The Vice President of India, M. Hamid Ansari has warned against undermining the constitutional intent of scrutiny of legislation. He was speaking after releasing the book ‘This Unquiet Land-Stories from India’s faultline’ written by well-known journalist, Ms. Barkha Dutt, here today. The Vice President referred the author’s comments on the trend of our political discourse today where she opines that parliamentary democracy has slipped into ‘audience democracy’ through television studios and different manifestations of the social media. The Vice President added that Mr. Ramchandra Guha had also written about our democracy being reduced to its electoral aspect only. He said that the pitfalls of both are evident; both manifest a propensity for symbolism, grand standing and shortcuts.
Both undermine the constitutional intent of scrutiny of legislation, of meaningful accountability and discussion on issues of public concern and these temptations should, must, be eschewed, he added. The Vice President said that it is difficult to quarrel with the author’s depiction of our culture being ‘essentially misogynistic’ and with her observation that ‘the life of the average Indian women continues to be a war zone’. The Vice President opined that the ‘faultlines’ identified by the author make distressing and disturbing reading. They portray failures of governance resulting from acts of omission or commission, even of mendacity; they were disruptive of social cohesion and resulted in harming - at times grievously - citizens of India.