In 2005, crores of people watched 11 MPs taking bribes on their TVs and in a prompt action, Parliament sacked them from the membership of the House. That event was unprecedented in the democratic history of India. Constitution expert Soli Sorabji then said that “nothing is written in our constitution about termination of membership of an MP on the basis of such incidents”. Despite this, both the Houses of Parliament created history by taking unprecedented steps and saved the dignity of Parliament.
In fact, Parliament felt that it was necessary to maintain the credibility of the democratic system. But, the question is that when any media organization will do a sting operation, only then will any such drastic action be taken? Can’t any infrastructural structure be put in place to keep a constant watch on the representatives of the people? Well, it is the responsibility of the operators of our country’s democracy to think this.
Learn about the case in detail?
That story of 2005 started like this. A media organization decided to conduct a sting operation. The name of that campaign was “Operation Duryodhana”. Some MPs were bribed to ask questions in Parliament on behalf of a fake organization of small scale industries. The bribe giving incident was caught on hidden camera. It was later shown on a private TV channel. Then what was there ! There was a sensation in the country.
At that time the speaker of Lok Sabha was Somnath Chatterjee of CPI(M). He directed that the House would inquire into it. The accused MPs will not attend the meetings of the House till the investigation is done. The MPs who came under the sting operation included six from the BJP, three from the BSP, one from the Congress and one from the RJD. Of these, one was a member of the Rajya Sabha and 10 the members of the Lok Sabha. Among them were BJP’s Anna Patil, Suresh Chandel, YG Mahajan, Pradeep Gandhi, Chhatrapal Singh Lodha and Chandra Pratap Singh.
BSP’s NK Kushwaha, Lalchandra and Rajaram Pal. Congress’s Ramsewak Singh and RJD’s Manoj Kumar were there. The action in this matter was taken very fast. In December 2005, the countrymen saw these MPs on TV taking bribe. In the same month, people also saw and read the news that the membership of all 11 MPs had been cancelled. Both the houses of the Parliament passed separate resolutions and canceled his membership. Most of the people appreciated this move of Parliament.
Two good things happened on this occasion from the Manmohan Singh government. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh himself justified the expulsion of tainted members, saying that “nothing is more important in our democracy than maintaining the credibility of Parliament”. The Prime Minister expressed the hope that “some system will soon be put in place regarding political donations, so that we can free our democracy from the stigma of greed, the influence of money and the desire for undue advantage.”
It is another matter that during his entire tenure, Manmohan Singh could not fulfill this promise. Regarding the sting operation, Information and Broadcasting Minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunshi said that the media will not be curbed. In this context, the leader of the main opposition party BJP, LK Advani said that the concerned members have been given bigger punishment than their crime. A petition was filed in the Supreme Court against the dismissal of the MPs. But the Supreme Court did not give any relief.
A political analyst expressed the hope that “this action could prove to be a milestone in the path of rejuvenation of the political class.” But subsequent events proved that even the goodwill of that analyst remained unfulfilled till now. On the other hand, the political class is not ready to take any kind of caution in such matters. Even these 11 MPs did not learn any lesson from the famous Jain hawala scandal.
It is too early to expect that someone will learn in future also. Remember that the famous Jain hawala scandal happened in the nineties. The Jain brothers who used to take huge money from anti-India foreign forces to the terrorists of Kashmir, the same Jain brothers had also given huge amount to 115 big leaders and bureaucrats of this country out of the same money. So that the leaders can be of use to them in the dark times. Some work also came.
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Beneficiaries included a former President of India, two former Prime Ministers, several former Chief Ministers and several former Union Minister level leaders. It was a multi-party scam. 15 big officers including intelligence officers were also included among those who received the money. It was alleged that the money was sent by the Pakistani intelligence agency ISI. The hawala traders took the money in turn to the above mentioned personalities and said that we want to donate you. They gladly accepted.
Haven’t even asked where have you come from, why are you giving us so much money? Remember that being a multi-party scandal, the CBI Didn’t even examine it properly. The then Chief Justice JS Verma also expressed regret during the hearing in the Supreme Court and said that the CBI. Did not even investigate this matter. Remember that 11 MPs did not learn a lesson from the Jain Hawala scandal.
I don’t know how many people are still learning a lesson.
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