The fight between scam vs sham has hit the roof. The most ambitious ‘reforms’ agenda as promised by Modi government looks like a rose tinted picture of a land that does not exist anywhere yet. Reason, the country’s opposition has been continuing to block the government from functioning, by way of stalling the parliament—something and the same thing that BJP did for years when former PM Manmohan Singh government was in control of the country’s fate.
The logjam in the parliament has almost put a huge spoke into government’s plans of furthering the
While the government has completely done a U turn on land acquisition bill, there is more to come in the future. The bill that was amended by the BJP government with nine points that had landed it in the soup, has now returned to the original draft as prepared by the Congress led UPA II.
This has not gone down well with the corporate sector which was waiting for its share of acche din, as promised by Modi to the corporates who were keen on setting up businesses in India. Even the in-house ones, are viewing this U turn as a major setback to their plans of expanding businesses.
With respect to both the bills, there is a delay and hence the dilution in the content. This is worrisome for the corporate sector since any dilution in the bills is bound to cost them time, resources and enormous amounts of financial investment to make things work.
The land bill that could have made it easier for the government to acquire lands and give it away for industrial and development purposes, is now a fairy tale that has been laid to rest. The amateurishness of the government in this is showing, and how! Much to the dismay of the people who vested their faith in it, Modi’s government is somehow crumbling the cookie.
The government which enjoys the majority of only 31% people who voted it to power, did not pay attention to the fact that it had to take opposition into confidence to make things work. Analysts say this is costing the government very dear, in terms of agendas and bills being stalled and sessions in parliament being disrupted.
The monsoon session is turning the government into a desperate situation where the political impasse is hurting very badly. The promise of restoring momentum seems like a far cry, what with the government not treading the right path with the reforms agenda.
The opposition too, is referring the disruption back to BJP where the latter did the same with UPA II. The chickens have come home to roost and it is hurting the overall image of the government very badly. Opposition says this was something they learnt from the party that is in power now. Having said that, Congress’ ways and means of disrupting the session aren’t well appreciated either. Doing it for the heck of it, may not be the right way to echo people’s emotions.
For its side, Congress felt people need to have a say in land acquisition process and hence, they took the fight to the streets and were greeted with great enthusiasm. This was the comeback moment for the party that suffered a serious drubbing last year.
But, disrupting the parliament over issues that have no serious political implications is doing injustice to the people of India. For the monsoon session, though the BJP had also come prepared with some serious allegations against states where Congress was in power, the session has turned into a huge blame game that sees no respite at the end of it.
People who voted for acche din, weren’t staggering numbers. The beauty of democracy is unraveling in the parliament. And this is not presenting a pretty picture at all.
Some concrete steps have to be initiated to break the impasse and get the monsoon session to deliver some goods to the people of this nation. After all, people cannot move from non-functionality to the days when nothing gets done because of corruption or ulterior motives.
Image credit: Indiatimes