O J's Corner : Reflections

Criminalised politicians or
politicised criminals ?

I have been an admirer of the vibrancy of Indian democracy. Soviet Union was as diverse as India with a plethora of languages, cultures and religions. Now we know that the Soviet Union was held together by the steel hand of Stalinism.

The moment Mikhail Gorbachev followed up perestroika and glasnost, people began breathing fresh air of freedom. Then there was no going back. The people had won when the Stalinist State had lost. When a lot of intellectuals throw stones against Gorbachev for “causing the disintegration” of Soviet Union, I salute him for providing freedom for a mass of humanity. I consider him as the saviour of Soviet people.

By eulogising Gorbachev, this is not an attempt at denigrating Communism, but praising him for providing an opportunity for the Communist Party to work in a multi-party set-up. Let it exist in Russia, China, India, America and elsewhere among other parties. Let it not be a one-party monolith.

The point is the Soviet Union had crumbled, whereas India with similar multiplicity of languages, people, culture and religion holds forth as one entity. It has its strengths and weaknesses. Its people, most of them uneducated, are wise enough to boot out the no-good governments from time to time.

But that is the only thing they can do. They cannot root out corruption in public life, let alone do anything against criminalisation of politics, even though they express their strong resentment at the hustings.

Democracy has been spick and span in the country so far, but a large number of politicians don’t mind committing , condoning, abetting and suppressing criminal acts. Conversely, criminals infiltrate the political spectrum to get away with their wrong-doings.

The killing of Pramod Mahajan by his brother, the cocaine acts of his son Rahul Mahajan and the dope death of his secretary Vivek Moitra cannot be considered as mere family tragedy.

Was it not criminalisation relating to some aspects of the lives of these people that ended up in this tragedy? Dubious sources hold sway over politicians and they wield power, with someone holding the reins from behind the curtains.

Manu Sharma, son of Congress Minister Vinod Sharma, was seen shooting Jessica Lal. He, however, managed to get acquitted.

There were cogent pieces of evidence against Vikas Yadav, son of former Rajya Sabha MP, in the Nitish Kataria murder case. But he has escaped conviction.

Amarmani Tripathi, Samajwadi Party Minister in the Mulayam Singh Yadav Government, has not been convicted for murdering his girl-friend Madhumita Shukla.

There are umpteen instances of escape of criminalised politicians or politicised criminals.

Sanjay Singh and Amita Modi went scot-free in the Syed Modi murder case.

Sanjay Singh’s present wife Amita was the wife of Syed Modi when the badminton champion was shot dead in public. Sanjay Singh was former Janata Dal Minister. Now he is a Congressman. Amita is BJP’s MLA.

Criminals have crept into realms of money, power, caste and culture. The process is capable of eroding the democratic edifice, which the 100-crore mass of imageless people have kept strong and safe.