In a recent government programme an honourable member of the NLA had stated that the regional party NPF would continue till the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. Indeed a very strong statement probably fuelled by the recent events in one of the most tumultuous tenures of the state legislative assembly. Another of his honourable colleague also stated that the former chief minister was forced to resign by violent mobs though he still enjoyed the support of the legislators. The audacity of the legislators rallying behind the former chief minister is understandable. The continued misadventures of the cabinet and a weak leader in the chair actually led to the forced removal of the chief minister himself. Weak because the former chief minister seemed indecisive when the people wanted answers from him as the chief minister of the state directly. Strong leaders are ready to take up responsibility as his position demands and not pass the buck to his legislators.
Unless the protocol have been changed for the state, the cabinet is there to advise and assist the chief minister or in the case of the union government the prime minister. The cabinet does not dictate the leader of house in every decision making; a leader of the house is not a puppet of his cabinet and his legislators nor of the party. There is a level of autonomy that the leader of the house enjoys and so a person who enjoys the confidence of the legislators and the party with qualities to hold such a position is elected as the leader of the house. There is no alternative and any other system that is applied for the sake of convenience is bound to fail. An example can be the case of the former Prime Minister who is an economist, a gentleman and had a clean image was alleged to be excessively manipulated by the legislators and the party that resulted in one of the highest financial scams in the country. The former chief minister actually lost the confidence of his cabinet when it rejected his agreement signed with JCC and the church leaders as the witness on January 30.
The utterances by the current set of legislators indicate that in the years since statehood the present set of elected leaders may have reached the intellectual nadir in the history of the NLA. The inability to differentiate the law versus their collective decisions usually done with the rule of the majority is blatant. Such cases were normally thought to be a problem that exists only in the village setup. So as correctly stated, the former chief minister have been made the scapegoat, but it may have been for the arrogance of the legislators in trying to implement their majority decision. Majority decisions are not always right, sometimes it is unethical and illegal too. Our lawmakers are supposed to know better. Moreover, the legislators represent their constituents and not their self which is respected if internal party democracy exists.
In such a scenario, as stated by the legislators the regional cock party might survive till the second coming of Christ in various avatars as seen through the years, but can it come for the fourth time in 2018. Can such display of arrogance by the legislators either patronising its own electorates or making veiled threats to the people vote them back to power? With such provocations the people might finally do away with the convenience of money during elections as was seen in the recently cancelled ULBs elections. With their eyes instead set on the Second Coming of Christ the ruling alliance seems to have forgotten about its fourth coming in the state elections.
