Samikhsya Bureau
Institutional handicaps under certain governments are not a new thing. It does happen under any dispensation. And during a process of electioneering, skirmishes either verbal or physical are nothing new. But this time around the happening have dipped to new lows when top leaders are being kept under the lens of suspicion which leads to frisking of the transports, be it a four-wheeler of chopper are brought under the process of physical scrutiny.
A few recent incidents in Odisha have kicked-off a kind of controversy over the intolerance demonstrated by leaders while being subjected to scrutiny.
Very recently an IAS, Mohammed Mohsin was put under suspension for leading a team of security personnel of the Election Commission for frisking the convoy of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s choppers in Sambalpur.
Notwithstanding the guidelines for the protocol under which the PM’s transport, heavily guarded by the SPG, as the rules laid down, while on an election campaign, even the officers on the ground must take the prior permission of the Election Commission for any such eventuality when the need arises for such a scrutiny of the convoy of the Prime Minister or the President. Which perhaps Mohsin was not equipped with.
However, going by the Blue Book , the book is specific in its stipulations about vehicles whereas there is no mention of choppers or aeroplanes etc. It is a pertinent point that can not be overlooked.
But, plainly speaking in a democracy as vibrant as in India, any leader who is out in the field as a campaigner, then he or she must not come under any preferential treatment. If the convoy or chopper of chief minister of a state during campaign can be frisked then why not the Prime Minister, is a question that normally lurks in any citizen’s mind.
This is a state of predicament before the Election Commission . When it has to be selectively vigilant. For instance when there is a clear directive from the Commission not to incorporate any security related issue like either Pulwama or Balakot for electioneering purposes, then how come Narendra Modi in many of his speeches refer to his government’s military action in Balakot or other achievements like anti-Missile fire etc and the EC is muted on such issues coming under the Model Code of Conduct.
The anger demonstrated by the union minister Dharmendra Pradhan when on April 16 his chopper was frisked by the EC team, perhaps, does not behove to his stature. Whereas, the day next the chopper of Naveen Patnaik was subjected to similar scrutiny by the EC team without any hassle. Same was the case with the chopper of Karnataka chief minister S.D. Kumaraswamy but it went on smooth.
The moot question is about the growing intolerance among politicians, who claim to be the servants of the people, when they are brought at par with the common men, as if they are a specie of different esteem. But listening to their speeches it largely sounds in defence of the people at the bottom. But that is not so when in practice it happens to them.
It can’t go well, that we still go on with the continuance of a set of rules of British era which must be amended. The question-begging politicians can no more remain under the cloud of vagueness.
