New Delhi: In a veiled attack on Team Anna for its remarks that people and not Parliament is supreme, Law Minister Salman Khurshid on Wednesday said it is the people who have given Parliament the power to make laws.
"We have recently heard in streets people say that the people are sovereign and therefore Parliament must listen to people. I think it is an unexceptional statement that Parliament must listen to people. But Parliament listens to people when it says that people have told us that you make the law...Parliament gets its power from nowhere else but people," he said.
Khurshid said if people don't like the laws, they can change its representatives in Parliament. "But people have not said in this country we will make the laws and you just endorse it and just put your stamp on that."
He was delivering the BR Ambedkar memorial lecture on 'civil society, democratic polity and democratic governance' here.
He said some people question the standing and sovereignty of Parliament when they claim that laws must be made by the people.
"When they say that every village and every panchayat must be consulted in making the laws of the land. Of course, it is a very romantic idea. But how long will it take to make the law"? he said referring to the demands that laws must be drafted after wider consultations and through referendum.
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