Former President Pranab Mukherjee addresses during the 2nd Atal Bihari Vajpayee Memorial Lecture in New Delhi... Read More

NEW DELHI: A party with a majority has the mandate to deliver a stable government but must also carry along “others” who did not vote for it, former President Pranab Mukherjee said while addressing the second edition of the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Memorial Lecture here on Monday.

“The Indian electorate has time and again conveyed to the ruling party that goes on to form the government that yes, they may be entitled to form the government with majority of seats won by them but they are also to take into consideration all those people who may not have voted for them. The mandate is to govern as a majority party with a stable government, but carry others with you,” Mukherjee said. He said no party or leader had won a 51% majority since 1951.

In comments that come in the wake of protests over the Citizenship Amendment Act, Mukherjee said an “overwhelming majority” in the legislature should not be an excuse to do “anything and everything”. “It is also to be noted that every time a government has behaved on the contrary, the voter has punished the incumbent in the elections that follow,” he said.

“Unfortunately, this message of the Indian electorate has never been clearly understood by political players. That is why we think we can do anything and everything when we have an overwhelming majority in the legislature. But that should not be the case,” the former President added.

Mukherjee remembered Vajpayee as a “strident yet reasoned voice” in the opposition, and a “consensus seeker while successfully heading the first coalition government for a full term” who “deftly managed to navigate issues in Kashmir, talks with Pakistan and the second nuclear test in Pokhran”.

The former President also pitched for raising the number of Lok Sabha constituencies from the present 543 to 1,000 and for a corresponding increase in the Rajya Sabha's strength, arguing that India had a “disproportionately large size” of electorate for elected representatives.

