Amidst allegations of an alleged assassination attempt on Gurpatwant Singh Panun, a US citizen and a Khalistan protagonist, the US Ambassador to India Eric Garcetti told a news agency, “that is a basic issue of sovereignty…that’s just an unacceptable red line”. That is what India precisely needs to tell the US after it repeatedly commented on Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kerjiwal’s arrest for his alleged involvement in a liquor scam.
India is undoubtedly the largest and most successful democracy in the world. Never in 77 years, since the democratic process of electing the governments started, has the transition of power been in any way problematic. The incumbent regime, if and whenever it has lost, has made an easy and smooth way for the successor.
Even the United States of America, cannot claim such distinction anymore after the January 6, 2021, Capitol Building incidents, which were a blatant defiance of the 2020 General Election verdict.
That a “third world” country with 1.4 billion people is successfully flourishing as a democracy does not seem to be tolerable to the ‘all-powerful’ establishments of the West, be it America or Europe. And there have been and always will be continuous efforts to discredit India’s democracy, by picking up isolated incidents and blowing these out of proportion and even questioning the legal, lawful and logical processes of law. These “powers” also try to exploit the political faultlines within the country to propagate their agenda.
This has precisely happened after the arrest of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for his alleged involvement in the Delhi Liquor Scam. There appears to be a greater game in this. Quite intriguingly the United States, Canada and Germany have commented on Kejriwal’s arrest.
The government of India has rightfully objected to these comments. What is more intriguing is the silence of the opposition parties, particularly the “principal opposition party”, as the Congress describes itself over these comments. Also, why these countries questioned only Kejriwal’s arrest and not anyone else’s is intriguing.
Ideally, the Congress as well as all political parties should also have objected to such comments from foreign countries, since these raise a question mark on the country's judicial system. They should have stood by the government on this. By maintaining silence over the comments by foreign countries, the opposition parties have done no good to their credibility.
But that is because of the level of extreme political polarization prevailing in the country right now. Understandably, it will always be like the ruling establishment to be cornered and criticized from whatever quarters.
When foreign countries make such remarks or comments, these are aimed to discredit the country as a whole not just the particular political dispensation that is in power at that point in time. Such redlines must not be allowed to be crossed. This is unacceptable.
The opposition will do well not to discredit the country’s democracy and electoral process, just because it has not been able to win two General Elections consecutively. At least it must not be seen as wanting to defend the credibility of the institutions, which have evolved over the last seventy years.
The Congress’ problem is understandable. It has been out of power for ten years. This is the longest period ever in the history of independent India and the party has remained out of power that long. It does not see any hope to be back in power shortly as well.
So the easiest way is to discredit the process and the institutions by questioning the competence and impartiality of the Election Commission of India and even go to the extent of suggesting that the courts are being pressurized. Besides, attributing the BJP’s victory to the manipulation of the Electronic Voting Machines.
The Conservative Party in the United Kingdom has been in power since 2010 having won three General Elections consecutively. But the opposition Labour Party never questioned or discredited the electoral process in that country.
Even back home in India, the BJP lost two consecutive General Elections, but it never complained about the “manipulation” of the Electronic Voting Machines, nor did it ever blame the Election Commission for being partisan.
It could easily have leveled allegations against Manohar Singh Gill who was the Chief Election Commissioner when the Congress won elections. He was made a Rajya Sabha MP and also a union minister during the Congress regime headed by Dr Manmohan Singh.
The parties will do better not to blame their failures on someone else, not at least the constitutional institutions like the Election Commission of India, which the opposition parties have already started doing, with Rahul Gandhi alleging that the elections were being fixed like cricket matches.
Such vague and baseless allegations only provide an alibi to the foreign powers to cross the proverbial “red line”, which they must not be allowed to.
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