India, Aug. 2 -- Rahul Gandhi could utilise his sabbaticals in India to try and read up his grandfather's parliamentary record and learn how as LoP he can use procedure to his advantage than demands laced in anger.

During the 1962 Chinese aggression, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru gave a clarion call: "Freedom is in peril, defend it with all your might." The failure of his regime to fathom Chinese intentions and the resultant national humiliation notwithstanding, perhaps parliamentary democracy today is similarly imperilled, not due to alien aggression but caused by the inability of our political parties to provide mature leadership and adhere to parliamentary norm and form. Disruption of Parliament began in the Rajiv Gandhi era, with B...