Speakers at the two-day All-India Lawyers’ Union (AILU) State conference which began here on Saturday alleged that the BJP leadership was trying to alter the basic structure of the Constitution by leveraging on its brute majority in the Lok Sabha and encouraging defections in the Rajya Sabha to implement its divisive agenda.
They observed that the clampdown on the people of Jammu & Kashmir (J&K) which immediately followed the abrogation of Articles 35-A and 370, the sedition cases being booked against those questioning the Central government’s decisions and various other actions were proof of the BJP’s authoritarianism.
The BJP’s top brass have no qualms in admitting that they did not believe in democracy and secularism which were the foundational principles of the Constitution. “What is being witnessed is ‘rule by law’ but not what was supposed to be the ‘rule of law’,” the resource persons stated, suggesting that it was time for a second freedom struggle lest the politicians who were currently at the helm of affairs should disband the Constitution altogether and bring about a new system of governance as per their whims and fancies.
Delivering his inaugural speech, AILU president Bikas Ranjan Bhattacharya said the judiciary should ensure that the Executive and the legislators deliver in terms of the people’s aspirations and in upholding the Constitutional values to which the Central government’s autocratic behaviour posed a grave threat.
‘Hindutva agenda’
Civil rights activist G. Haragopal said the BJP was bent on implementing its Hindutva agenda and it was destroying democratic institutions and persecuting whoever came in its way to achieve its objectives. He alleged that the Hindu outfits were saying there was no need for the Constitution and blackmailing politics reached the doorsteps of the judiciary.
Former MLC and analyst K. Nageshwar said consent was being manufactured to achieve political objectives and the Constitution was under attack in different forms. It was high time that the legal fraternity played its role in protecting the Constitution and democracy, he stated.
Andhra Pradesh Bar Council chairman Ganta Rama Rao, AILU State president Sunkara Rajendra Prasad, general secretary N. Srinivasa Rao and others spoke.
