(Pawan Khera is a political analyst with the Congress party.)Amidst all the heat and dust on the roads of Bangalore and Chennai and the din in television studios caused by the verdict by a court in Karnataka on J Jayalalithaa, one needs to also thank the one man who made this possible. It was Rahul Gandhi who intervened to ensure that the Supreme Court's judgment striking down a provision in the electoral law that shielded elected representatives from immediate disqualification prevailed. His critics will perhaps now realize the far reaching impact his intervention has had on probity in public life.
Apart from being convicted for disproportionate assets, the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister should also be charged with stealing the Modi thunder. On a day an entire machinery was working overtime to ensure that not one breath of Narendra Modi went uncelebrated, the historic judgment of a court in Karnataka disrupted the smooth coverage of Narendra Modi in America.
There is a loud message in the Court order not just for corrupt politicians but also for cult followers - don't just worship your leaders, make them accountable. The distasteful bhakti on the streets of Bangalore and Tamil Nadu shows the underbelly of the patron-client relationship our leaders have with their followers.
After several decades, Tamil Nadu will breathe without either Karunanidhi or Jayalalithaa. It is time for the second line of leadership to use this opportunity and emerge from the shadows of their cult mentors. For a long time now, single-leader regional parties have disrupted clear mandates and kept central governments on tenterhooks rendering democracy at the mercy of horse traders and power brokers.
There are no mechanisms within these parties to question the Supremo. In such whimsically governed states, every institution gets co-opted in mutually beneficial networks of inter-dependence. In the event of a case sneaking to either an agency or a court outside the state, it becomes a handy tool for the central government to tame the leader.
The Supreme Court had to intervene when the AIADMK government, upon coming to power got testimonies of witnesses changed and derailed the case which was near completion. The case was transferred to Karnataka, like it was done in the encounter cases involving Amit Shah, where cases were transferred to Maharashtra from Gujarat.
It is pertinent here to question the 99th amendment of the Constitution replacing the collegium system with a system which indirectly empowers the political executive to appoint and promote judges. Independence of judiciary is under a tremendous threat of getting undermined.
The independence of judiciary needs to be safeguarded especially when the country is being methodically blinded into worshipping a leader.
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