. Arun Jaitely,  Disinvestments Minister, Mr. Arun Shurie and the party spokesman Mr. Vijay Kumar Malhotra.

       On the same day, Mr. L.K.Advani, referring to the incidents in Gujarat, asked the people not to take revenge.

          On 22 April 2002 the Chairman of Hindustan Paper Corporation (HPC) said that the exercise for the disinvestments of Hindustan Newsprint Limited (HNL) would be over by first week of May 2002. He    was not aware of the changes taking place due to this work.

          A Parliamentary Standing Committee on Shipping tabled its report in the Parliament on 23 April 2002. It opposed the privatization of the Shipping Corporation of India (SCI) at a time when it was planned to invest Re. 650 crore in fleet expansions.

      Similarly,  another Parliamentary Committee, headed by Mr. Mulayam Singh Yadav, opposed the privatization of Indian Petro Chemical Corporation Limitd (IPCL).

      Now the I.5 lakh ordinance staff decided to defer their 48-hour agitation following an assurance from the Minister for Defense that the ordinance factories would not be privatized. This assurance came not because of their threat to strike work, but because of the pressure from the President of India based on this work.

          In the meantime, Mr. Arun Shourie,  Minister for Disinvestments, picked up courage and said that the Government would privatize 30 companies during 2002-2003.

      At the same time, Mr. Ram Vilas Paswan ruled out any disinvestments in Coal India Limited (CIL). Accordingly, the latter said that the Coal Nationalization (amendment) Bill would be withdrawn. It indicated that the Union Cabinet was not one sided in the matter of privatization.

          The confederation of Indian Industries and Commerce now invited Mrs. Sonia Gandhi, Congress President, to inaugurate its annual session. Thus, it deviated from its normal practice of inviting the Prime Minister to inaugurate the session.

     Mr. A. B. Vajpayee had been requested to give the valedictory address. This was presumably done in consultation with him. This was a ploy to woo the Congress President by flattering so that she would agree to a constitutional amendment like removing the word “socialism” from the Preamble. In this way, the industrialists wanted to show that there was unanimity between the ruling party and the main opposition party in the matter of privatization.

       The NDA actually had been very considerate with regard to the Congress President. It could be gauged from the fact that it even did not change the Governors appointed by the Congress Party. 

      However, the ploy did not work as Mrs. Sonia Gandhi had been continuously receiving copies of these letters. Thus she - in her inaugural address - very politely asked the motive behind inviting the leader of the opposition to start their annual get-together.

           She, further asked whether there was a change in the direction of the political wind. Finally, she said that due to the fundamental difference of opinion on the very character of the society there would not be much agreement between the Government and the opposition.

          On the next day, i.e. on 27 April 2002 Mr. A.B. Vajpayee, in his valedictory speech, said that the attempt to destabilize the Government with the support of the destabilizing forces had neither helped the cause of business nor had they done any good to the economy of the country. He asked Mrs. Sonia Gandhi not to count the chicken before they were hatched.

      Finally, as a reply to the letters of this writer, he said that, “The Government would do business with the businessmen and the businessmen would continue to do business with the Government”. 

     The above statement showed that Mr. Vajpayee was a supporter of privatization and that but for these letters he would have privatized all PSUs to the detriment 1000 million people.

          The industrialists were disappointed because their meticulous plan to enlist the support of Mrs. Sonia Gandhi did not click.

     The Delhi correspondent of The New Indian Express on 29 April 2002 said that the ruling coalition would no longer expect any helping hand from her even for carrying through the essential reforms bills and agreed reforms measures.

    The exasperated correspondent pointed out that her new stand did not auger well for the economy.  
    The article was concluded by saying that the Congress would go along with the Left for the rest of the term. 
      The implied meaning was that the letters of this writer and the President of India were standing in the path of privatization. However, they attributed this to Mrs. Sonia Gandhi. They did not to attribute anything to this writer.