Parliament disruption
For the third consecutive day, both Houses of Parliament have been disrupted over the Congress leader, Rahul Gandhi’s remarks abroad that ‘Indian democracy is in peril’. In its annual report on global political rights and liberties, the U.S.-based non-profit Freedom House has downgraded India from a free democracy to a “partially free democracy”; the Sweden-based V-Dem Institute says India has become an “electoral autocracy”, and India, described as a “flawed democracy”, has slipped to 53rd place in the latest Democracy Index published by The Economist Intelligence Unit. The backsliding of democracy is linked to the political changes after 2014. Then how can one say that the political leader in question has been insulting the country when the world is already in the know of things?
S.K. Khosla,
Chandigarh
It is unfortunate that the disruptions without space for any business have become the order of the day for Parliament, the difference now being continuous adjournments induced by the Treasury benches. The ruling party may want the Opposition Member to apologise but it should express its displeasure by using other platforms and not by disrupting the House. There are important issues of public interest awaiting the attention of the legislature. Both parties must prioritise issues of national interest over political mileage.
Dr. D.V.G. Sankararao,
Nellimarla, Andhra Pradesh
Seeking a lifeline
I wish to highlight my traumatic experience after calling some free emotional crisis intervention, suicide prevention and counselling helplines. I had traumatic experiences with almost all these helplines, and wish to write about one service in particular. These helplines can certainly help play a very important role in saving a person’s life. But it does not give the right to some of the staff to make it a humiliating experience for the caller. I wonder whether there is any accountability, feedback and grievance redress mechanism. Some ‘trained counsellors’ appear to be arrogant, judgemental, do not have control over their emotions, and even put the receiver down in frustration. They must remember that there is an emotionally traumatised and distressed caller at the other end of the line. In my experience, I found the counsellors to be projecting their inadequacies onto the caller, judging, accusing, labelling and invalidating the experiences and feelings of the caller in the name of counselling. In a day and age when mental health is still stigmatised, such an attitude can destroy the hope and the trust of an emotionally distressed caller from ever seeking help. There needs to be an investigative report on the state of services provided by these helplines.
Blaise D’Souza,
Mumbai
