Managing A Vision: Democracy, Development and Governance

Managing a Vision captures the first five decades of constitutional democracy in India with particular reference to democracy, development and governance. The author styles the analysis as a social audit statement on the quality of social transformation on a scale of progression-regression, the constitutional deficit in terms of distortions of the vision, faulted process of power, impaired umpiring and obsession over the letter sans the spirit of the Constriction. The statement focuses on the deficiencies in meeting the challenge of mission-mode of governance. The social audit drives home the point that the need of the hour is the democratic ethic and constitutional culture – a conducive environment and a missionary leadership of all the institutions. The eminent jurist of our times Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer observes that this publication presents an original assessment of the Constitution in Action. The eminent jurist notes that the author correctly spelt out the institutional identities and their interaction, and quotes the author: “wherever there is any doubt about the Articles of the Constitution, the legislators have to reflect upon the spirit of the Constitution embedded in the Preamble and the Director Principles. While the Supreme Court has been assigned the role of arbiter and interpreter, with advisory Jurisdiction on the letter of the constitution, the President is assigned the sacred and ultimate task of preserving, protecting and defending the letter and the spirit of the Constitution. The powers and authority vested in the Supreme Court thus do not impinge upon the ‘role’ assigned to the President as the protector and defender of the Constitution”. Justice Krishna Iyer commends that ‘every constitutional a Jurist and political scientist in India will do well to organize a debate on the various dimensions and deficiencies highlighted in the chapter on the Constitutional Deficit”.