RECALLING ELECTED REPRESENTATIVES:

Legislators of American State Lousiana passed a legislation hiking the base pay of legislators from $16,800 to $37,500.Any such legislation has to be approved by the Governor of the State to make it effective. The Governor of the State Bobby Jindal had indicated that while he is against the proposal, he would not at the same time veto the proposal. This led to some of the voters filing a recall petition against the Governor. What this means that if after verification from the voters about their stand on the matter, the Governor could be recalled. But this would require approval of the proposal to recall the Government from one third of the voters. There are nine lakh voters in that State. Hence this would be a mammoth exercise. Then again while a large number of voters had indicated their disfavour at the pay hike, when it comes to expressing their individual views in the verification, the voters could take a different stand, mainly on account of the pressure of the legislators.

Governor Jindals main contention was that while he is oipposed to the proposal he would not veto the same for fear of jeopardizing his legislative agenda. This is a genuine apprehension because the legislators can block any of his proposals.

Ultimately Jindal gave in and approved the proposal.

Wish we had something like this in our electoral rules. Atleast voters can put the fear of God on erring legislators. This is not a novel approach. Recently in a Panchayat the elected office bearers were thrown out by the electorate.