The Wire: New Delhi: Sunday, May
01, 2016.
Why was the
PMO reticent in providing information about Modi’s degrees? And what could be
the political fallout? The Wire breaks it down.
The
controversy over Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s educational qualifications
taken centre-stage once again after the Central Information Commission (CIC),
acting at the behest of a RTI application by Delhi Chief Minister Arvind
Kejriwal, directed the Prime Minister’s Office to provide ‘specific roll number
and year’ of the prime minister’s degrees from Delhi University (DU) and
Gujarat University (GU).
The CIC said
that this would help them locate Modi’s records easily, following which the
universities could provide relevant information about his degrees to the
public.
The debate
over Modi’s educational qualifications started last year after various RTI
applications seeking details about his degrees were refused by the universities
and the PMO.
This had led
to suspicion among Modi’s political opponents that he may have provided wrong
information in his election affidavits. His election affidavits mention that he
finished his undergraduate degree through a distance learning programme from DU
in 1978 and his MA from GU in 1983.
The debate
has fuelled yet another spat between Aam Aadmi Party leader Kejriwal and the
BJP machinery. When did this controversy erupt? Why was the PMO reticent in
providing information about Modi’s degrees? And what could be it political
fallout? The Wire breaks it down.
Neither the
constitution nor the Representation of the People Act specify minimum
educational qualifications for getting elected as an MP or even becoming prime
minister. So why is a fuss being made about Modi’s degrees?
The emerging
controversy over Modi’s degrees is not about whether he his qualified to serve
as an MP or prime minister but whether he made a false statement on oath in an
affidavit that is a crucial part of the election process. Not having a degree
does not disqualify a candidate in any way but if a candidate says he has
degrees which he does not possess, then that would amount to having made a
false declaration and misled voters.
When did the
controversy begin?
Modi, in his
affidavit for the 2014 general elections, acknowledged having been married to
Jashodaben for the first time. In his earlier affidavits for the Gujarat
assembly polls, he had claimed to be unmarried. This had led to a huge
political furore in the campaign leading up to the general elections. Modi’s
inconsistent claims regarding his marital status fuelled further doubts about
his educational qualifications. Moreover, the controversy around Minister of
Human Resources and Development Smriti Irani’s fake Yale University degree
goaded many of Modi’s political opponents to probe his educational
qualifications in 2015.
Consequently,
a number of RTI applications were filed in the PMO, GU and DU to scrutinise
Modi’s claims of education. His election affidavits in the 2014 parliamentary
polls claimed he had undergraduate and postgraduate degrees. Likewise, his
election affidavits for the 2012 and 2007 Gujarat assembly polls claimed the
same.
So what was
the response of the PMO and the two universities?
In response
to an RTI filed on the matter, the PMO advised the RTI activist to approach the
Election Commission of India (EC) and refused to divulge any information. The
PMO said in reply to the RTI request, “The information about the PM’s education
qualification is available on the PMO’s website http://www.pmindia.gov.in under
the hyperlink ‘Know Your Prime Minister’ which can be accessed by the
applicant,” and asked him to get the required information from the EC.
The EC too
added to the mystery by saying that this information was not available with
them and the applicant could access them by visiting “http://eci.nic.in under
the head Affidavits of candidates.”
Following
this, a Gujarat-based social activist filed another RTI at GU seeking details
of his masters degree, which was again denied by the university. The university
sent a one-line reply in Gujarati, “Under the RTI Act of 2005, this information
can’t be made public.”
But the RTI
Act allows for appeals if the information sought is denied. Was an appeal
filed?
When the
activist, who chose to remain anonymous, moved the appellate authority against
GU’s reply, he was asked to file the RTI requests all over again and told the
PMO was not obliged to provide any information if GU does not have the
requisite information. The appellate body, headed by S.E. Rizvi, said, “A
public authority is obliged to provide information, which is held in its
records and, in the matter in hand where the requisite information does not
form part of office records, the contention that the PMO should provide the
same is not correct.”
The appellate
authority interpreted section 2 (J) of the RTI Act to relieve the PMO from
divulging this information. It said that since no minimum educational
qualification was required to become the prime minister, the PMO is not under
any obligation to possess details about Modi’s educational degrees.
The secrecy
around Modi’s degrees was further magnified when DU also denied any information
on his undergraduate degree details in April 2016. To Delhi resident Hans Raj
Jain’s RTI, the DU said that the information sought is too general and cited
its inability to find any information without a roll number. DU’s plea was
accepted by the CIC, which dismissed the case.
Why did the
controversy come to the limelight again?
After Jain’s
plea was rejected, Kejriwal on April 28 wrote a strongly-worded letter to Chief
Information Commissioner M. Sridhar Acharyulu.
“According to
some reports (details are attached), Prime Minister Narendra Modi is preventing
the concerned department from releasing details about his educational
qualification. Allegations are being made that the PM has no qualification and
degree at all,” said the letter, written in Hindi, which also questioned the
CIC’s autonomy.
Kejriwal in
his letter said, “Nation has the right to know the educational details of the
Prime Minister. His educational qualifications should be released in the public
at earliest. The RTI Act gives us the right to know the qualifications of the
person holding the position of the Prime Minister.”
Thereafter,
the CIC treated this letter as an RTI application and directed the PMO to give
Modi’s roll numbers to the universities so that they could find out the details
of his degrees.
