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E-mailThe cozy relationship between the various hues and colours of politicians in India goes on unbridled. It is rather increasing as politicians have opted not to hurt each other’s vested interests while hurling accusations and abuses on the rivals in the public, for sheer public consumption. The recent controversy in the Election Commission of India is nothing but a part of murky body politic. The facts are startling.
Arun Jaitley, the suave powered face of the BJP is leading the campaign against Navin Chawla, an election commissioner. The same Jaitley was instrumental in getting the coveted post of Secretary to Government of India, Minister of Information & Broadcasting, for Chawla during the NDA rule. He took briefs on behalf of his friend Chawla to Maneka Gandhi, the then Information & Broadcasting Minister. Everyone was aware of the extreme bias of Chawla for the Congress but the sharp bureaucrat had powerful links in the BJP.
Earlier, he was empanelled as Secretary to the Government of India during the NDA rule. Mr. N. Gopalaswami, the Chief Election Commissioner was a member of the committee, as Home Secretary, headed by the Cabinet Secretary, which had cleared the name of Chawla for empanelling as Secretary to Government of India.
Interestingly, Chawla, who had been indicted by the Shah Commission (looking into the misuse of office and power during the dark days of Emergency), never hid his extreme preference for the Congress though a public servant (bureaucrat) is supposed to be an impartial one and above the party politics. Is it not a phoney war to befool the gullible public?
Another interesting political development is that Mr. Arun Jaitley has been offered a ‘bail-out’ in the ensuing Lok Sabha elections by his highly placed and well entrenched friends in the Congress. 
For the first time in his political career, he will enter into a fray. This time, he will be the BJP candidate from New Delhi Lok Sabha constituency, at present represented by Ajay Maken, a junior minister in the UPA Government. Maken, having a sound grassroot base, will be shifted to Chandni Chowk Lok Sabha constituency.
He could be a formidable foe for Jailey. Kapil Sibal, another minister, representing the Chandni Chowk, will be shifted to New Delhi constituency while Ajay Maken will swap the position with Sibal. Thus a weak candidate will be fielded by the Congress, making Jailey to romp home to the victory in the ensuing elections.
RSS 
This is the fate of this country.
It is the Congress party’s habit to pick and retain all the tainted people in its fold and in its governance.
At the time of the Emergency of 1975-77, Navin Chawla was private secretary to the lieutenant governor of Delhi [Images], Kishan Chand (who later committed suicide unable to bear the ’humiliation’ following the adverse finding about him in the Shah Commission’s report). According to Justice Shah, Chawla, along with his cohorts in the police at the time, ’exercised enormous powers during the emergency because they had easy access to the then prime minister’s house. Their approach to the problems of the period relating to the citizens was authoritarian and callous. They grossly misused their position and abused their powers in cynical disregard of the welfare of the citizens, and in the process rendered themselves unfit to hold any public office which demands an attitude of fair play and consideration for others. In their relish for power, they completely subverted the normal channels of command and administrative procedures.’
Chawla was also found to have exercised ’extra-statutory control in jail matters’, including ’the treatment of detenues’. Not confining himself to dictating to his boss as to the persons to be arrested, he also prescribed how they were to be treated in prison. For instance, he was for constructing special cells with asbestos roofs to ’bake’ certain prisoners. Kishan Chand pathetically admitted to Justice Shah that he was not a free agent and Chawla used to receive instructions directly from Sanjay Gandhi and he (Kishan Chand) came into the picture only to the extent that he was required to fulfill some technical formalities.
Distinguished bureaucrat L.P. Sahi was the head of the three-member High Power Committee to advise follow up action. The committee had no doubt that the shocking material contained in the Shah Commission’s report indeed made Chawla unfit to hold any public office and that he deserved to be summarily dismissed from service without any further inquiry or proceedings, invoking the special powers under provisos (b) and (c) of Article 311 of the Constitution. This precisely was the fate Chawla would have met with but for the fall of the Janata Party government and return of Indira Gandhi [Images] to power resulting in the restoration to coveted posts with a vengeance of all those indicted by Justice Shah.
Appointing a person with such a background to the Election Commission which is the fountainhead of all other institutions of democracy was itself a brazen defiance of norms of accountability and decencies of public life. This is quite apart from the allegations of bounties received from the Congress government in Rajasthan and a number of Congress MPs.by the Jaipur-based Lala Chaman Lal Education Trust established by Chawla and his wife, and the unsavoury speculation engendered by the government of Italy [Images] conferring on him the Mazzini award in March 2005 ’in recognition of his efforts to forge a new relationship with Italy and strengthening existing bonds’.
No hard punches exchanged only shadow boxing practised.
For democracy to cleanse systems and have institutions with sound creditability in place, it is essential that opposing parties do not collaborate on issues in order to protect each others petty interests.
The issue is not Navin Chawala or N Gopalaswami but the impartial functioning of the Election Commission that must conduct the crucial parliamentary election in a few months time.
No individual or political party should be allowed to undermine the mandate that the people are preparing to deliver.