Nothing could have been more odious than the sight of two legislators watching a pornographic clip on a mobile phone while sitting inside the Assembly, smugly confident that nobody would get to know of what they were up to. But everybody in the country has got to know of their shockingly salacious deed, thanks to an alert television cameraperson who caught them in the act.
What makes it worse is that the legislators were also Ministers holding important portfolios and, had they not been exposed, would have still been occupying high office. With this latest episode of limitless shame, there’s little the BJP can say either in defence of the ‘party with a difference’ or its truant MLAs who have fetched pitiless ridicule on themselves, the Government of Karnataka, and the organisation that had vested them with trust and responsibility.
As if getting caught on camera were not bad enough, the legislators went on to defend their deplorable action by coming up with the ridiculous explanation that they were preparing for a debate on rave parties by acquainting themselves with what transpires at such gatherings. Only the naïve would believe that to speak against rave parties where booze and drugs are consumed freely, legislators have to first watch a woman having sex, either voluntarily or otherwise, with four men.
Surely Mr Lakshman Savadi, as Minister for Cooperative Bodies, did not require such dubious education, nor did Mr CC Patil, as Minister for Women and Child Development, needed to inform himself about the degradation of women in such a crude manner. A third legislator, Mr J Krishna Palemar, who was Minister for Environment and Ports till Wednesday morning, is as guilty as his two colleagues for it was his mobile phone on which the pornographic clip had been loaded; he had passed it on to the others.
There is no percentage in the BJP accusing the Congress of trying to exploit the shameful — and shaming — episode for scoring political points. Had it been the other way round, the BJP would not have spared the Congress. True, the BJP can claim that it has acted swiftly and forced the three Ministers to resign from the Cabinet within hours of their misdeed becoming public knowledge, which is far more than what the Congress has ever done to chastise errant leaders and legislators.
The scandalous conduct of the Congress in protecting those involved in the sexual abuse and murder of Bhanwari Devi in Rajasthan till it was impossible to white-wash their crime is a case in point. But such comparisons are uncalled for because the BJP has set the bar far higher for its leaders, MPs, legislators and even party members and workers than other parties have done.
The BJP cannot aspire to be a ‘party with a difference’ if there is no difference between it and others. To repair the damage that has been inflicted to the party’s image by these three legislators, the BJP should expel them without any further delay and ask the Speaker to disqualify them. There must be no space for malcontent in the party, nor should there be any compromise with those who bring disrepute to it. The BJP owes it to the lakhs of members, workers and sympathisers who fly the party flag with pride.
If no demonstrative action is taken now, a wrong message will go out and that would severely dampen the faith that many have vested in the main Opposition party. This is an opportunity for the BJP to prove its credentials to the masses.
