Disregarding Parliament

Synopsis: 

Parliamentary Standing committees must not be hijacked by politics. They are an integral part of the Indian Parliamentary system and perform an enormous amount of good work. 

Background:

• The head of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Information Technology has written a letter to the Speaker of the Lok Sabha. 
• He urged him to take action against officials of the Union government who refused to appear before the committee.  

What’s the issue?

• The committee was required to examine a number of issues, including the allegations of phone tampering and tapping associated with the Israeli Pegasus software.
• The officials from three Union ministries (electronics and information technology, communications, and home affairs) had been summoned for the same. However, all of them declared at the last minute that they would not be able to attend.
• These refusals arrived within a few minutes of each other and showed a coordinated refusal by the summoned officials. Hence, officials should be duly punished for breaching their responsibilities.

Indian Scenario Versus Global Scenario:

• In most other democracies, surveillance and other intelligence operations by the executive branch are held in check only by in-camera supervision by a subset of legislators from all parties. This is a system that works well. 
• There is no formal structure for such supervision in India. There is a structure that expects, if the relevant committee asks for information, it must be either provided or the relevant official must provide explanations for secrecy in person.

Impact of Coordinated Refusals:

• It undermines the functioning of Parliamentary standing committees and enables the executive to escape from accountability. 
• It is a violation of Parliamentary privilege and an attack on Constitutional foundations.