PM can't be under Lokpal
Judiciary doesn't like the RTI                     
Babus can't be touched                                 
The rest will wear Rupa baniyan to jump the queue
We just love...."The Rule of Exemptions"

Why is the centre so adamant at keeping the prime minister and several other functionaries of the government, judiciary and bureaucracy out of the purview of the proposed corruption watchdog?

The key question at the heart of the raging debate over the Lokpal Bill also forms the theme of the June 16-30 issue of our fortnightly magazine, Governance Now.

Perhaps it is not surprising that the stalemate over the Lokpal Bill between the members of civil society and the centre continued even after their eighth meeting on Monday. It has to do with the Rule of Exemptions that governs us. To give you a sneak peek into the cover story of the June 16-30, here is the introduction to the package:

The government wants to exempt the prime minister, judiciary, MPs and lower bureaucracy from the Lokpal bill. And considering that we are not even considering bringing big business into its purview, it will effectively mean that the Lokpal will extirpate corruption from the country by catching and putting away pickpockets.

What is this tendency that prompts us to make a law with 300 clauses and bring it crashing down in one insignificant sub-clause that exempts somebody or the other or gives discretion to some people? Why do we allow that sub-clause, that one little asterisk to turn every potent law into a sterile piece of legislation? Why do we Indians, specially our leaders, want to be exempt from everything? Why then do we make laws?

Of course, exemptions are not something only our leaders seek and get. When, as ordinary citizens we are denied exemptions, we try to arrogate them by derived power of attorney: my uncle’s son’s friend’s golf partner is the police commissioner, you know... We want exemption from standing in queue for the ration card, movie ticket and research the lineage of the Regional Passport Officer even before we download the passport form. And, of course, the ultimate exemption: a free pass to the cricket match or to the concert. It’s almost like the day begins over the morning cuppa by drawing up a list of all the exemptions we want for the rest of the day.

- Editor

The government wants to exempt the PM, MPs, judiciary and lower-rung of bureaucracy from the Lokpal Bill. That’s several thousand folks who run our country.

Awesome.

Now that they escape the corruption net, we can sleep at night in peace knowing that corruption has been destroyed and Baba Ramdev can have his din-din again.

I want the bloody bank to give an exemption to my sister who has multiple sclerosis and cannot get up from bed, sign her name or show mobility but they won’t give it and her thumb-print has to be verified each time she needs money. We had to hire an ambulance to take her to the post office to get her money from her postal deposits in her name. This is in New Delhi after begging the post office to give her the money into her pension account to avoid the hassle.

Not so awesome. 

So the government and I both play India’s favourite sport after cricket: exemptions.

The point is that the government will get its exemptions, even the MPs and MLAs who have criminal records will get a safety net, but you and I and the great unwashed will not. For us it is the rule book and the piety of protocol and babu inspired procedures, huge gasps of horror that we want to navigate the rules not for greed or pelf or plunder but to make life logical.

Land at Delhi airport, old son. There is a sign of the times there. It says MPs and MLAs need not do security.

Say what?

Then there is a special line for bureaucrats and foreign service types  — like the fragile little creeps cannot stand with the ones they are supposed to serve, like at 0200 hours they are rushing to the PM’s house for an emergency meeting to save the nation, like they will be sullied if they touch the billion natives crawling in abject apology for going to another country.

What are they doing, Mommy?

They are using their clout, darling, to get that 46 inch Sony Bravia flat screen in without paying customs.

Why don’t they pay it, Mommy?

Because they are exempted, my pet, you are too young to understand.

Since we are a nation that equates exemptions with prestige and power and privilege only the VIPs have the right.

Consequently, even the watchdogs of the fourth estate want exemption from sartorial elegance. They will attend a formal dinner badly dressed because they are exempt. Other idiots will wear black suits with ties. Our lot will wear crumpled bush shirts and chappals, because, don’t you know, we are exempt… pass the scotch, please.

Film stars will ignore paying their taxes because they are too high up in the firmament. The taxman will cometh for Mr Sethi, Mr Sachdeva and Mr Katyal in 43/6 D, Rajouri Garden (where the washing hangs to dry on the 36 inch rust pocked balcony) for defaulting on their property registration but some twit in politics can salt away billions and he won’t get his comeuppance till his power base has collapsed. Exempted, you know. 
Bureaucrats, celebs, the whole caboodle want exemptions from the rules, whatever those rules are, please exempt us because you must know who we are, we are important Indians, not run of the mill Indians.

Take this Lokpal Bill issue. Hundreds of rules and clauses and codicils, years of legal hard work sculpting something that might slow down the wicked and then that one little human asterisk. Exempt the following…

Why? Because they are special, being special is now well on its way to becoming an art form in India. The group right at the top of the command totem pole, instead of being the spearhead for a movement they all claim to espouse, wants protection against it. Whatisthatallabout?

What are they afraid of… have they done something wrong, uh oh, it will be used against them, so hey, what if it is used against me, sweetheart, doesn’t that count?

No, it doesn’t. I don’t get the traffic stopped when I whizz to work…

Stop grinning, neither do you.

So, I thought to myself, the other morning, what if I was one of these people who want to be an uncommon citizen of India and spend a day exempting myself from everything?

Like, sorry, you cannot pat me down, I am a senior diplomat, no airport security, take me through the VIP area, please, like you would Mr Dhoni, after all he didn’t discover penicillin but he can hit a ball. 

My car is exempt from paying the octroi or the toll tax and you see that sign on the windshield… dikhta nahin hain, andha hain kya, chalo driver.
Migoodness, have to get my driving licence renewed, let me just call the CM’s office, the PA to the PS to her executive secretary was in school with me and his brother is DIG Traffic… what, you expect me to go to the Transport Bhavan, are you, nuts, arre, I got my passport in two days, no police clearance-vearance.

Just a moment, flying to Washington for the government on a fact-finding mission, call the MD of Air India, see I get upgraded and who’ll receive me at VIP lounge? 

Like I say we are one big duty-free shop. We don’t want to pay the price the other guy is paying even if we finally legislated something in the greater good.

Dude, it is for you, not for me, I am a big man.

Excuse me, sir, how come you are sauntering through the green channel with five suitcases and a huge Playstation and two cops escorting you when this poor ass of a labourer from the Gulf is getting dicked for a mattress?

Hiss hiss, that is chief secretary, sar.

I don’t give a rat’s backside if he is the Queen of Sheba, why can’t he stand in line and pay his customs duty?

Of course I am exempted from passing a traffic red light, I am connected, did I cause an accident, really, not my fault.

Will not stand in a queue. For a ration card, a PAN card, a bill payment. I’m exempted.

Sorry, cannot wear a helmet, exempted category.

An international Twenty20, give me three passes, I am Somebody.

A R Rahman concert, make sure my four seats are good, pass le lena, nahin toh woh permission rok dena.

You get the drift. These people want to be exempted from every queue, every rule, every diktat, even the law, because that sort of stuff is for other people, not for the likes of them. 

And while you might agree with me the tragic part is we want to be like them.

PS: Dammit! Why didn’t I ask for exemption from writing this article? After all, I’m a senior journalist. Alternatively, you could have been exempted from reading this, too, but if you have reached thus far, the exemption would be pointless.

This appeared in the Jun16-30 issue of the Governance Now magazine (Vol. 02, Issue 10).

Get your copy today. Call Md. Neyaz at 8860901537 or Rajshekhar Chakrabarty at 9873739266.