The success of a parliamentary democracy depends on a number of factors. The most important of them is the performance of the elected representatives of the people. In a vibrant democracy, the debate over public issues in the legislatures should take centre-stage. In the Indian context, the quality of debate, whether in the two Houses of Parliament or in the State legislatures, has been steadily declining as parties tend to field candidates to sit in these bodies more from socio-politically empowered groups than from a cross section of society. This has resulted in a skewed sense of perspective so far as public good is concerned. Ample proof of it can be had from the recurrent logjams in the Houses. The passing of important Bills runs into a roadblock, debate over important public issues get suspended and crores of public money is wasted as members engage themselves more in physical than mental exercise. Indian politicians, by and large, are more prone to wielding power than delivering public service. Recent reports on the Centre’s worry about a huge amount of money allotted under the Member of Parliament’s Local Area Development Fund (MPLAD) would simply buttress such misgivings. That the Union Government has woken up to the situation just in the pre-election year makes the situation even more curious since the guidelines on the MPLAD spending lay down its disbursement within a year of the allocation for the projects. Reports suggest that quite a substantial part of the allocation under the MPLAD during the 14th and the 15th Lok Sabha is yet to be spent and the utilisation certificates received. More than 200 MPLAD accounts of the 14th Lok Sabha and some 318 accounts of the 15th Lok Sabha are yet to be closed. It simply suggests that implementation of those schemes are still under way. The fact that most of the unspent fund related to the BJP-ruled States makes the cynicism of the dominant ruling dispensation even more poignant. Uttar Pradesh, helmed by Yogi Adityanath, reportedly heads the list of defaulting States. It is saddled with an unutilised fund of Rs 692 crore, followed by yet another BJP-ruled State Maharashtra where the MPs appeared to have been clueless as to how to spend the money. Bihar, where Nitish Kumar heads the National democratic Alliance (NDA) government, has not either covered itself with glory as it has not been able to draw on a fund amounting to Rs 340 crore. West Bengal where the largest body of the MPs belong to the ruling Trinamool Congress has some Rs 250 crore in the pending account. The idea of creating the MPLAD was to empower the people’s representatives to stay tuned to the local needs of their constituencies as plans and programmes of the government departments did not always meet those requirements due to either procedural problems or, let us admit, bureaucratic apathy. That is how we have witnessed bus waiting sheds being built, roads widened, streets illuminated, public conveniences created, schools repaired and given a coat of paint, libraries acquiring new buildings and books, playgrounds upgraded, and even gyms making their appearances in semi-urban areas, courtesy the MPLAD. Our people need, nay, deserve these facilities in larger numbers. Their representatives must not fail them.
