'Left parties are not afraid of Article 356'

Buddhadev Bhattacharya, who is in charge of the Home (police) portfolio in West Bengal's Left Front Ministry, took a tough stand when the Vajpayee Government sent a team of three bureaucrats to the State in June for an on-the-spot study of the State's law and order situation. He instructed State officials not to cooperate with the members of the Central team as they were "unwanted guests" whose visit was unconstitutional. Kalyan Chaudhuri met the Minister for an interview. Exerpts:

Since 1950 President's Rule under Article 356 has been imposed over 100 times by the Union Government. Do you think that the Centre has been just in all these cases?

No. Every time it was for narrow political gains that the Centre imposed President's Rule and dislodged governments of Opposition parties. The injustice began in 1959 when Article 356 was applied to dismiss the world's first elected Communist government, which was headed by E.M.S. Namboodiripad in Kerala. This was engineered by Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru at the behest of his daughter Indira Gandhi who was then Congress president, alleging a breakdown of law and order in the State. We in West Bengal were also a victim of the Centre's foul political game. In 1969, the United Front Government, in which the CPI(M) was a partner, was thrown out of power following the imposition of President's Rule by the Congress Government at the Centre. That in many cases the Central Government has misused the emergency provision has been pointed out by the Supreme Court.

What in your assessment is the essential difference between the situation before and after the Supreme Court judgment in the Bommai case?

T.A. HAFEEZ

The judgment in the Bommai case asserted that secularism is a part of the basic structure of the Constitution and that religion and politics cannot be mixed. Secondly, it held that a proclamation under Article 356 is judicially reviewable. The judicial review has the scope to examine whether the proclamation was issued on the basis of any material at all, whether the material was relevant or extraneous or whether the proclamation was issued in mala fide exercise of power. Thus this judgment, said to be a landmark one, placed secularism on a high pedestal and brought about transparency in the exercise of the power of the Centre under Article 356. This is the essential difference between the pre-Bommai and post-Bommai situations.

*Even after the Supreme Court judgment governments at the Centre could not always resist the temptation to misuse the power conferred on them by Article 356. Do you think Article 356 should be abolished?

We do not want the abolition of Article 356. Central rule could be imposed only when national security is threatened and an emergency situation arises. For the last one year the Left parties have been trying to define Centre-State relations at the Inter-State Council and demanding that the emrgency factor enshrined in Article 356 be clearly and objectively stated without letting any subjective prejudice to creep in. It was for the purpose of clarifying Centre-State relations that the Sarkaria Commission was set up. When he came to know that the Vajpayee Government had justified the recent visit of a Central team to West Bengal for an on-the-spot study of the law and order situation under Article 355, our Chief Minister Jyoti Basu wrote a letter to the Prime Minister seeking a definition of the meaning and scope of this Article of the Constitution. Article 356 should be used in an extremely non-partisan manner. Otherwise the federal character of the nation will be destroyed and the unity of the country will be in peril.

How can the Bommai case judgment be enforced when there remains a tendency to violate the standards and restrictions laid down by the Supreme Court?

The Bommai judgment is a big impediment to the BJP, to the cause of Hindutva and Hindu Rashtra and to every other brand of communalism. A momentous victory for the forces of secularism, it has now turned the tide definitely against the forces of communalism. The stage is now set for the introduction of an intelligently targeted and tough legislation against the mixing of religion and politics, whether by the state or by any political party. Parliament should now establish credible institutional safeguards to check the abuse of religion in the electoral process. This is the unfinished task, and all secular forces in the country should work, either in Parliament or outside through people's movement, to bring about legislative safeguards to enforce the Bommai judgment.

* Do you not think that the demands from the BJP's allies such as the AIADMK, the Samata Party and the Trinamul Congress for the imposition of President's Rule in some States with elected governments are unconstitutional?

These regional allies of the BJP are parties of opportunists with the least regard for political ethics. There is no constitutional or legal basis for the damand to use Article 356 against State governments led by their rivals. Their demands are based on their party interests and are directed against their political opponents. This is a clear effort to misuse constitutional powers to serve narrow party interests. No government in its senses can agree to such unconstitutional demands.

* Your comment on the visit of the Central fact-finding team to West Bengal.

The sending of central teams to Tamil Nadu, Bihar and West Bengal, which have non-BJP governments, was again politically motivated. Law and order is a State subject and I can say from my experience that this is a part of an unfair process initiated by the Vajpayee Government. The reports of the Central team might be used as a ground for dismissing governments in States with non-BJP governments. It is unfortunate that the minority Vajpayee Government should be toying with the idea of using Article 356 to dismiss governments elected with overwhelming majorities. I told the three-member Central team to study the law and order situation in Uttar Pradesh and report about the clandestine acitivity to construct a temple at Ayodhya.

Is anyone afraid of Article 356 today?

Since this emergency provision has been misused several times in the past, it has lost its credibility and effectiveness. The Left parties are not at all afraid of Article 356 because they know how to deal with it by resorting to organised political movement.

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