For the last several weeks, Parliament has followed a rather familiar routine: Both Houses being adjourned within minutes amidst bedlam. Even the Union budget was passed without a discussion. All focus was on the government’s demand for an apology from Rahul Gandhi and the Opposition’s insistence on a JPC into the Adani issue. The result: Yet another washed out session.
At a time when India’s Parliament is in deep crisis, here’s a point to ponder: Both the two architects of the two main parties, the post-Independence Congress and BJP — Jawaharlal Nehru and Atal Bihari Vajpayee — shared a common trait: They were both, above all, passionate parliamentarians and diehard Lok Sabha men. Their parliamentary speeches are enormous compendiums of facts and arguments, deployed with wit and flair. Both Nehru and Vajpayee were parliamentarian-PMs, regularly sitting through Question Hour, facing a volley of questions. In Vajpayee’s case his bureaucrats would complain that it was difficult to get him to come to his prime ministerial office as he kept on sitting in Parliament.
