Press Statement by LF

Press Statement

The leaders of the Left parties – Communist Party of India (Marxist),
Communist Party of India, All India Forward Bloc and Revolutionary Socialist
Party – met on July 23, 2008. They have issued the following statement:

On Trust Vote

The Manmohan Singh government has won the vote of confidence in the Lok
Sabha but the entire country has witnessed how parliamentary democracy has
been subverted. Reports of bribery, intimidation and horse-trading have
been proved true by the cross-voting and abstentions engineered by the
Congress and the Samajwadi Party. It is by such means that they got a
majority. In this connection, the tape submitted by a television channel
about a bribery episode should be made public.

The Congress leadership is mistaken if it considers this vote as one that
has provided legitimacy to the government. The moral authority of the
government has been compromised. The debate in the Lok Sabha has shown up
the sharp division on the nuclear deal. This is no mandate for going ahead
with the deal.

The Left parties will continue the struggle against the Indo-US nuclear
deal. They will step up their opposition to the anti-people policies of the
Congress-led government and strive to build the widest movement against the
failure of the government to tackle price rise, the problems of the farmers
and the rural poor due to the agrarian crisis. The Left parties will join
hands with other like-minded parties to take up these issues.

The Left parties decided to extend their full support to the call of the
Central trade unions for a general strike on August 20, 2008. They appealed
to all sections of the working people to participate and join the strike.

Sd/-

Prakash Karat A.B. Bardhan
General Secretary, CPI(M) General Secretary, CPI

Debabrata Biswas T.J. Chandrachoodan
General Secretary, AIFB General Secretary, RSP

‘Bribed’ MPs safe if they vote’

Supreme Court Verdict In JMM Case Gives Immunity To Those Taking Money

Manoj Mitta | TNN

New Delhi: If horse-trading is going on in the run-up to the confidence vote, as alleged by the Left, then it is only the bribe givers who are at the risk of being hauled up for corruption. Thanks to the Supreme Court verdict in the JMM bribery case 10 years ago, the bribe taking MPs enjoy constitutional immunity so that their freedom to vote in the Lok Sabha as they like is not impaired.

All that MPs will have to bear in mind is that when they take bribes to bail out the government or even to vote against it, they should ensure that they actually cast their vote. For, according to the controversial judgment delivered by Justice S B Bharucha, it is the action of casting the vote that will save them from criminal liability. Such is the expansive interpretation given to Article 105(2) of the Constitution, which says that no MP shall be liable to any court proceedings in respect of “anything said or any vote given by him in Parliament.”

To be fair to it, the apex court was “acutely conscious of the seriousness of the offence” that the alleged bribe takers were said to have committed in the JMM bribery case to help the Narasimha Rao government defeat a no-confidence motion in 1993.

“If true, they bartered a most solemn trust committed to them by those they represented,” Justice Bharucha said, “By reason of the lucre that they received, they enabled a government to survive. Even so, they are entitled to the protection that the Constitution plainly affords them. Our sense of indignation should not lead us the construe the Constitution narrowly, impairing the guarantee to effective parliamentary participation and debate.”

Manmohan Singh Government Wins Confidence Vote

The Manmohan Singh government, at the end of the day,
won the confidence vote with a small but convincing
margin. It was 275 against 256 with 10 abstentions.

But the way three BJP MPs displayed bundles of
currency notes, amounting to Rs. 10 million, allegedly
given to them as the first/advance instalment,
supposedly received sometime last evening, of a
promised bribe of Rs. 90 million, in the late
afternoon before the Speaker in the house was
undoubtedly one of the darkest moments of
parliamentary democracy in India.
While the leaders of the ruling coalition and many
independent observers raised serious doubts about the
allegation and the theatrical way it was presented,
the opposition, cutting across ideological divides,
came down heavily on the Manmohan Singh government for
resorting to grossly unethical practices to win the
confidence vote.

The debates today were repeatedly interrupted. The
house had to be adjourned a number of times.
So much so that the Prime Minister was unable to read
out his concluding reply. He had to submit the copy of
his written speech to the Speaker.
He has reportedly made stinging attack against L K
Advani, the leader of the Opposition and also Praksh
Karat, the CPIM leader, without naming him.

The way the political equation stands radically
restructured with all the bitterness generated amongst
those who had been allies till the other day may bring
in spinechilling consequences in the days to come,
after the next general election in particular.
At least one young Muslim MP – from Andhra Pradesh
(Asaduddin Owaisi of the MIM) gave full vent to his
apprehensions and castigated the Left in pretty strong
terms. And another from Jammu and Kashmir (Omar
Abdullah of the National Conference) also spoke
forcefully in a somewhat similar vein.

UPDATE – 23rd July 2008

TRITIO POKHKHO UPDATES
23rd July

NEWS

1. Chavez says Venezuela needs Russia for protection
2. Heat and light: Venezuelan light bulbs
3. Rise in TB Is Linked to Loans From I.M.F.
4. Indo-US Nuclear Deal
5. Manmohan Singh Government Wins Confidence Vote
6. Russian military “considering stationing bombers on Cuba”

http://www.orkut.co.in/CommMsgs.aspx?cmm=49435580&tid=5223567598130556620&na=3&nst=21&nid=49435580-5223567598130556620-5225056903810248396

READING PARLIAMENTARY DEMOCRACY

Bills Pending -
(i)The Constitution (One Hundred and Third Amendment) Bill
(ii)The National Commission for Minorities (Repeal)

http://www.orkut.co.in/CommMsgs.aspx?cmm=49435580&tid=5225769937100861132&start=1

STUDY CIRCLE

Gone, and Being Forgotten – Why are some of the greatest thinkers being expelled from their disciplines?
10 Most popular misconceptions about the nuclear deal!
Introduction to Dialectical Materialism – Ch 1

http://www.orkut.co.in/CommMsgs.aspx?cmm=49435580&tid=5223238023815098060