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Tracing the legacy of Ram Nath Kovind, the 14th President of India

Prakriti Anand
By Prakriti Anand
132
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“Let him not dwell in a country where the rulers are Shudras”. These are words from the Manusmriti, an ancient Indian authority on law. Thankfully, present-day India isn’t governed by these archaic lawbooks; however, the hierarchy that they aimed at preserving is still a reality of our social fabric. A proof of this is the festivities that surrounded the election of Ram Nath Kovind as the 14th President of India. From his nomination to the present day, his identity as a lower caste president has remained the highlight of all the news headlines and reports. Politicians and political analysts called his nomination a masterstroke on BJP’s part, done to win the support of Dalit voters. Many people from the marginalized sections welcomed this step while others saw this as merely a symbolic move. With over four years in office, having headed the country during a pandemic, it is time to scrutinize Kovind’s legacy in a developing nation working hard to strike a balance between its past and modernity. 

Before diving into an assessment of Kovind’s tenure, let us have a look at the duties and powers of the President of India. The President of India is the head of the state, elected by the members of the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha, as well as the legislative assemblies of states and union territories. The president can dissolve the Lok Sabha and has the responsibility of assessing a bill before it becomes law. He has to appoint the Prime Minister of the country and can dismiss a governor whose acts appear to have gone against the spirit of the Constitution. He has an appointing power in the case of Chief Justice, Attorney General, as well as several other vital administrative posts. The president is also the commander-in-chief of the Indian army and takes decisions regarding war and peace with other nations, as and when advised by the council of ministers. He can be approached by convicts for a pardon request in cases of the death penalty.

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President Kovind has visited 28 countries since coming into office in 2017. Using the powers vested in him by Article 356 of the Indian Constitution, Kovind declared presidential rule in Jammu and Kashmir, Maharashtra (2019), and Pondicherry (2020). He appointed several CJIs, including Deepak Mishra and N.V. Ramanna. Kovind gave assent to acts such as the Appropriation (No. 5) Act 2021 (which allows the government to spend an additional amount of ₹3.73 lakh crore during the current fiscal year), the Constitution (105th Amendment) Act (which allows the states to maintain their list of backward and scheduled castes which can differ from the central list), the Election Laws (Amendment) Act 2021 (which allows the electoral registration officer to extract Aadhaar number from voters already enrolled in the electoral list).

Looking at the list of accomplishments of Ram Nath Kovind, it seems that he did his job well. Considering that the office of president, despite the bulk of powers vested in it on paper, has always been a nominal one, Kovind has successfully delivered what is expected of the post. Then why do we catch hints of disappointment and criticism whenever Kovind’s name is mentioned? 

The answer to this question lies in the legacy that was left behind for Kovind by his immediate predecessor Pranab Mukherjee, as well as the first Dalit president of the Republic of India, K.R. Narayanan. 

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Pranab Mukherjee came into office in 2012 and for the next five years, he was known as the president who always spoke his mind. From warning the present BJP government against repeated use of ordinances to urging the Congress-led opposition to not disrupt parliamentary activity, Mukherjee used his post to not only do the traditional job of a president but was also cognizant of his allegiance to the Constitution. In a 2017 speech, Mukherjee voiced his disappointment over the increasing number of mob lynching cases in the country and asked the people to play their role in safeguarding the basic tenets of the Constitution.

Going further back to the year 1997, when a Dalit leader K.R. Narayanan was elected the president, India had completed 50 years as an independent nation. In the same year, he received a letter from the Prime minister and his close friend Indrakumar Gujral, advising him to put Uttar Pradesh under presidential rule. Narayanan sent the letter back because the BJP at that time had a majority under Kalyan Singh. In a similar case in 1999 in Bihar, where the Rabri government was challenged to prove the majority, Narayanan refused to order the president’s rule in the state.

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In a speech given in 1999, Narayanan pointed out that in the absence of external danger, the country still splits into factions based on caste and provincialism and that it is necessary to get over these differences to ensure the country’s security.

This is the background against which Kovind’s tenure appears lackluster. He did everything a president is supposed to do, but nothing more. As a Dalit leader having connections with the RSS and BJP and armed with the experience of having served as a lawyer, it was expected of him to be more vocal regarding the numerous incidents of atrocities against Dalits and people belonging to the oppressed castes. Immediately after his nomination, his caste identity and how the election should be seen as a great achievement for the Dalit populace were highlighted by several high-ranking members within the BJP. On the other hand, there was a vehement attack on the nomination, dismissing it as a symbolic deed by a party continually accused of siding with the uppermost rungs of society. The four years that Kovind has served as president have proved that on balance, people making the latter point have the upper hand. Despite these facts, one must not forget two important points. One, that the president, at the end of the day, functions majorly on the advice of the council of ministers headed by the prime minister and cannot independently take any decision. Secondly, the president is only one person, and though it is fair to expect that the president should use his/her position in a way that makes a difference in vis-à-vis caste-based violence and other sociopolitical issues, it is not fair to put the burden of this massive social reformation on the shoulders of an individual. The makers of the Constitution gave us a democracy, one which functions when several levels of government come together and it is the shared responsibility of all of them to make sure that the spirit of the Constitution remains intact. In recent years, India has been fighting battles with communalism and casteism, two devils which have inhabited our social fabric for centuries. And though Ram Nath Kovind could be held responsible for not being outspoken enough when Dalits were being lynched on the road, the rising number of caste-based atrocities aren’t solely his burden to bear. In a nation where a person from a scheduled caste was the victim of a crime every 10 minutes in the past year, the president, who is the nation’s first citizen, can only be held nominally responsible, much like his post.

Prakriti Anand
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