Dear Express reader, This week, the Union Budget was presented in Parliament, Delhi Police barricaded Delhi from the people’s protest and a tweet by pop star Rihanna riled the mighty Indian state. The Budget has been described as a bold one. In our editorial, we commended it for not playing to the gallery at a time when the temptation to do so was inarguably strong — when continuing COVID-induced distress coupled with the unrelenting farmers’ agitation is mounting pressures on government to do the right, and wrong, things. There is another view on the Budget, of course. It has been pointed out that it does not really put its money where its mouth is, and actual expenditures in areas that should have been prioritised in these extraordinary times — agriculture, education or social welfare, or infrastructure creation and employment generation in rural areas — have either come down or remained stagnant. But there can be no two views about this — Delhi Police’s barricading of the national capital, its frenzy of activity at the site of the farmers’ protests at the borders, was an unpretty sight. Police built multi-layered barricades, dug trenches, put in metal spikes and erected barbed wire fencing to draw a hard line between protests and the city. In a democracy that prides itself for its rich and long argumentative tradition, and its constitutionally guaranteed freedoms, it sent out a message of harsh and repressive use of state power to intimidate the dissenter and exile dissent. The tweets by Rihanna, and by Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, supporting the farmers’ agitation and opposing the government-imposed internet bans at the protest sites — incidentally, the government rolled back the ban on 4G mobile internet after 18 months in Kashmir this week — and the MEA’s schoolmarmish public scolding in response, could again be seen in two ways. They showed the government to be thin-skinned and insecure vis a vis international opinion, which is what we said in our editorial. But they could also be read as the government cannily seizing upon the Rihanna-Thunberg comments to yet again rally the base and the believers at home. But the real story in this week of Budget, barricades and celebrity tweets, was that Parliament is back in session. And the important question is: Can Parliament reclaim its place at the centre of India’s democracy? That’s a large question and it has no easy or quick answers. But it needs to be asked and asked again, in a time when intermediary institutions do not seem to be holding their ground and crucial space is being ceded to a government that weaponises its mandate on the one side and, on the other, to the push and pull on the street. The mobilisation against the farm laws is also rooted in the abdication and diminishing presence at the centre — the government was seen by farmers to push through “reform” by force, first as ordinance and then as legislation without adequate deliberation on the floor, or in the committee, in Parliament. Among other consequential statutes that are seen to have been railroaded through Parliament are the abrogation of Article 370 and the amendments to the Citizenship Act — both of which have been challenged in the apex court. Is a weakened Parliament allowing negotiations that should rightfully take place in the House to spill into the courts and leach into the street? This session will be watched, not just for the number of laws passed, but also for indications on whether the government and opposition are able to meaningfully find their way back to the House. Much depends on if, and in what manner, they are able to do so. Thanks, Vandita | 
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