Lawmakers as law-breakers

A thousand years ago, during the early experiments with modern democracy, the republican-minded citizens of Pisa leaned towards a concept called podesta in their consular form of government. A podesta was a citizen of another city, so that he wouldn't have any local ties of affinities that affected his impartiality. The podesta enjoyed considerable powers, but was elected for six months and could not leave the city at the end of his term without a rigorous scrutiny of his judgments and his accounts.
That's a scenario in which BJP MP Babubhai Katara and those of his criminal ilk couldn't have survived.But in a millennium of evolution, where we have twisted and mangled the Westminster model, such people are allowed to thrive and flourish. Our Parliament and assemblies are often packed with people who have scant respect for the mandate given to them and the responsibilities of holding public office. With aplomb, they turn their privileges into tools of trade and conduct corrupt businesses from the very offices created to guard the rights of citizens.
They feather their nests with the MPLADS money, use diplomatic passports to sneak out illegal migrants past airport authorities, use their influence to win contracts for friends and relatives and murder. What do we do? One solution is to contact the Kataras who are still roaming free and arrange a safe passage out of this country. But if you stay here, you can just fume as you read about our honourable parliamentarians debating whether to refer such cases of blatant criminality to the ethics committee. Bollocks, I say! Don't they see it's not about ethics any more? None should advocate the revolting Chinese model of putting corrupt politicians before a firing squad. But it's time to rock the boat.
If Parliament wants to adjudicate over its criminal flock (from Sidhu to Soren) it must perhaps do what the Army does. Institute a kind of court martial. The Army gets butter to the breakfast tables of its soldiers and officers and gives them weapons to protect the country. But when rules are broken, it puts its soldiers in the dock and lets it be known that the laws used to judge men in uniform will be harsher than those for civilians. After all, all power has to be tempered with terms and conditions.
If Somnath Chatterjee is angry and red-faced over presiding over a tainted house, he should suggest an alternate set of punishments for lawmakers. Disqualification isn't a punitive act, it's tantamount to letting them off the hook. Clearly laid down judicial principles have to apply to lawmakers. A rape or a murder becomes more heinous when the aggressor is the person meant to be the guardian or protector and courts take a harsher view of such cases. Similarly with legislators, who enjoy more privileges than the citizenry they are expected to represent, any transgression should attract a disproportionately higher punishment.
It is canonical that the modern state has no purpose but to serve the citizens. Therefore, the constituents of the state should have no other role but that. If institutions and individuals fail in that, they should perish — taken out and replaced. Perhaps, it's time to revisit the checks and balances of the podesta era. An electoral mandate shouldn't be read as blanket immunity. Once elected, every tiny act of the person should be placed under public gaze and legislators made to account for actions on a routine manner, not when the police finally catch up with them.