Democracy not cataclysmic periodic exercise but continual participative operation: CEC Sunil Arora

New Delhi, March 21, 2021

Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora, who is currently overseeing the huge gigantic exercise of elections to legislative assemblies in West Bengal, Assam, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, has said that “democracy is not a cataclysmic periodic exercise but it is government by the people".

"It is a continual participative operation," Arora said while felicitating 12 MPs for their outstanding performances in the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha here on Saturday.

This was the 11th edition of the Sansad Ratna Awards which are given annually by a Chennai-based NGO, Prime Point Foundation, whose umbrella organizations Sansadratna Awards and the digital magazine PreSense select best performing parliamentarians through a high-level jury and the PRSI, a wing of the Lok Sabha.

"Democracy is government by the people," Arora said, pointing out that the little man (the voter) in his multitude casts his vote at the polls, which is social audit of his party's choice of his proxy.

"Although the full flower of participative government rarely blossoms, the minimum credential of popular government is an appeal to the people after every term for a renewal of confidence,” he said adding “ so we have adult franchise and general elections as constitutional compulsions… it needs little argument to hold that the heart of the parliamentary system is free and fair elections periodically held, based on adult franchise, although social and economic democracy may demand much more."

Twelve parliamentarians, including the chairman of the parliamentary standing commttee on agriculture were honored with the Sansad Ratna awards at the Constitution Club of India for their best performance in Parliament during the year 2019-20 in the 17th Lok Sabha in the 11th edition of the awards, held for the first time in the national capital. All previous editions were held in Chennai in the spacious campus of IIT in collaboration with that premier institution.

The Sansad Ratna awards are the brain child of K Srinivasan, founder of the Prime Point Foundation. The awards were founded after he was inspired by a thought passed on to him by late President A P J Abdul Kalam that a civil society must honour hard-working and best performing politicians.

This year's Mahasansad Ratna Awards, that is if an MP scores more than a hat-trick of awards, went to veteran BJP MP Bharthruhari Mahtab , Supriya Sule (NCP) (absent) and Shrirang Appa Barne (Shiv Sena). This award is presented once in five years.

The standing committee on Agriculture received the Sansadratna Award 2020 as the best performing committee for the year 2019-20 in the 17th Lok Sabha. P C Gaddi Gouda (BJP, Bagalkot, Karnataka), chairman of the committee, received the award.

The working president of Sansad Ratna Awards, Priyadarshini Rahul Bhandari, an advocate of supreme court, acted as the MC and was responsible for the organization of the event in the capital.

NNN