Pop Historian and one-time cricket administrator Ramachandra Guha who also specialises in propaganda decided to take on India’s Attorney General KK Venugopal, in one of his tweets on Friday:
Why should the serving Attorney General of the Government of India be representing or even speaking for the provincial unit of a political party?
— Ramachandra Guha (@Ram_Guha) May 18, 2018
As seen above, Guha in his tweets raised objections over the Attorney General (AG) supposedly speaking for the BJP Karnataka during the state’s electoral drama and questioned the morality of the same.
This “outburst” of Guha seems to pertain to the Congress party objecting to Governor Vajubhai Vala’s decision to invite BS Yeddyurappa to form the government in Karnataka and his subsequent swearing-in ceremony, which they wanted stopped.
As reported, the Attorney General while appearing before the Supreme Court bench (which was hearing the matter), contended that the Congress should not have filed the petition, and instead should have waited for the floor test’s outcome.
He also vehemently opposed the plea which wanted the swearing-in stayed by arguing that the apex court could not call into question the Governor’s discretion to call a party for forming the government.
As evident, Guha, raised objection over this role of the Attorney General, and indirectly attempted to bring into question his operating procedure. His attack though was soon busted by social media users, who explained to him why the Attorney General was getting involved in the case.
Following Guha’s tweet, lawyer Kartikeya Tanna produced the petition which was filed by Congress leader G Parmeshwara and others against the “Union of India”. The said petitioners in their affidavit had impleaded three respondents, out of which “union of India” was the respondent number one.
Hence as contended by Tanna, owing to the “Union of India” being made a respondent by the petitioners, the Attorney General’s association was necessitated owing to him representing the Indian Union:
Hi genius, see who the first Respondent in this petition is – ‘UNION OF INDIA’. Guess who impleaded the Union of India? The petitioner. Guess who represents the Union of India in SC? The AG. pic.twitter.com/oXGxJH8ZPs
— Kartikeya Tanna (@KartikeyaTanna) May 18, 2018
The above point thereby also exposed Guha’s claim of, “the Attorney General speaking for the provincial unit of a political party” – as a lie.
Besides Tanna, other social media users to enlightened Guha in this matter:
Eminent public intellectual @Ram_Guha blithely ignores the fact that first respondent in the case is Union of India, represented by the Attorney-General. But that’s alright. The Commentariat is not supposed to let facts stand in the way of its profound commentary. #GoldenPumpkin https://t.co/gq9PeueRE9
— Kanchan Gupta (@KanchanGupta) May 18, 2018
Mr. Guha, its time you take retirement.
The plea was against the Governor. Governor is a representative of Government of India. Attorney General was there to represent the Governor.
Mukul Rohatgi and not the AG was representing BJP Karnataka. https://t.co/t7lzuPMSc4
— Neha S (@neha_aks) May 18, 2018
Despite all this, Guha continued to frivolously attack the Attorney General:
The Supreme Court rightly said that KK Venugopal’s suggestion that the anti-defection law be kept in abeyance was “preposterous”. Is it the Attorney General’s job to support suitcase politics, or it is to uphold the Constitution?https://t.co/1hZ7pUFPv9https://t.co/nn7OovlGDP
— Ramachandra Guha (@Ram_Guha) May 18, 2018
This too was called out as ignorant behaviour on Guha’s part and it remains to be seen whether the same dawns on pop historian in the near future.
