Section 417 says: Whoever cheats shall be punished with imprisonment ... for a term which may extend to one year, or with fine, or both.
Now the current Congress-NCP Government in Maharashtra came to power last October at least partly on the back of an election promise to "legalise all slums that have come up till year 2000." (See, for example, this report). This was in clear contrast to the Shiv Sena-BJP election promise, which was that they would not extend the cut-off date past 1995.
That is, by subscribing to this party promise, the various Congress and NCP MLAs who won election made this commitment to their voters: that all slums built before 2000 would be allowed to stay intact.
In office, the MLAs threw away that commitment. The Government they formed has embarked on the largest spate of slum demolitions this city has ever seen, maintaining that the earlier cut-off date, 1995, applies. (See, for example, this report).
(And as an aside, note in that report the sentence that says: "Demolitions against rich defaulters, however, won't be as easy. [Municipal Commissioner] Joseph acknowledged that in many cases, action can only be taken after serving notice." Note it, and wonder why action is in fact taken against other "defaulters" -- slum dwellers -- without serving notice. End of aside).
Let's suppose we locate a slum dweller, call him Satyajit, who:
- moved into his home after 1995, but before 2000; and
- voted in last October's Maharashtra's election; and
- would have ordinarily voted for the Shiv Sena-BJP alliance; but
- was afraid that they would destroy his home; and so
- voted for the Congress-NCP this time because of their promise to legalise his slum home; and
- has now watched his slum home disappear under a Municipal bulldozer's maw.
Leave aside for a few minutes whatever views you have on slum demolitions. Consider now Satyajit, on the one hand, and Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh and his Government of Maharashtra, on the other.
Clearly, Deshmukh and his coalition's election promise intentionally induced Satyajit to do something which he would not have done without that promise: he voted for the Congress-NCP instead of the Sena-BJP. Just as clearly, this induced act of Satyajit's has caused damage to his property (let alone his body or mind). (All quotes in this para, as you have guessed, from Section 415 of the IPC).
Question: are Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh and his Maharashtra Government colleagues therefore "cheats" by the definition of Section 415?
Question: if a court decides that they are, will these cheats then be prosecuted under Section 417, leading to up to a year in prison or fine or both?
7 comments:
dilip, sounds like this is the first time you've heard politicians make false promises. if not, maybe you should be asking these questions every time you hear such promises made and not kept, not just when (mostly illegal) slums are demolished. let's face it, we've been voting for cheats for half a century.
Tanuj,
Your last sentence rings true: we have been voting for cheats for half a century. Naturally we should be asking questions about that.
But there is something a little more substantial here. The language of the IPC is pretty clear: a person has to induce another person to do an act he would not ordinarily do, which act then causes the second person some damage. In that case the first person is a cheat.
It seems to me that this may be a fit case for taking our politicians to court for false election promises: because this is a specific, clearly worded commitment, the failure to keep which has caused specific damage to the property of a specific person (if we can find such a person).
Whereas with the more usual, more generally worded election promise -- like "Target 100 % literacy" (another Congress-NCP election promise) -- such cheating of a specific person will be much harder to prove.
Look at this as more than just the slum issue. This may just be a way to force an ounce more accountability from politicians. Every ounce counts.
I buy your argument. Good luck finding that Satyajit who'll file that complaint.
Sanketh
dilip,
exactly my point - let's not look at this as just a slum issue.
promising roads, power or lower taxes to extract votes is as much a crime as retaining slums. and as far as i am concerned, no one's trying to prove anything in court anyway - i'd like to excuse myself from debates on IPC semantics.
Dilip,
What a coincidence! I just read AWADmail issue 153 (A Word A Day by Anu Garg at www.wordsmith.org) which had this (A post by Mr Richard Garbutt):
Reprinted from the Calgary Herald, Sunday, January 30, 2005
Breaking election promise OK: judge
It's official: Politicians can break campaign promises with impunity.
An Ontario Superior Court judge has absolved Ontario premier Dalton McGinty of breaking an elaborately signed contract that promised not to raise or create new taxes.
Justice Paul Rouleau said anyone who believes a campaign promise is naive about the democratic system.
Sachatur
Dilip, what else did you expect from politicians - the worst scum in the world. It is amazing how the best amongst expects so much out of the worst amongst us.
However, should politicians have the power to do whatever they want simply because they promised it at election time?
If many BJP MPs and MLAs before '92 got elected based on the promise to build Ram temple in Ayodhya, does that justify Dec 6? Of course not. Illegal and Immoral should always be Illegal and Immoral.
IMHO, legalizing slum settlements would have been wrong and we should punish politicians for making wrong promises, not for not fulfilling them.
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