The SOVEREIGNTY of a NATION is supreme. The government is merely the elected organ by the people of a nation to run the affairs of the country in accordance with the declared interpretations of the Constitution. Since the Government of the day is responsible to the parliament, the government is and ought to be the best judge to decide on security issues threatening the nation.
The MAOIST issue has been threatening the nation and we find a whole host of areas where the Maoist have rendered desolate thru their action. Yet the Booker Prize winner Arundhati Roy has spoken of the Maoists as “Gandhians”. Arundhati Roy cites the MoUs signed between the various state governments and the commercial corporations, as a devious scheme to deprive the poor of their land by the government. I do agree with her but this devious scheme did not come into existence now. This was brought into the Constitution of India when Article 31 was meddled with, all in the name of providing the poor land out of the massive land holdings of the Zamindars and other royals!!
When the 42nd Amendment to the Constitution of India was brutally pushed through the Parliament, all based on the report of a political party’s committee under the chairmanship of Swaran Singh, most of the seminal articles of the Constitution were amended. WE AS A NATION SLEPT! Janata party came to power, but without the numbers to amend, and since 1976 we are still with most of the Amendments intact. This 42nd amendment was the culmination of the SOCIALISM which was made the flavour of the nation- all in the name of empowering and enriching the poor.
The same amendments which gave the power to the governments to set up DIRECTIVE PRINCIPLES over FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS is what is being used NOW by the political parties to swindle lands from the poor. IT IS NOT THE GOVERNMENT OF THE DAY, BUT THE AMENDED CONSTITUTION which gives the teeth to the government to tread on people’s rights and properties. That has to be RE- AMENDED and Article 31 should be RESTORED in the full spirit with which our LEARNED MEMBERS ( which i cannot vouchsafe about the present members of parliament) of the constituent assembly drafted the Constitution.
Ms. Arundhati Roy is BARKING UP THE WRONG TREE. The security of the NATION cannot be bartered away merely because lands are being taken away by the Governments and handed over to huge Corporations. Those RIGHTS on LAND has to be restored thru RE-AMENDMENTS.
Arundhati Roy calling the Naxal Maoists as Gandhian is ludicrous. How can VIOLENCE be Gandhian at all? And that too on innocent policemen who are merely discharging their duty?
I hope Arundhati Roy gets real and instead of being lop-sided, takes up issues in the right perspective. Even the Supreme Court of India has been very kind in the past and if she doesn’t change, she is likely to lose all sympathy.
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