This refers to the editorial "Empowering the voter" (October 3). In a knee-jerk reaction to the Supreme Court (SC) ruling on convicted serving politicians, political parties had got together more than once to find a parliamentary antidote. The Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP), too, showed considerable initiative to a remedial Bill, only to find its weak knees, subsequently. In the face of this volte-face by the BJP, which hardly has any allies to please, Rahul Gandhi as the Congress vice-president had little recourse but to keep his party away from an ostensibly executive decision by the Cabinet. The Prime Minister has to run a coalition government and hence had to go for it alone, keeping in view the position adopted by the allies, on an annulling ordinance.
It would perhaps appear that the Congress is attempting to hunt with the hounds and run with the hares. The stark reality is that the SC is destined to fight a lonely battle for key electoral reforms and the nation ought to heave a sigh of relief that if no one else, then at least the judiciary has taken up arms on its behalf.
R Narayanan Ghaziabad
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