On trial for sedition in 1922, Mahatama Gandhi told a court in Ahmadabad, Gujrat: I have no desire whatsoever to conceal from this court that to preach sedition towards the existing system of government has become a passion with me. Sedition in law is a deliberate crime, he admitted, but it appears to me to be the highest duty of a citizen.
Under the circumstances that prevail in Pakistan today, nothing could be more appropriate. We have a government that has lost all legal and moral relevance in the wake of its repeated affront to the dictates of the constitution and its efforts directed at, on the one hand, concealing its countless misdemeanours and, on the other, perpetuating and institutionalising the scourge of corruption. Worst of all, it demands that the people of the country continue paying for its insatiable lust for more graft! How else would one describe its plans unfurled with regard to imposing a 10% flood surcharge for six months and a (Reformed) General Sales Tax at a uniform rate of 15% encompassing export-oriented sectors of textiles, surgical goods, leather, sports goods and carpets. It also envisages abolition of exemptions on tractors and fertilisers. Sectors that are currently paying less than 15% GST, sugar for example, will also be hit by the enhanced rate meaning that people would have to pay still more for the commodity.
The proposal is faulty in its genesis. Its unjustness and inequity rest in it having exempted the agriculture sector from any burden. Against all persuasion, the incumbent coalition has refused to bring the largest segment within the ruling clique under the net of taxation, thus further damaging its credibility and stamping its intentions to continue rewarding itself and its cronies as the ordinary people pant to survive the rigours of additional taxation. Also exempted are the sectors of stock exchange and the real estate that are manned by influential mafias within the ruling elite and the parliament. This blitz also comes in the wake of widely circulated reports with regard to virtually no taxes that the political leaders of this country pay and an unprecedented hike in the prices of the basic commodities over the last few months typically exemplified by the machinations of the sugar mafia that has such powerful hold over the relevant echelons of government in the capital.
The manner in which the opposition and some elements within the ruling coalition have reacted to the proposed legislation is encouraging, but it remains to be seen whether they are able to effectively thwart the governments efforts to impose the draconian measures once the bill comes up for hearing before the national assembly. One has reasons to doubt both the extent of the oppositions commitment to the cause of public welfare as well as its influence within the parliament to sway the sentiments in its favour.
What are the options that the people of this country have now that they are being drained of the last vestiges of hope to be able to live? This is a question with grave moral, legal and constitutional dimensions. While the governments move is completely drained of any moral legitimacy both in its inception and applicability, it is the other two factors that would become increasingly more important with the ensuing developments within the parliament as well as outside it.
One has also gathered that the move has only cosmetic significance as the government is fully abreast of its inability to carry it through the parliament. By granting it the cabinet approval and passing it to the relevant committee of the national assembly, the government would make itself eligible to receiving the next tranche from the World Bank. That is the extent of degeneration that the government is willing to embrace to meet its lop-sided priorities and to continue filling the personal coffers of its actors.
In due course of time, particularly if the parliament fails to defeat the proposed legislation, or even before that, the move would be petitioned in the Supreme Court which would provide yet another opportunity to the government to paint the judiciary black. But, in the absence of a parliament that is conscious of its responsibility to the welfare of the people, judiciary remains the only recourse available for redressing genuine grievances.
Article 38 of the constitution of Pakistan makes it the responsibility of the state to secure the well-being of the people, irrespective of sex, caste, creed or race, by raising their standard of living, by preventing the concentration of wealth and means of production and distribution in the hands of a few to the detriment of general interest and by ensuring equitable adjustment of rights between employers and employees, and landlords and tenants. In the instance of the incumbent government having not only abdicated its principal responsibility to do as enshrined in the constitution, but to have driven the people to the verge of committing suicides, it is left with no moral, legal or constitutional right to stay in power. At the least, it must quit and let people breathe in the hope of better times.
The writer is a political analyst.
