Electoral/Constitutional reforms I would like to see

After looking at the past few elections and also looking at the way the govt is run, these are a few of the electoral/constitutional reforms which I believe would help in trying to improve the political situation of the country. It is quite a huge list, but i do hope somebody reads through this.

- Make it mandatory to vote in elections. In the world’s largest democracy, it is pathetic to see that more than half the eligible people to vote do not vote and this after repeated efforts and pleas to make them vote. My idea is to make it into some fundamental duty which every citizen of India should fulfill.

- Have the option to reject all the candidates from the constituency in the EVM only. It being a secret ballot why should I let others know that I am not going to vote for anyone else.And going by the precedence even this time not many of the presiding officers in the polling station knew of what to do in case a person decides to reject all the candidates

- Have some system to make that negative vote count. Not sure how, but may be something like if the candidate gets negative votes amounting to more than 1/n th of the total votes polled, where n is the total number of candidates in the fray, then he/she cannot be elected.

- Some measure to reduce the number of independent candidates. Right now there are constituencies where nearly 70 odd independent candidates stand for election. I don’t know how many of them get more than 10 votes. Also reducing the number of independents also will lead to reduction in the cost of printing the extra ballot sheets and EVMs

- Try to hold union and state elections together. I feel that it will lead to a major savings in the cost of holding the elections

- In cases where a person gets elected from one party, then resigns soon after, joins another party, then the expenses for conducting the elections have to be taken from that person only. After all, he was the reason for having this extra election and we are not a rich country anyways. The same holds for people elected to state assemblies standing for parliamentary elections and winning and for the people who stand from more than one constituency and win more than one. It is not being conducted to show off your strength. And if you think the elections are a show of strength, then pay for showing off your strength.

- A fixed term for parliament will help, I believe. At least that way we know the people who we have elected have 5 years to do something.

- A way to question our elected representatives. Pardon me if this is already there in our constitution, but I need to have the right to question my elected representative about what he has done in that year or not done. Something like the General Body Meeting where we get to know what the person is doing. Or at least make sure that they release an activity report every year or twice every year.

- Make it mandatory for the prime minister to be an elected MP of the Lok Sabha and not Rajya Sabha. I am not having anything against any particular party, but my train of logic is this way. Every one believes that Lok Sabha election is the only election where they elect someone to represent them. Now a Prime Minister who is the leader of the country has to be someone who is elected by the people directly. Whatever the constitution says we all know that Rajya Sabha election is no way an election where the people's representatives are elected. If a party is sure that they will be elected to power, then I don't think they have any reason not to field their prime minister candidate from one of the constituencies. After all if he/she is good enough to lead the country, then the people will elect him/her.

- Some way of curbing the influence of the regional parties in the national politics. Now I know this is easier said than done. But the reason for me putting this here is what we have seen in the recent past. Too many regional parties are holding the national govt captive in order to achieve some of their regional issues/rivalries or whatever settled. Some way to curb this is the need. What can be done? Say have something like the regional parties are free to contest the state elections on their own, but if they are having candidates for the national elections, then they need to align themselves with one of the two/three main parties. And they need to do it before the elections and have to stay with them for the entire term of the parliament. The penalty may be something severe like de-recognizing the parties who fail to adhere to this or shift allegiance to another front. This way at least they do not have the power to threaten the government that they would withdraw support if they do not do some damn A, B or C

After mentioning all these things let me question myself too... Which individual or the party has the balls to get these reforms passed? I am sorry to say that though one or two of them might try to implement a few of them, not all of these will be implemented. And of course, I sincerely do not believe the congress-led present govt has neither the will power nor the interest in implementing it.

Arbit - 1

Things u need to make a mega serials( in short saas-bahu type)
- A “highly gifted” script writer. Not easy to find one, but they say that if you find someone who thinks he can write and get him high, he can become a “extremely gifted” script writer
- A protagonist, better if it is a female one cause all u want to do is give all the trouble in the world to her, and a female protagonist shedding the glycerinated tears in the story is more suitable to earn the viewership of your target segment-the female of the house and thus makes sure that u earn back the money u spent on bottles of glycerin
- A vamp. It is better if this is also a female, but now a days they are trying out by having some male vamps also (vampires??)
- A big family, where no one knows how they are connected to the other, but make sure that everybody knows that they are in some business, though no one knows what business they are in.
- Try and put in dialogues talking of deals amounting to some 300 crores – 500 crores every 5 minutes though none of the actors/actresses talking the dialogue will know how many zeroes are there in that much of amount
- Something happening to the protagonists other half (not sure that they are better), so that more bottles of glycerin can be used. Then she finding another “other-half” and so on and so forth.

