INSANITY RULES IN GOD'S OWN COUNTRY PLAGUED BY ITS DEVILISH LEGISLATORS

The letter of the law says that a person is innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.  This is the defence that Finance Minister KM Mani and the UDF Ministry has taken in the matter of what has come to be known as the 'Bar Bribery Case'. Strictly speaking at this moment there is no case in the sense that none have been filed on the allegation that Mani took a bribe to help withdraw the restrictions on sale of alcohol. Since no case has yet been filed and the matter is only at the enquiry level Mani is legally correct in refusing to resign from the UDF Ministry.  If ministers have to resign every time someone accuses them of wrongdoing, then we would have to exponentially increase the membership of the legislatures and their floor size so that we have enough MLAs and MPs to play musical chairs and enough space for the chairs!

But there is a catch. Chief Minister Oomen Chandy has conveniently overlooked  this while spouting his legal semantics. In the 'Bar Bribery Case' the allegation against Mani has not been made by a political rival or some unknown person. The accuser is the bribe giver and a leading member of the bar owners' association. This accusation is significant for two reasons. One, it has been made by a bribe giver who is as much culpable as the bribe receiver under the law. Two, it has been made by an office bearer of a trade body that is very dependent upon the largesse of the finance minister and needs to be on his good side. A psychologist would say that the accuser has a suicidal tendency; the common man would surmise that the unprecedented accusation points to the fact that the accuser is both angry and confident and hence there is a large kernel of truth in the charges against the minister.

In such a situation sheltering behind the letter of the law is the cowards' way and reeks of political opportunism. A higher law, the law of moral propriety says different: resign, clear your name, and return.

If Mani had opted for this 3-step programme he would have created an honest precedent. The problem is he is not certain that step three, 'return', is foolproof. In the event Mani returns unscathed by the scandal, there are enough claimants within his party to his ministerial chair that whoever steps in as a temp is likely to claim permanency. There is also another uncertainty: given the slow pace of the judicial process in the country there is every possibility that the Mani case will prolong beyond this ministry's term.

In these circumstances, the Left Democratic Front which constitutes the opposition should have known in its collective wisdom that its demand for Mani's resignation is unachievable. In the absence of wisdom the LDF decided to prevent Mani from presenting the state budget, an even more unachievable target. To make it achievable this meant, short of kidnapping the finance minister, the street was to be brought into the legislature. What followed was bedlam with fists, teeth, claw, and damage to property all brought into play in defence of democracy!

In normal times a finance minister reads out the budget speech, and this can take hours depending upon his inclination to verbosity. The fact of the matter is that the speech is unnecessary because what is required is for him is to table the budget papers in the legislature. Rarely has any finance minister confined himself to this simple act because speech-making is part of the genetic code of a politician. In the street fight situation prevailing in the Kerala legislature Mani was forced to cut short his speech and table the budget papers.

While the LDF's demand for Mani's resignation had a moral content its sanction of rowdy behaviour that would have got an ordinary citizen a plethora of criminal charges and fines is a sign that politics have given way to insanity. Likewise, Chief Minister Oomen Chandy's recourse to legal semantics throughout this affair reveals that he too has irretrievably lost his sense. 

Insanity rules in God's Own Country Plagued by its Devilish Legislators.