Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit Friday acknowledged the need for governments to work in coordination with civil society on matters of social importance.
Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit Friday acknowledged the need for governments to work in coordination with civil society on matters of social importance but said nobody has the right to "over ride" the people's representatives in a democracy.
Dikshit, whose government is often lauded for the 'Bhagidari' initiative of consulting civil society, also said Indian society and its aspirations were too diverse to be represented by any single civil society group.
Enough checks and balances are in place in the system though they may have weakened and may need strengthening or upgrading to meet challenges of the time, She said at a seminar to discuss the civil society's role.
However, she said any change needed, should be done by the elected lawmakers.
"In a democracy, if a set up needs to be changed, it needs to be done by the parliament duly elected by the people. Others have the right to say, but no one has the right to override Parliament, they can though overthrow it every five years," she said.
Contending civil society too has its limitations and no particular group can be representative of aspirations of all the country, she asked, "Can even five lakh representatives in a population of one billion claim to be representing the country or the 500-odd lawmakers who have been directly elected?"
Amidst a debate on a strong Lokpal bill, Dikshit also touched upon her not-very-good experience with the Delhi Lok Ayukta.
"Our experience has been that the Lokayukta felt that he or she must perform and must do something, so they went off the tangent. If they looked for corruption, they couldn't find it. Then they came to the issue that intention was not right," she said.
The Delhi Lok Ayukta had recommended the President censure the Delhi Chief Minister for "misrepresenting" facts by announcing in the run up to 2008 assembly polls that 60,000 low-cost flats were ready.
The Lok Ayukta had also recommended removal of city PWD Minister Raj Kumar Chauhan from the council of ministers for trying to protect a leading resort in a tax evasion case.
"There are differences in what is corruption, what is intention and what is being spread out. Now if an official says he was only trying to help and perform his public duty, what is to be done," she said.
Dikshit said by standard even the BJP, which had promised to build the Ram temple, can be faulted for not fulfilling its election promise.
On the 'bhagidari' (citizen's partnership in governance initiative), she said it has been "very peaceful and very coordinated experiment".
To stress democracy automatically brings a certain degree of accountability into the system, she said a trend has been witnessed in electoral politics that state governments that functioned well have been re-elected, be it Assam, Delhi, Gujarat or Bihar.
"In bureaucracy or in judiciary, a person works for 30 to 35 years, but in democracy the political system keeps changing. The day we are elected, we start thinking about the next election...There are checks and balances. We have institutions and a constitution which is one of the finest but over the years a feeling of comfort or lethargy has crept into them. These need to be strengthened," Dikshit said.
She said the 50-odd parties represented in the parliament are elected by the civil society.
"I agree fund collections need to be made transparent, In fact I would go to the extent of saying that expenditure should be borne by the government," the CM said.
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