What does CBI stand for?

Is CBI Central Bureau of Interrogation or Congress Bureau of Interrogation? I am sorry to say it, but it is looking more and more like the latter. Do you want more proof?

Well lets look into the case of CBI vs Mulayam Singh Yadav.

March 2007 – A case of disproportionate assets was registered against Mr Yadav on the directions of Supreme Court based on a PIL filed by a lawyer.

October 2007 – CBI reports that it has completed the preliminary investigation and has found “sufficient material” to implicate Mr Yadav.

July 22, 2008 – Mind you till now Mulayam Singh is against the UPA govt in the center. Now in the wake of the left front taking back its outside support to the government and the government moving into minority consequently, Mr Yadav decides to support the government from outside. So he is on the side of the government now.

November 8, 2008 – The law ministry sends a file to the solicitor general asking his opinion on the case. SG reports back telling that Mr Yadav has his assets within his income limit and the govt must consider withdrawing the case. Legally the Solicitor General doesn’t give legal advice to Govt of India. It is the attorney Generals work.

November 17, 2008 – The union law minster signed off on the case writing “I agree with the legal opinion of the learned Solicitor General. The Department of Personnel may withdraw the IA pending in the Supreme Court.” CBI decides to withdraw the case and this U-turn even surprises the apex court which asks CBI to explain its conduct.

February 2009 – The relation between SP and Congress starts to turn sour. There were comments made by Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav and some other SP leaders against congress leadership. Congress and SP goes into a war of words.

March 31, 2009 – This was the latest hearing of the case and in this CBI informs the supreme court that it still stands by the “recommendations” made in the status report filed in October 2007, implicating Mr Yadav.

So this was an amazing double U-turn by the premier investigating agency and surprisingly the implication and withdrawal of case was consistent with whether Mr Yadav was on the side of govt or against it.

It is also amusing that in July 2008, the CBI suddenly files an affidavit against Ms Mayawati, the arch-rival of Mulayam Singh, in a disproportionate assets case which was on the backburner for the past 5 years and says that it has enough evidence to prosecute Ms Mayawati.

And also now the case of withdrawing the case against Mr. Quattrocchi in the Bofors deal.

CBI in 1999 names Mr Q as the conduit in the case and includes his name in the chargesheet. It also manages to get a red corner notice against Mr Q.
In June 2003, Interpol finds two bank accounts in the name of Mr Q and Mrs Q, containing 3 million Euros and $ 1 millon and says that it is a “curiously large savings for a salaried executive”. The CBI gets the account frozen, so that the money cannot be withdrawn from it.

In January 2006, the central law ministry suddenly decides to defreeze the above mentioned accounts and on January 16th, the entire amount was withdrawn from the bank by Mr Q.

February 2007, Mr Q is held in Argentina based on the red corner notice by Interpol. CBI does not even inform this news to the public in India and only announces it after the report comes in the media regarding this in March 2007. CBI bungles in its efforts to get Mr Q extradited and loses its case to get him extradited in June 2007, with the judge remarking "India did not even present proper legal documents". Embarrassingly, India was also asked to pay Q’s legal expenses.
Mr Q’s son who grew up with Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi visits India frequently, works in a company called Club Invest – Europe and has an office in Bangalore. When his father was arrested in Argentina, he was present in India and left India a day before CBI made the news public.

October 2008- Mr Q’s counsel files a protest against CBI asking it about the legal validity of the Red Corner Notice (RCN). CBI passes on the file to the law ministry and on the same day it is sent to the Attorney General for his opinion. The AG gives his opinion the next day.

“The whole purpose of a warrant of arrest is to secure presence of the accused,” said the AG. “This is possible by extradition when the accused is abroad. But two attempts have failed and the judgements indicate that there are no good grounds for extradition. The warrant cannot remain in force forever. Therefore, the warrant dated February 1997 would lose its validity, particularly in view of the successive failed attempts of the CBI to extradite the accused in Malaysia and recently in Argentina,” the AG said.

April 2009 - The law ministry tells that there is no use in continuing the case and the CBI asks for the withdrawal of the RCN and dropping of charges against Mr Q.

Yes, it does look as if all the things are done as per law. But the whole thing becomes murky because of the involvement of the law ministry of a govt which is in its last date and also the point that the govt is headed by the close friend of the accused against whom the charges are dropped.

That is what makes me wonder. What does CBI actually stand for?