Daya Sagar
Indian citizen who are now in Azadi ka Amritkaal must understand how serious and considerate the framers of The Constitution of India constitution were while choosing parliamentary democratic system to give the Indian Citizens in a way a government of the ‘people’, by the ‘people, for the ‘people’ to be constituted through the choice of citizens of India where each and every citizen had equal voting power to be exercised at free will after a prescribed time duration which was prescribed as five years. Art-79 (Constitution of Parliament) reads .”there shall be a Parliament for the
Union which shall consist of the President and two Houses to be known respectively as the Council of States and the House of the People”. The President and the two houses are elected bodies, House of People (Lok Sabha) where members are directly elected by the citizens of India where as the members of Council of States (Rajay Sabha) and President are elected through indirect method. Electoral college comprises of members of two houses of parliament and members of the state legislative assemblies for the President and the only the members of a particular state for the members of Rajya from the concerned state.
As per constitution of India President is constitutionally named as Head of the State ( Art-53 Executive power of the Union.-(1) The executive power of the Union shall be vested in the President and Art 73 : Extent of executive power of the Union.-(1) Subject to the provisions of this Constitution, the executive power of the Union shall extend- (a) to the matters with respect to which Parliament has power to make laws; and (b) to the exercise of such rights, authority and jurisdiction as are exercisable by the Government of India by virtue of any treaty or Agreement, Supreme Commander of the Defence forces { Art-53(2) Without prejudice to the generality of the foregoing provision, the supreme command of the Defence Forces of the Union shall be vested in the President and the exercise thereof shall be regulated by law}: and all the actions and policies of the government are taken/ made in the name of the President {Art-77. Conduct of business of the Government of India (1) All executive action of the Government of India shall be expressed to be taken in the name of the President. (2) Orders and other instruments made and executed in the name of the
President shall be authenticated in such manner as may be specified in rules1 to be made by the President, and the validity of an order or instrument which is so authenticated shall not be called in question on the ground that it is not an order or instrument made or executed by the President. (3) The President shall make rules for the more convenient transaction of the business of the Government of India, and for the allocation among Ministers of the said business.}. But head of the Government is the Prime Minister of India who is though appointed by the President but has to be the leader of the political party / political Group that enjoys the confidence of the majority of elected members in Lok Sabha. The other members of Council of Ministers are appointed on the recommendations of the Prime Minister who must be member of one of the houses.
In a way the actions/ authority of the Government are subject to confidence enjoyed by the Government in Lok Sabha, all news laws / amendments can be made by the Parliament only and the Prime Minister heads the Government that conducts the business of the Parliament ( ofcourse through the Speaker in Lok Sabha/Chairman in Rajya Sabha) way practically all operating powers of Government as regards the policies / acts lie with the Council of Ministers / Prime Ministers since power to even amend the constitution of India through movement of bills also in a way constitutionally rests with the party enjoying needed majority in the Parliament. The framers of the constitution of India ( Constituent Assembly headed by Dr. Bhim Rao Ambedkar as Chairman of drafting Committee and Dr. Rajinder Prashad as President of constituent assembly) were conscious of the fact that even the elected members would be ‘normal human beings’ and since the tenure for governing would be limited by years, say 5 years, the incumbents may at occasions attempt to fiddle with the constitution and hence President of India was vested with the power/ duty to defend and protect the constitution under oath( Art-60) and check a ‘existing’ majority government or even act for installing a new government when exceptional circumstances may emerge even by not necessarily going with the advice of the council ( Art-74 of constitution as adopted on 26 Nov 1947) . No doubt original constitution also provided for a council of ministers to aid and advice the President in performance of his functions but President was not bound to go with the advice of the council of ministers till Constitution was amended by 42nd and 44th Constitutional amendments ( which were not questioned by President and had they been questioned may be SC would have given different opinion since after that President of India has been left with no any enforceable authority exclusively on his/her part ).
See Art-13 which too has been amended by adding Clause-4 { Nothing in this article shall apply to any amendment of this Constitution made under article 368 } by the Constitution (Twenty-fourth Amendment) Act, 1971 w.e.f 5-11-1971) which too in a way makes Clause -4 of Art-32 insecure ( The right guaranteed by this article shall not be suspended except as otherwise provided for by this Constitution).
Since constitutionally the Executive power of the Union rests in President of India ( Art-53), President is supreme commander of Armed Forces, in terms of Art-79 (Constitution of Parliament) the Parliament for the Union consists of the President, & two Houses (the Council of States and the House of the People) and , in terms of Art-77 {Conduct of business of the Government of India.-*77(1) } all executive action of the Government of India are to be expressed to be taken in the name of the President so will it not be worth considering to name all the welfare programmes of Government of India as President’s programme ?
Not only that, going by the experiences over the last seven decades and now in the times when we are celebrating Swatantrata (Azadi) ka Mahotsav there may be a need for even creating a constitutional provision delegating to President also authority like to on his/her own decide and appoint an advisory committee for assisting him/ her on matters related to atleast constitutional / political/ social / economic affairs during the tenure since only he/she has been constitutionally delegated to protect and defend the Constitution
(The author is a Sr Journalist & analyst of J&K Affairs dayasagr45@yahoo.com).