The Rediff Special/Arun Shourie

Politicians believe that riding roughshod over the people is their right, that using the State as their private property is a prerogative of office, and that office is their birthright

Earlier this week, Kamal Nath and Buta Singh were discharged in the hawala case, bringing up the number of politicians let off in last year's biggest political scandal to 16.

Was the hawala case conceived by P V Narasimha Rao -- as Buta Singh alleged soon after he was let off -- to checkmate his adversaries? Or was there something to the controversy after all?

In this essay written at the height of the hawalastorm, Arun Shourie examines the issues involved; the questions that will not go away even after the ruckus dies down.

There is so much to watch as ministers resign, as they are trooped to jails and hospitals. First, of course, there are the statements, the explanations: I want to be free to clear my name, say some.... Surely nothing inhibits them from doing so from office, in fact a ministerial office gives them excellent facilities for the purpose; it is an unmerited and unnecessary embarrassment for me 'which only can be set at rest by my action', says another... Some hope!; the charges give me 'an opportunity to put an end to scandal', says a third.

Of the explanations I think nothing measures up to the one Balram Jakhar gave --- that the chargesheet against him had been filed because he had been working for the interests of farmers!

And there is also the drafting, and the calculation. The statements, the letters of resignation, these are not just spontaneous bursts of creativity: The ministers at any rate have known for months that their name is next; each has pondered his move for long, each must have gone over the drafts of his letter of resignation so many times: He is conscious of speaking to posterity, so to say. So there is great effort at eloquence: of course in that department nothing equals the performance of that lout, Kalpnath Rai -- quoting Shakespeare as he was hauled of to jail for harbouring murderers and gangsters.

And then there is the calculation: How many hours must have gone into it! Should I praise the prime minister? How effusive should I be in thanking him? Would that lead him to think that I am down and out, and will he then conclude that as I can do him no harm he might as well disregard me all together; or will praising and thanking him lead him to believe that I continue to be reliable and therefore lead him to give me the ticket notwithstanding the chargesheet?...

Should I express confidence in the judiciary and declare that I have the fullest faith in its impartially --- would that dispose the judiciary to look kindly at me, or would it mean putting all my future in their hands --- after all, what if the magistrate holds against me in the end? What will I say then?

If only they would have devoted a fraction of the earnestness to matters which came up to them as ministers which they are devoting to these little letters and statements, we would not be where we are today.

Nor should we overlook in all the dust what is being said on behalf of the prime minister. On the one hand we are being told, 'The law shall take its course, the prime minister has given complete independence to the CBI to proceed strictly according to evidence.' Indeed, the Congress party is proclaiming this non-interference as proof of the sagacity and commitment of the prime minister to the rule of law. On the other hand the same Congress is passing resolutions hailing the prime minister for his 'initiatives' to clean public life!

But the main image to store in our minds, the one we should burn into our consciousness is the utter helplessness of these ministers etc. Their littleness. I remember well the terror V C Shukla was during the Emergency. Well, it was this Shukla. I remember well what a figure of authority Balram Jakhar cut as he did Rajiv's bidding -- giving his rulings to smother discussion in Parliament. Well, it is the same man we see today contriving explanations. There is a lesson in that for us in each of our capacities.

We must learn to assess a person by his intrinsic worth, and not be taken in by the chair he occupies at the moment. The inanities of these fellows are treated as wisdom, their rulings and decisions are accorded a finality -- the only requirement being that they should be in office. But this is the stuff they are made of.

By according them the importance that we do, that our press does we harm our country no end. We turn their heads --- and that in turn leads them to believe that riding roughshod over the people is their right, that using the State as their private property is but a prerogative of office, and that office is their birthright.

We hold up quite the wrong sort as role models to the people, specially the young in our country. Worse by extolling such pickpockets we demean ourselves, our country. So, please do look at them as they 'twist and turn slowly, hanging in the wind', and internalise those images.

It is even more important for those of us who are civil servants to internalise the image of these fellows defrocked. Why do you obey them just because they happen to sit in a ministerial chair? Is it not true that it is through you that they rationalise their evil? Do you not do so not only when they ask you to do so but just as often anticipating their convenience? How false and self-serving are the rationalisations by which you console yourself when you do their bidding or ensure their convenience?

'But they are the representatives of the people,' you say. 'In a democracy the elected representatives of the people are the masters,' you say. Were these persons elected to do what is now being show up? 'But orderly governance would be impossible if everyone started deciding what is right and what is wrong,' you say. But hasn't orderly governance become impossible precisely because you have made yourself available as instruments to such persons? And the questions assumes that the difference between right and wrong in regard to what they are doing, and getting done through you is razor-thin. But the wrong of it is evident from a thousand miles.

I do hope therefore that professional associations -- of the IAS, of the IPS etc will set the rationalisations they have been using for acting as the minions of these fellows against the truth about them which is on display today.

'But what is the help for those civil servants who are hounded and persecuted because they stand up to these politicians, and then starve?' asked a civil servant as I urged this reconsideration at a discussion the other day. First, I have not known a civil servant to have starved for having stood up. Our's is a free society, there is a lot to be done, there is every opportunity to do a lot even if one is forced out of government service. But the fact is that, while he may be marginalised, a civil servant is seldom driven out of starve on account of the stand he takes. And even this marginalisation comes to pass only because of the same reason -- namely that some among you make themselves available as instruments to these politicians, in this instance not just to enable the politician to cover his tracks but also to do in a colleague.

Where would the politician be if, when he got a civil servant out of a post for the wrong reason, other civil servants refused to man the post? One of our senior-most defence officials was recalling the other day what happened when the British government decided some years ago to dispense with a particular type of fighting craft which the navy thought was necessary; the naval chief resigned, he said; the second man to whom the post was offered refused to join; the post was then offered to the third person, he too refused; it was then offered to the person who was third in seniority, he too refused; the post was offered to the person fourth in seniority, he too refused; the post was offered to the fifth man, he too refused.

The government was driven to a corner. It is only when they assured that they would in effect reverse their decision that the person sixth in the line of seniority agreed to become the chief.

Tell us what you think of this opinion