Immoral Use of Party Power

Calling the Swatantra Party names is no answer to the challenge of that party. The conscience of the Congress Party is aware of its present rotten inside. The Congress today has become a parasite of the Government. Its influence and its pomp rest entirely on State power and State finance. It has lost all moral authority. When autonomy came to the provinces in 1937 and also when Independence was conceded by Britain in 1947, the Congress gave strength and moral power to Government. But today all that the Congress does is to suck power from the vast official organization of the State, both at the Centre and in the States. It gives nothing, but takes everything. The Welfare State structure has become a rich mine for this exploitation.

     The members of the Congress Party wield official influence without sharing in the responsibility of the officials. When a crisis brews, the official is thrown to the wolves and the party man is secure from attack or investigation. The voluntary contribution that the Congress Party gets today would astonish the dead patriots who paid or collected money for the Congress in 1920. The methods and means, too, are poles apart from those employed in the old days. The Congress was the beloved of the poor in those days and was respected by the wealthy and the powerful. Now it is the terror and the detestation of everyone that has anything to lose and has a stake in the welfare of the country.

     How long can the character of officials hold when the political party that governs and gives orders has gone rotten? They remained good for a considerable time but there is a limit to staying power under evil conditions. They, too, have lost the public respect that they had once enjoyed.

     The socialism through which Mr. Jawaharlal Nehru seeks to produce national welfare is the sucking up of all national resources by the State and the entrustment of spending it on production work to officials. These have to exercise their functions under the interested supervision of party men and subject to their'palace' influence. This, over and above their own incompetence and want of interest in the fruits of their exertion. In the best of circumstances, production is ill done through officials replacing the personal interest that encourages and produces in private effort.

     In the rotten atmosphere of the present Congress Party, under whose baneful influence all officials have to work, it is no wonder that public money goes greatly to waste in the country.

     The Swatantra Party seeks to stop, or at least reduce, this great waste. When newspapers give support to the new party, the Prime Minister seeks to find strange explanations and calls the party names. He has stated that I have attacked him personally. I should like to know a single instance of this. I have the highest regard and affection for him. What I do not like are his policies in internal affairs. When the whole country went against him over China, I maintained that China's misconduct should not be laid on his shoulders and that it was a pure case of betrayal of him by the leaders of China whom he had trusted, and no fault on his part.

     He thinks that under the control and management of his officials, production will go up and will be better than under private ownership. I think this is an erroneous belief as applied to this country and that it will emasculate the nation and spread corruption, besides causing loss in vital types of production. He thinks he is helping the poor. I think he is causing the drying up of capital and thereby increasing unemployment among the poor. He thinks he is making people industrious and patriotic. I think he is making them more and more lazy, money-minded and poor in spirit, more and more afraid of the Government and Government officials, and more and more disgusted with them, instead of feeling that the Government is their own and an organization to protect them.

     With due deference to the P.M's expressed opinion, I maintain that the value of the new party is worth the trouble and annoyance involved in building it up. It may save democracy for India.

     It may be that I often use rather strong language in describing the conditions prevailing under the domination of the Congress Party. It is the expression of my soul's revulsion at the improper and immoral use of party power and the manner and degree in which the opportunities afforded by the 'welfare' State are exploited by party bosses for the advantage of the party and of oneself and one's suta magadha bandins at all levels, things that would be revolting to the conscience of the Father of the Nation whose picture adorns the walls of the Congress and government offices.