India should have an executive president

I mean the real executive, not the rubber stamp one that occupies prime real estate in New Delhi. Yes. We need a real estate baron/tycoon/robber in our Rashtrapathi Bhawan to set things right.

You are thinking that I have gone off my rockers and you may not be wrong.

The Winter Session of the Indian Parliament has begun. As usual, commotion. No, it has not come to heaving microphones and all that, not on the first day, but the fact remains, no business. We are quite sure this would continue for how many ever days the session continues till one day we hear “Parliament session suspended sine die.” Yes, I am that pessimistic.

In short order, I am expecting media history, however recent it may be, to repeat – the chatterati locating our governance troubles at the form of governance we have adopted.

That is good enough reason for me to advocate the executive president form of democracy for India. I have now come to think that, some 60 odd years ago, we made a bad choice. Even the half-baked French form of divided powers between the president and prime minister could have been better to what we have now. Think about the possibility of Marine Le Pen occupying Elysee Palace, Paris. Not too bad, I say.

Now, it is for me to get serious.

Give another two months and we would have a real estate baron/tycoon/robber ordering around the world from his throne in the White House, Washington D.C. That is the type of executive president that we would end up with, I am sure, if we switched our governance structure. There will be a true election contest between a hydrocarbon robber, a broadband robber (may be the same person), an aluminium robber, a shipping robber, a software services robber and on and on. The field will be crowded, but more the merrier.

Americans were (past tense used advisedly) very proud of their system; upholding federalism at its core; respect to individuals; rule of law. Now, that pride seems to have taken a hit; not that they would crumble but the chest-thumping and strutting around will have to stop, at least for a while, or until Donald Trump surprises many (fat chance!).

So, are there any takeaways? Yes, do not go about blaming the system unless you have focused enough on the actors (in the US, in the recent election, the actors were the vacillating members of GOP, not knowing how to handle Trump till it was too late) and found them not culpable. It is the individuals that decide the fate of the system. True, the system too can, and often does, throw up legitimate actors who will hew close to its intentions, and if not equally frequently, some illegitimate actors. We may want to call these instances in the parlance of probabilities – Black Swan.

No comment on Narendra Modi, but Donald Trump is indeed such an illegitimate product (ironically thrown up by a much vaunted system) of the American system – a Black Swan in white feathers. It would be better if Indian media recognized where the fault lies.

Raghuram Ekambaram