HVK Archives: Neither law, nor propriety
Neither law, nor propriety - The Observer
Dina Nath Mishra
()
23 January 1997
Title : Neither law, nor propriety
Author : Dina Nath Mishra
Publication : The Observer
Date : January 23, 1997
Is the end of Laloo Prasad's loot raj in sight? I don't think so.
Deve Gowda's government is structurally too weak to handle a mafia
leader like Laloo Prasad. It is not a question of only the fodder
seam in which Rs 960 crore were neatly pocketed by the
conspirators' network, headed by none else than Laloo Prasad Yadav
himself. There are a dozen more seams covering the whole contour
of the state government, unearthed by various agencies and
opposition parties. Some of the opposition politicians shared the
booty or Were deliberately made part of the network for obvious
reasons.
The net result is that the Bihar nightmare continues. What is, the
response of the Gowda government? This government has been
operating as a shield to protect the likes of P V Narasimha Rao and
Laloo Prasad Yadav. It is the judiciary that has come to help the
crusaders against various sets of political and other mafia.
It is no use expecting pressure from the Left Front to halt this,
for the same communist parties were the main forces in perpetuating
Laloo's regime during the last six and a half years. They have been
his drum beaters throughout. Remember the rallies at Gandhi Maidan
in Patna where the Left leaders, including Jyoti Basu, lined up to
annoint Laloo Prasad as the messiah of social justice. The loot raj
was there even in those days. Our Leftist friends were aware of
it. But they continued to perform aarti of this 'messiah'. Even
after the full exposure of the fodder seam, their drums did not
stop, but only muffled. It is only when Laloo Prasad came to be
hated as much as Narasimha Rao, Leftists tried to distance
themselves. At the state level, their protest against Laloo Prasad
was just mild and oblique. At the Central level, the Left leaders
did not do even that. Therefore, it is superfluous to expect
pressure from them in the UF to get rid of him.
Prime Minister Deve Gowda is not quite friendly with the Bihar
chief minister. On the contrary, he would like to see him out at
the earliest. But the problem is that he fears Laloo Prasad as a
ferocious enemy. A situation may develop where the exit of Laloo
Prasad Yadav may overlap with the demise of the UF government. In
fact, this fear haunts every UF partner, for, Laloo Prasad may go
to any extent. That explains the numerous delaying tactics of the
CBI in the High Court and the Supreme Court. Of late, the strategy
of Laloo Prasad has been to terrorise all concerned. Media was in
the forefront of the exposure. Laloo Prasad abused the media
persons in the most vulgar language.
The Laloo brigade was out to terrorise journalists. Such was the
terror that journalists had to opt for protest marches and dharnas.
His next target was the High Court, and naturally so. It is
monitoring the fodder seam investigation by the CBI. It may be
remembered that this is the same High Court which. had recommended
a CBI enquiry in a PIL case, which was doggedly resisted by Laloo
Prasad Yadav for years. The state government has gone to the
Supreme Court against the High Court order, but lost. As per the
Supreme Court directive, the High Court started monitoring the
investigation.
The CBI director tried his level best to slow down the
investigation, but the bench consisting of Justice S N Jha and
Justice S J Mukhopadhyay saw through the game and ensured that the
investigation was not derailed. Naturally, the judiciary -
particularly these two judges became eyesores for Laloo Prasad.
The chief minister used the forum of the legislative assembly to
mount an attack on the judiciary by wrongly interpreting one of the
orders.
The third target of his onslaught was the CBI investigation team,
particularly its joint director U N Biswas, in charge of the
investigation. First, he tried to buy off the individual members
of the CBI team. He succeeded only with two officers, but not U N
Biswas and others. Having failed in other ways, Laloo Prasad used
terror tactics, apart from tongue-lashing.
He dubbed Biswas a conspirator and a BJP agent. So much so that
Biswas was in danger, and he had to be provided a security guard,
only after Laloo was persuaded by Deve Gowda not to overstep his
limits. But he had far exceeded them.
The fourth target of his tactics was the opposition, mainly the
BJP. The opposition leader in Bihar assembly, Sushil Kumar Modi of
the BJP, has been relentlessly exposing the fodder scam for years.
The Laloo-brigade tried to assault him a number of times in the
premises of the assembly itself. 1 have no doubt that the next
target of his terror tactics would be the UF leaders at the Centre.
In fact his menacing verbal onslaught has already surfaced twice
during the last 10 days.
What is that which Laloo Prasad wants to achieve? Simple; he wants
to continue as the chief minister, and to achieve that he wants the
chargesheet to be delayed indefinitely. Even if he is
chargesheeted, he wants to continue as the chief minister. He has
even said that he would rule Bihar from the jail.
His arguments are the finest examples of excellent absurdity. He
asks: Why should he resign? He says, "the CBI has not elected me."
Can one beat this? When questioned regarding his recommendations
on the files which could prove his major involvement in the fodder
seam figured during the CBI interrogation, response was that he
signed the files brought by his secretaries without reading them!
The Constitution of India does not put a bar on an illiterate to be
the chief minister or the prime minister. Incidentally, Laloo
Prasad holds a master's degree and also a degree in law.
When S R Bommai's name figured in Jain diary, Laloo demanded the
former's resignation from the JD presidentship, even though Bommai
was not chargesheeted.
Now, he is the JD president and says that he will not resign even
after CBI chargesheets him. When the fodder seam was exposed, he
summarily dismissed scores of officers without following
procedures. Having been involved in the very same seam, he wants
to stick to power even after being chargesheeted.
One may recall that Motilal Vohra and P Shiv Shankar resigned as
governors the moment they realised that they were going to be
chargesheeted. Sharad Yadav was not taken in the cabinet as he was
involved in the hawala case.
If the CBI investigation finds a prima facie case against Laloo
Yadav and chargesheets him, he has to go. The governor of Bihar
will have to act. Meanwhile, Laloo Prasad is contemplating the
dissolution of assembly so that he may continue as caretaker chief
minister, and will have the power to select the candidates. He may
try to use extreme methods to rig elections and somehow manage a
majority to prove that people have exonerated him. It may not
happen, but if it happens it would touch a new low in our
democratic morality.
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