In his article titled ‘Speakers and Politics’, published in the Harijan on July 17, 1938, Mahatma Gandhi had thoughtfully observed“… [T]he speaker’s position assumes very high importance, greater than that of the Prime Minister”.
Adducing the reasons in defence of what he wrote, Gandhiji outlined the role of a Speaker as a judge to give impartial and just rulings, enforce decorum and laws of courtesy between members, remain calm in the midst of storms and avail opportunities of winning over opponents which no other member of the house could possibly have.
Rahul captures Gandhi’s vision
Eighty-four years later, in his impactful maiden speech delivered in the Lok Sabha as Leader of Opposition, Rahul Gandhi, while completely checkmating the treasury benches including Prime Minister Narendra Modi and a host of his cabinet colleagues, flagged a crucial point concerning the inappropriateness of Om Birla bowing to PM Modi the day he was elected as Speaker of Lok Sabha.
What Rahul did in disapproving Birla’s conduct invokes in retrospect the utterances of Gandhi that “[T]he speaker’s position assumes very high importance, greater than that of the Prime Minister.”
It is quite extraordinary that there is convergence of what Gandhi wrote and what Rahul said in the Lok Sabha with regards to Speaker Om Birla’s gesture of lowering his head before PM Modi. It signalled an impression that Speaker is subservient to the Prime Minister. What Rahul expressed with anguish in a way conveyed the meaning mandated in the constitutional architecture that legislature is not subordinate to the executive.
While a battery of cabinet ministers including PM Modi himself interrupted Rahul on some pretext or other during the course of his speech, he summoned rare courage for seeking forgiveness from Birla to talk about his highly contrasting manner of shaking hands with PM and LOP when both of them escorted him to occupy the exalted Chair of the Speaker.
“When I shook your hand,” Rahul said, “you stood straight…,” and proceeded to sharply remark, “ When Modi ji shook your hand, you bowed down and shook your hand.” When Birla defended what he did by citing culture and tradition which taught him to bow down to the persons elder to him or even to touch their feet, Rahul proceeded to thoughtfully state, “I respect you but I want to tell you that no one is bigger than the Speaker in the House…this is democracy and you are the leader of the House”. “You should not bow down,” he asserted, “in front of anyone…you are the last word in the Lok Sabha…I and the entire opposition are subservient to you.”
Without understanding the import of what Rahul said, or by wilfully disregarding the essence of it, BJP MPs shouted agitatedly in the other corner of the House.
Birla’s conduct lowered legislature’s worth
What Om Birla did in bowing down before PM Modi after getting elected as Speaker, Lok Sabha, is contrary to the Constitution, parliamentary culture and tradition mandating the elevated position of Speaker as someone who represents the House.
The Speaker’s chair is the key component of the legislative organ of the State, which is not subservient to the Prime Minister who represents the head of the executive or the Government. So, by bowing down before Modi, Speaker Birla, was conveying the wrong message that legislature is subservient to the executive.
Rahul’s statement that “….no one is bigger than the Speaker in the House…” is evocative of Mahatma Gandhi’s vision articulated by him in his aforementioned article “Speaker and Politics.”
Nehru on Speaker
India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru said, “The Speaker represents the House. He represents the dignity of the House, the freedom of the House and because the House represents the nation. In a peculiar way, the Speaker becomes the symbol of the nation’s freedom and liberty. Therefore, it is right that that should be an honoured position, a free position and should be occupied always by men of outstanding ability and impartiality.”
So, by bowing down before Modi, Birla outraged the office of the Speaker and its role in representing the freedom of the House and the whole nation. That honoured position should be above the level of the Prime Minister and Rahul is right in telling Om Birla that no one is bigger than the Speaker in the House and he should not bow down in front of anyone.
What was stated by Rahul Gandhi as Leader of the Opposition should have been stated by PM Modi who is the Leader of Lok Sabha. The example set by Rahul in defence of the Lok Sabha Speaker is a step in the direction of safeguarding our Parliament in which, very hearteningly the country is hearing the slogan Jai Samvhidhan (Victory to the Constitution) from the Opposition benches.
The slogan is evocative of people making saving the Constitution an electoral issue during the 18th general elections concluded recently. This convergence of voices of the people and the voices emerging from Parliament augurs well for the future of our country.
S.N. Sahu served as officer on special duty to former President K.R. Narayanan.
