In a fortnight from now, the much anticipated vice-presidential elections will be fought. Though opposition’s Vice-Presidential nominee Gopalkrishna Gandhi may not seem to have the upper hand, he is hopeful of being India’s 13th Vice-President. In this interview to the Sunday Standard, Gandhi talks about the election and its significance. He also responds to the charge of supporting Yakub Memon’s mercy petition and talks about the life beyond polls. Gandhi further asserted that he is not banking on his grandfather’s name alone. Here is the full interview.
Q- NDA’s vice presidential candidate Venkaiah Naidu is said to have the support of 485 of the 788 members of the Electoral College. There are chances of you not winning this election. So, are you looking at politics beyond this poll?
I am not thinking of myself in the future of Indian politics. That would be presumptuous. India is teeming with talent, dedication and vision. Men and women, unknown to us now, perhaps, could stun us by their leadership. Our future needs of leadership will be served well by the people of India.
Q- 18 political parties have pledged to support you in the Vice-presidential elections but possibility of cross voting cannot be denied. Seems you will have to canvass support from NDA. How do you plan to go about it considering you wrote a scathing open letter to Prime Minister Modi soon after he assumed office?
A- I am not canvassing votes from the NDA’s MPs. I am not saying to them ‘leave your candidate, vote for me’. That would not be right, that would be in fact, crass. Their votes have to go their candidate, the Hon'ble Venkayya Naidy Garu. But I am telling them that the culture of mutual respect and political courtesies that the veteran national leader Atal Bihari Vajpayee nurtured should make them see me not as an opponent but a fellow citizen with views different from theirs and as such entitled to their attention as democrats. They too should know what I stand for in this election, not as pre-conditioned voters but as receptive thinkers. Also, it is important to bear in mind the fact that MPs are not just entitled to but expected to vote in sovereign autonomy, as MPs. No whip applies on them. Not only that, MPs have a first preference vote and a second preference vote. The rules and regulations provide for not just completely independent voting but nuanced voting. This flexibility that I am talking about works both ways and every candidate can gain from it or lose on account of it. That is the beauty and the challenge of the procedure.
Q- Some quarters have criticized you severely for filing Yakub Memon's mercy petition. Do you think that has impacted your chances of winning this election?
A- I did not file Yakub Memon’s mercy petition. Citing the example of President A P J Abdul Kalam, who was against the death penalty, I wrote to President Mukherjee requesting him to consider all grounds before him, while deciding on the mercy petition. I also wrote, in like vein, to the President of Pakistan to desist from executing our fellow citizen Kulbhushan Jadhav. I believe the death penalty should, in Babasaheb Ambedkar's words 'be done away with altogether'. As to my chances in the election being affected by this, I believe Hon'ble MPs know well how elections generate sensation and know how to separate false from true.
Q- Looking back, do you think it (supporting the mercy petition for Yakub) was a right step? A news channel even started a campaign for your defeat on grounds of this petition. Are you proud of what you did? Or do you regret taking that step?
A-I have answered that in the previous question.
Q- You are against death penalty. So, would you file similar mercy petitions in the future too for death sentence convicts and those convicts may include terrorists?
A-Terror has to be met by the state with all its might by the use of the most state-of-art intelligence machinery to stall terror in its tracks and by the merciless annihilation of terrorists on the spot where they are carrying out their foul deed. The culpability of any accused in the state's custody has, of course, to be examined in accordance with the Constitution and the law. This is how any abolitionist who also despises terror would see it.
Q-You are the grandson of the father of our nation. But even your grandfather's name may not help win you this election. What does this say about today's times?
A- If I intend to stand and hope to win in an election on account of my grandfather's name alone, I deserve to lose the election. And as for India in the context of Gandhi, I can say that the two can never be sundered. India has and always will hearken to the message of the Mahatma because as he said himself, his life was his message. And his life and his death are there for all to see. As the world has seen it, from Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu, the Dalai Lama, Aung San Suu Kyi, Barak Obama...The list is endless and growing.
Q-What do you feel about the Modi government since it has completed three years in power?
A-The candidature is for the office of the Vice President of India, not for a legislature. So I should not answer your question in the stark political tones in which it has been put. But this I would say: The last three years have ranged the liberal against the illiberal, the inclusive against the divisionist, the egalitarian against the monopolist as no other three continuous years in free India.
Q- In case you lose, what are your plans? Losing won't mean end of your public life, right?
A- Politics is larger than elections, life is larger than politics.
Q- Do you think you had a better chance if you stood for the post of President? You were being considered as the Presidential nominee of the opposition?
A-That is not so.
Q- As governor of West Bengal, you earned the ire of the then Left front government in the state when you spoke about the farmer’s agitation. But now, Left parties and Trinamool Congress are supporting you. Why do you think Left has come out to support you?
A-Both the Left and the Trinamool have taken far-sighted views of things and prioritized the issues before the nation today. I salute their egoless-ness in this regard.
Q- The opposition’s presidential candidate Meira Kumar called the presidential election a battle of ideologies between the BJP and its allies on one side and Congress and other “secular” allies on the other side. Would you call vice-presidential election an extension of that contest?
A- I see my election campaign as being that between the core values of our Republican Constitution best proclaimed in its Preamble on the one hand, and the impulse for stark, severe and strict majoritarianism on the other.
Q- As a former IAS officer, you served as Secretary to the President of India...That experience would help if you become the Vice-President?
A-I was also secretary to the then Vice President, the veteran leader, Sri R Venkataraman. That experience should help. But I should add that those two experiences of mine are not unique. There are many who held those secretarial positions with distinction. Nor are those two positions that I held, determining. I cannot claim a consideration for any vote merely because I held those positions. I can claim consideration only on the strength of what I stand for now, in this election.