“Not
prescribing the education (degree based) qualification for contesting electoral
offices is one of the great features of Indian democracy. What is needed is
education and not degrees. However, when a citizen holding the position of
Chief Ministership wants to know the degrees-related information of the Prime
Minister, it will be proper to disclose. The commission directs the CPIOs of
Delhi University and Gujarat University to make best possible search for the
information regarding degrees in the name of ‘Mr Narendra Damodar Modi’ in the
year 1978 (Graduation in DU) and 1983 (Post-Graduation in GU) and provide it to
the appellant Mr. Kejriwal as soon as possible,” the CIC order said.
What impact
will this controversy have on national politics?
Both Kejriwal
and Modi have been attacking each other in public rallies for a long time.
Apart from the public spat in rallies, Kejriwal has been accusing the Central
government of intervening in the daily affairs of the Delhi government. His
party has made it out to be a political attack by the BJP, which the AAP
defeated in the Delhi assembly elections comprehensively.
In the recent
past, Kejriwal and AAP have been the most vocal opponents of the BJP regarding
the Union government’s handling of political and administrative affairs.
Clearly, Kejriwal is trying to propel himself and his party as the political
alternative to the BJP. The AAP’s long-standing campaign has been to target
non-transparent governments, be it during the Congress-led UPA government, or
now. The AAP has built its support base by rallying against corruption and
opacity in governance. Therefore, Kejriwal has successfully catapulted the
reluctance on the part of PMO to divulge details of Modi’s educational
qualifications into a campaign against an opaque government.
In its
political fight against the BJP, the AAP has relied not on big exposes against
the government but on its small governance failures that have a cumulative
effect on people. With the CIC granting Kejriwal’s request, it is a small
victory for the AAP over the BJP. Kerjiwal’s deft handling of the issue of
Modi’s educational qualifications is sure to get him more friends than enemies.
What happens
if DU and GU are unable to confirm the award of degrees to Modi, or say
categorically that no degree was awarded by them to Modi in the years mentioned
by the prime minister in his election affidavit?
At present,
giving false information on oath is listed as a criminal offence in the Section
191 of the Indian Penal Code. It says:
“Giving false
evidence. -Whoever, being legally bound by an oath or by an express provision
of law to state the truth, or being bound by law to make a declaration upon any
subject, makes any statement which is false, and which he either knows or
believes to be false or does not believe to be true, is said to give false
evidence.”
A little bit
of history on election affidavits may be worthwhile to understand the
legalities of the process. Following a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) filed
by the Association for Democratic Reforms in 1999, election affidavits were
first put in place after a series of court orders by the Delhi high court and
the Supreme Court in the early 2000s.
After these judgments, the EC made election affidavits that required
each candidate to declare his/her criminal, financial, and educational
background mandatory.
At present,
the EC does not have any exclusive punitive powers if a candidate is found to
have provided false information. There are no verification procedures to ensure
that candidates do not provide wrong information in election affidavits. The
ADR, an advocacy organisation for electoral reforms, has been demanding the
Election Commission of India develop a proper verification mechanism for
election affidavits.
However,
given the constraints of time and resources, the EC has not been able to do
much about it. Jagdeep Chhokar of the ADR told The Wire: “The EC does not
verify.To our demand in the court, the SC had said that the EC should take the
help of intelligence agencies to verify the information. However, the Union of
India filed a petition in the SC saying that it should not be done. The EC gave
an affidavit saying that it was impossible for it to verify information of so
many candidates in such a short span of time.”
Chhokar said
that the problem the EC faces is actually serious. “There are 7000 candidates
in a general elections. In 15 days, you cannot expect the EC to do the
verification. Following the EC’s and the government of India’s petition, the SC
in 2002 said that verification cannot be done. Subsequently, we have been
asking the EC to verify the information of only the winners within six months
of their election. The EC has been saying that it sends the entire lot of
affidavits to the income tax department for verification. However, the income
tax department is not willing to do that.”
If the EC
can’t act, are there other legal penalties for making an incorrect declaration
in an election nomination-related affidavit?
At present
only IPC Section 191 lists wrong information on oath as a criminal offence. The
Representation of People (Amendment) Act, 2010 under which elections are held
does not list out any penalty against submitting a false election affidavit.
The courts have intervened occasionally. For instance, when Modi in his Gujarat
assembly elections had left the column of his marital status blank, the SC,
hearing a petition filed by Sunil Sarawagi in 2013, ruled that a candidate’s
nomination can be rejected by the EC if a column is left blank. In his 2014
parliamentary election nomination, Modi was, therefore, forced to declare that
he was married to Jashodaben.
The EC is
demanding some reforms in the whole process but thinks that the verification of
so many affidavits is not feasible. “The EC has no way to verify. We got only
two hours to accept or reject a nomination. But what we do is to put all the
election affidavits in the public domain so that citizens can themselves
verify. However, we had been demanding that the EC may have some punitive
powers for candidates who lie in affidavits. This will act as a deterrent. The
Justice A.P Shah Law commission report
released in February 2014 also recommends some of these reforms.,”
former chief election commissioner S.Y Qureshi told The Wire.
The Law
Commission has recommended amending the RP Act on the issue of filing false
affidavits. It has said that false affidavits could be grounds for
disqualification, that it should ‘qualify as corrupt practice under the Act.’
It also said that the maximum punishment prescribed at present should be
increased from six months imprisonment to a minimum of two years.
“Consequently, trials of cases in relation to false affidavits must also be
conducted on a day to day basis. Further, a gap of one week should be
introduced between the last date for filing nominations and the date of
scrutiny. This would give adequate time to file an objection on nomination
papers,” the commission recommended.
However,
given the pressures it may create for legislators, it looks highly unlikely
that the BJP-led government would implement these recommendations in the near
future.