Indian P.M. denies presidential plans

Press, 30 August 1984, Page 10

Indian P.M. denies presidential plans

NZPA-Reuter New Delhi

India was hit by early symptoms of election fever yesterday which forced a high-level denial that the Prime Minister, Mrs Indira Gandhi, planned to introduce a presidential form of Government.

The Finance Minister, Mr Pranab Mukherjee, told the Indian Parliament’s Upper House that press reports of a looming Constitutional amendment to allow a presidential system were untrue.

“You are discussing something which does not exist,” Mr Mukherjee replied to several agitated - questions from opposition politicians. “Let’s not think of crossing the bridge before reaching the bridge.” The furore was sparked by front-page articles in the authoritative “Indian Express,” India’s largest-sell-ing newspaper. One article said that on Mrs Gandhi’s instruction a prominent lawyer had drawn up a Constitutional amendment providing for a directly-elected president. The amendment would be introduced in Parliament before national elections due in the next five months, the article said.

The other story reported that 50 members of Parliament from Mrs Gandhi’s

Congress Party had met on Tuesday evening to discuss the same issue.

Speculation has been rife for months in newspapers and among politicians that Mrs Gandhi plans a French style of Government to replace the existing system in which the post of president is mainly ceremonial.

Opposition politicians have said that Mrs Gandhi hoped she would win a presidential election and install her son, Rajiv, as Prime Minister.

The Indian president is now elected by an electoral

college of both Houses of the national Parliament as well as state assemblies.

The “Indian Express” said members of Parliament had considered a paper by the Fertiliser and Chemicals Minister, Mr Vasant Sathe, which said there was a serious danger no one party would win a governable majority in elections. Such a situation would leave the nation exposed to instability which would be avoided if a president was elected with more than a 50 per cent majority of the entire electorate, the report quoted Mr Sathe as saying.