There was no Assembly; there was anarchy, only anarchy

Subhas Chandra Pattanayak

Air is a must for the people to live. Food is a must for the people to live. Water is a must for the people to live. Society is a must for the people to live.

But Assembly is not a must for the people to live, if viewed from the angle of Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik. This is where, anyone who loves the Country that Baji Raut’s blood had contributed to create, cries in pain.

In the preceding post I have shown how he was instigating his party MLAs to create commotions in the well of the House so that Opposition demand for debates on chit fund stays stymied.

Shameful, yet vivid details of how on the first day of the session, the treasury benches engineered the ruckus and resultant adjournment by deliberate use of a loudmouth minister Pradeep Maharathy in harassing a lady MLA of BJP with sexual slangs, has come out in newspapers and TV channels, some of which even have their natal links with some of the close colleagues of the Chief Minister.

Maharathy’s monkey business was engineered when the chit fund felony was sure to be discussed, as the Speaker had with him the Opposition’s adjournment notice and the collateral call attention notice from the treasury side on the subject, against a background that was crying for the debate.

Scenario that cried out for debate

The scanning of the Chief Minister’s shadow Saroj Sahu by CBI, and the unveiling of the Chief Minister as the godfather of chit fund cheat Prasant Dash of SeaShore, and metamorphosis of a pack of the CM’s close colleagues to the status of under-trial prisoners for their roles in chit fund deals, and increasing suspicion that the chit fund crooks were mere frontmen of the Chief Minister et cetera had built up strong justification for the Assembly to take up the debate on chit fund in supersession of all other businesses. But, instead of leading the House to this necessary debate, the Leader of the House – the Chief Minister himself – instigated his sycophants to put the Assembly in strangulation till death of the session, to evade the debate on chit fund.

Why the Assembly?

In a democracy, the Government is required to convene the Assembly to place before the representatives of the people the details of its programs for betterment of the people, and to seek collective wisdom of the representatives of the people on issues affecting the State, and to explain its accounts to the representatives of the people for knowledge and approval of the people, and to report its actions taken on lacunae located by CAG and other authorized bodies so that the representatives of the people can approve or advise as they deem proper, and to answer the questions raised by the representatives of the people on various facets of administration, and to refine its Law Drafts with the legislative wisdom of the Opposition to help the people with Acts and Rules that they may use for better management of their affairs, and to obtain permission of the representatives of the people to spend for implementation of the ongoing and proposed programs from the State exchequer and funds generated.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has blatantly failed in this duty to democracy as the aborted session of Orissa Assembly has so emphatically shown. Legislative responsibility stayed subservient to arrogance of power, as the Leader of Opposition has observed.

Unseen Mischief

This arrogance comes from the massive majority he has captured by confusing the people, by naming all welfare programs of the Government by the name of his father matching the name of the party he heads and begs votes for.

Effect of inanition

For the voters, who constitute the massive majority of the population, it was impossible to understand this mischief; because, continuous slow starvation had pushed them into such a shocking state of inanition, that, comparing manifestos, analyzing political economies, locating class characters, keeping composure and casting votes for class interest was not possible for them.

That they have lost their vigor and intelligence to understand the intricacies of election and necessity of preferring the correct candidate is proved by the very fact that they have been digesting the ignominy of thriving in slow starvation with the almost entirely subsidized rice supplied to them at the rate of Rs.1 only per kg.

And, when majority of voters are in such a state of inanition, it was not difficult for the candidates of the ruling party with bulging purses and rains of promise, to flow in into the Assembly with overwhelming strength exactly as filthy water flows in into the river systems with destructive strength during a flood.

Result is that, the Assembly session could be aborted midway without working normally for even a day, with the Chief Minister escaping accountability.

As we saw, there was no Assembly; there was only government ignited anarchy.

At the end, an Oriya Axiom

The scenario portends a severe end; because, every anarchy ends severely.

It would be better for the Chief Minister’s sycophants, who dazzle under the pretentious feeling that their strength is never to wane, to pause, peruse and understand an Oriya axiom that suggests how severe their end shall be. Here it is:

ADHAMA BITTA BADHE BAHUTA, GALAA BELE JAE MULA SAHITA

(Achievement may reach the highest stage through illegal ways, but ends with total extinguishment.)

Their cult father Biju had experienced the correctness of this axiom.

The sycophants may do better in seeing the perfectness of this axiom in their supremo’s loss of courage to face the Opposition in the Assembly. Abrupt end of the Assembly session is indicative of beginning of the end of this strength-blind Government.

People need a Chief Minister, not a Scourge

And, if they want to save their government, it should be better for them to make Naveen Patnaik understand that in him, the State expects a Chief Minister, not a scourge.

Biju, by whose name the BJD is known, after occupying the Chief Minister post with unprecedented strength in 1961, had become such a scourge that we, then the youth and students of this State, had built up the strongest ever campaign to save our motherland from his selfish and corrupt grip. History has recorded this reality.

Even his Party – Indian National Congress – was sure that his stay in power would be a disaster for the people. Therefore, he was shunted out of Office under the pretense of Kamaraj Plan. Despite that, as he continued to act super Chief Minister from the podium of the State Planning Board, we, the student and youth of Orissa, had to rise in revolt to see him ousted from every position of power. His then supporters in the Congress party had tried to save him from the CBI inquiry and qualifying penal prosecution; and, it is well known to the history that, the people of Orissa had punished the Congress Party mercilessly in the election of 1967 for the sin of supporting Biju.

The Naveen sycophants should read this history and amend their steps, if they want to survive in power.

In Naveen Patnaik, the people need their leader, not a godfather of chit fund operators. In him the people need their benefactor, not a comprador. In him the people need an enhancer of the dignity of the Assembly, not its destroyer. The sycophants should tell him of this, in their own interest also.

To him, let it be said, that, for the people, the Assembly is never discardable, but is always desirable.

And, the people shall never stay away for ever from establishing that, they are the sovereign, and the Republic belongs to them.

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