Parliament Street

The Prime Minister is reported to be upset at the way the Opposition rendered the last session of Parliament infructuous. The Union Budget was passed without much debate""a rare event in an otherwise high-decibel forum.

In the process, relations between Manmohan Singh and the Opposition have reached rock-bottom. Singh has been introduced to the treacherous cut-and-thrust of competitive politics and the Opposition has been treated like a bunch of truant school boys. So what does one make of all this?

Freedom fighter Bipin Chandra Pal once famously described the Congress as a debating society that served no useful purpose. Almost a century later, MPs appear to have reached the same conclusion about Parliament.

The just-completed Budget session proves beyond doubt that MPs regard Parliament as surrogate for the street, where political battles must be fought with all the drama of a brawl between two competing groups of thugs. Until 1991, they would take the government on at (and around) the Boat Club outside Parliament.

This was done via bandhs, morchas, processions, and marches that would hold up traffic. They would also take on the police who were there to enforce Section 144 of the CrPC. Now they have shifted the venue inside Parliament.

The public has thus been spared a huge inconvenience, for which it is thankful, but in fact the gain is illusory. Earlier, its time used to be wasted. Now its money is also being wasted""at the rate of nearly Rs 100 crore a day.

The decline in political standards started with Indira Gandhi, who did not have much use for Parliament anyway. From 1971, when she won the general elections by a landslide, her contempt for it increased with each passing session.

By mid-1975, she had reduced it to not just a debating society but also a mute one at that. Only two sorts of speeches were witnessed""those that were non-critical or those that were laudatory. Even these had to be in a low voice.

Nevertheless, the form was observed. Everyone went through the motions and this token genuflection became the norm for the next two decades. India fooled itself that its Parliament worked.

Since 2001, however, when the Tehelka-George Fernandes scandal surfaced, that comforting belief has been whittled away. Thanks to the presence of TV cameras, MPs now use the House to convey their positions.

The only difference is that instead of doing so through speeches, they do it through walkouts, shouting matches and mob-like conduct in the House. This is, after all, much safer than having to defy prohibitory orders and face water cannons from the riot police.

In the end, it is only the public that can make the MPs behave. Until that happens, we can only gnash our teeth in silence. Or switch off our TVs.