OPINION

In August 2012, three reports submitted by then Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG)VinodRaion the allocation of coal blocks, functioning of the Delhi airport and allocation of additional coal blocks to Reliance Power had drawnimmediate and sharp criticism from then government. The counter was coordinated from the Prime Minister’s Office. The Minister of State in the PMO, V Narayanswamy, was quick to state that the CAG was not following its constitutional mandate, rather over-stepping it by questioning government policy.
In view of the recent judgment in the 2G spectrum allocation scam acquitting senior DMK leaders A Raja and M Kanimozhi of any wrong doing has once again brought the focus back on the functioning of the constitutional body.
The 2012 CAG reports raised the debate over the mandate of the CAG especially since its leaked reports opened Pandora’s Box, leading to filing of criminal cases against serving Ministers. Originally, public audit was rule-based and was concerned with probity and compliance alone.

Two phase Nepal elections were held on 26 November and 07 December, respectively. Nepal’s federal structure consists of two houses, House of Representatives (HoR) Lower House, and National Assembly (N A) Upper House. Unlike India, the two houses have near equal powers. 

The current results clearly show a lead by the two Communist parties who came together to have an alliance. They have collectively won 174 seats out of 275 which is a majority of 63%.  The Communist Party of Nepal (United Marxist- Leninist) has won 80 seats in the first past the post (FPTP) method and with a 33.25% vote share getting an additional 41 seats in the proportional representation (PR) system to make a grand tally of 121 seats and becoming the single largest party.

Their alliance partner Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist- Centre) has won 36 seats in the FPTP method but a vote share of only 13.66% to get another 17 seats in the PR method to tally at 53 seats. The Nepali Congress (NC), seen as a pro-India party, has come second although they have won just 23 seats in the FPTP method but have a huge vote share of 32.78% which is roughly half a percent less than the vote share the winner Marxist- Leninist thus have got 40 seats in the PR method and stand second with 63 seats.

Gujarat Assembly elections results 2017 have been interpreted by a number of political analysts in different ways. Some of them may be taken here as examples to understand the electoral outcome there. In the beginning, one opinion led by the Congress and some section of media termed it (a) revival of Congress party and the maturing up of its president, Rahul Gandhi and (b) a related argument that it’s a moral victory of the Congress and a technical/numerical victory of the BJP. On closer examination, these arguments do well to booster the morale of Congress workers and the party, if they were confined only to the Congress brass.

Rahul Gandhi, in the backdrop of his continuous electoral failures one after the other can be justified to draw satisfaction in this defeat in an attempt to win approval of his leadership within his party and outside with the opposition led mainly by the regional satraps. But one fails to appreciate the idea of a moral win over the BJP especially when one faces the fact of 49.1 percent electorate reposing faith in the ruling party and give it a majority in the Assembly to form the government again even when there was a ferocious use of caste and creed by the Congress.

The bitterly fought state assembly elections are over with BJP firmly in the saddle, both at Himachal and also Gujarat. The brute majority margins of victory that one witnessedsome time ago have declined; the number of seats in Gujarat has gone down, from 115 to the current 99, a cause of worry.

In Himachal too one expected with near similar conditions and charges of corruption, a result with brute majority like Uttarakhand.  Today Uttarakhand has 57 out of 70 that is81% BJP legislators; Congress was nearly reduced to single figures but managed 11. The BJP in Himachal has won 44 seats out of 68 which is 64%, thus this too is a worrisome factor. There are other issues like vote share etc that needs analysis but the major take away is that the Congress is on the revival rather than a “Congress Mukth Bharat”.

The next take away is in a democracy a healthy opposition is mandatory and the Indian democracy gets more vibrant with this result. How will this play out for more state elections which are due in Mizoram, Tripura, Nagaland, and Meghalaya and of course Karnataka,is the big question.

It was not a simple election. Around two months that I spent working on the ground in Gujarat, I always felt the that the soul of AamAadmi Party (AAP) has come to lodge itself in the body of Congress. The entire campaign of Congress in Gujarat was deluged with lies, divisive politics and undeliverable promises made by the Congress and her three crutches of caste cowboys – HAJ (Hardik Patel, AlpeshThakore and JigneshMewani).

 Our suspicion of AAP’s soul in Congress’ body first came from lies and baseless allegations made by HAJ. This was confirmed by two incidents – firstly, the shocking satisfaction expressed by HAJ on unconstitutional and unachievable promises of Congress on quota and secondly, AAP’s absence in the election campaign? Until a few months before AAP was challenging Prime Minister NarendraModi for election in his home state but as the elections came close they surrendered.

For records AAP contested on 29 seats but I could not see even a single popular leader of AAP visiting Gujarat during elections. Even AAP’s Gujarat ConvenorGopalRai was not seen there. Nobody knows where all of them disappeared suddenly? Was this done on the directions of Congress? AAP is considered a media friendly party but hardly any AAP candidate got media coverage in this elections. Who was managing all this?