India and Democracy
India being the biggest democracy in the world has made a laughing stock of itself, by all the wrong things happening in India in the name of Democracy. Democracy was supposed to end the misery of the populace of nation and take the country to heights of progress. But in case of India, at least I feel we haven't achieved that objective of prospering the country/populace :-(
The 15th Lok Sabha elections are crucial to India, what with all the bad things happening all over the world, like resurgence of global terrorism, worst economic recession of our times,global climate change etc. In this time of great test, we needed leaders of the calibre of Obama, to lead India out of this mess. Alas, India lacks such leadership and god knows when we will have such great leaders leading us.
Even though India has produced high calibre leaders in the corporate world, we lack the same standard of leadership when it comes to Governance. If we look at the past couple of governments ruling India, with the exception of Narsimha Rao and Vajpayee, we haven't seen any leader who can take tough decisions for the welfare of the mass!!! Nowadays, the Indian political system has come to such a state that all criminals(budding as well as the established crooks,dons,dacoits) take refuge in Politics, when the time catches up with them and they're about to be punished by the law of the land. Lalu prasad yadav, Phoolan devi(she served prison before jumping to politics though), Mutthappa Rai(the reformed don of K'taka), Arun Gawli etc. The list is endless and it keeps growing. No political party is devoid of such elements. Even the once revered BJP,for its intellectual ideology and discipline it had within the party, is no exception to this trend. We have seen BJP also fielding the Criminals in elections all over India and such candidates getting elected!!!
In the backdrop of all these, this time around, was very important and decisive phase in the history of India. Because of such a sorry state of Indian polity, there was a strong push from the educated elite, to the populace of India in general and youth of today in particular, to participate in the democratic process and choose a responsible government to lead us into growth and prosperity. There were huge campaigns being run from the likes of Jaagore to Billion votes to Lead India etc. Because of all these awareness campaigns, before the start of the elections there was a feeling that this time people will come in hoards to elect a responsible government. We could get this hint, by the way the youth and the populace in general, scrambled to get their names registered in the electoral roll before the elections.
This time to facilitate elections, almost all working places were closed around the nation to facilitate the working class to come in huge numbers and vote. But come the election day and what you see, 40-50% voting in Urban areas!!! Rural areas are better than the urban areas, in that there is on an average more than 60% voting reported from rural India.
Then what is the reason Urban India shies away from its responsibility each time election comes and is the first and more aggressive of the lot to protest even for a smallest of the things!!! Then what could be the reason for being such hypocrites? No one knows the answer. If you look at the urbanites, they are the most pampered lot in India(if you look at the conditions prevailing in rural India). In one sense they deserve it also, as they contribute to the large chunk of the exchequer(by way of Income tax). But that should not be the only reason to provide them all the basic amenities and starve the rural India, for no fault of theirs. Maybe because of the comforts available to them, they are always indulged in personal comfort,are self-centered and care the least for the country as a whole. They don't care until something drastic strikes them directly. For e.g. if bomb blasts keep happening in Bombay, rest of India is not bothered about it, as Bombaites should be worried about it only. If Assam is reeling under terrorism, it makes no sense to bombaites/others in rest of the country to solve the issue, as they're not directly affected by it. Because of such attitude of our population, everybody is taking advantage of our system. Look at the way terrorists are striking our cities, from Kashmir to Bangalore to Bombay to Assam to Delhi to Ahmadabad. They have not left any part or religion or caste of India from this menace(they at least seem to believe in Equality of mankind, unlike our politicians who are always involved in divide and rule policy).
This kind of attitude towards nation was reflected recently by our cricketing heroes Dhoni and Bhajji, who thought it was not in their interest to attend the Padma awards function and receive the awards conferred on them. They were busy endorsing the brands, which pay them handsomely. What a shame, no action has been taken on such irresponsible act. They should have been stripped of the Padma award and banned from playing for the country for life, by this time. But no one is there to take such a tough decision, because they're governed by a politician(Agricultural minister to be precise) who concentrates more on making ans stashing away billions, rather than look into the problems facing the farmer today. Hundreds of farmers are committing suicide all over India, because of varied reasons and our Agricultural minister is least bothered about it. He will win this election also and who knows he might become our next Prime minister !!!
So what is the solution for all this? None. You may ask, why? Why because, when none of our electorate is interested to elect good leaders to lead us, how will all this end and we also become as developed as any developed country in the world?
Because ours is democracy, we can't question the people for not participating in the elections. Because ours is democracy, we can't question the decisions taken by our elected leaders be it nuclear deal, be it raising the salaries for MPs by hundred folds, when they take years to give a hike to the government employees, armed forces. Because ours is a democracy, we can't question the multimillion defense deal, even if it meant compromising our security. There are thousands of such things which we can't question, just because ours is Democratic country and the elected leaders are the final authority for anything and everything.
In such a scenario, only God can save us from this misery.
The 15th Lok Sabha elections are crucial to India, what with all the bad things happening all over the world, like resurgence of global terrorism, worst economic recession of our times,global climate change etc. In this time of great test, we needed leaders of the calibre of Obama, to lead India out of this mess. Alas, India lacks such leadership and god knows when we will have such great leaders leading us.
Even though India has produced high calibre leaders in the corporate world, we lack the same standard of leadership when it comes to Governance. If we look at the past couple of governments ruling India, with the exception of Narsimha Rao and Vajpayee, we haven't seen any leader who can take tough decisions for the welfare of the mass!!! Nowadays, the Indian political system has come to such a state that all criminals(budding as well as the established crooks,dons,dacoits) take refuge in Politics, when the time catches up with them and they're about to be punished by the law of the land. Lalu prasad yadav, Phoolan devi(she served prison before jumping to politics though), Mutthappa Rai(the reformed don of K'taka), Arun Gawli etc. The list is endless and it keeps growing. No political party is devoid of such elements. Even the once revered BJP,for its intellectual ideology and discipline it had within the party, is no exception to this trend. We have seen BJP also fielding the Criminals in elections all over India and such candidates getting elected!!!
In the backdrop of all these, this time around, was very important and decisive phase in the history of India. Because of such a sorry state of Indian polity, there was a strong push from the educated elite, to the populace of India in general and youth of today in particular, to participate in the democratic process and choose a responsible government to lead us into growth and prosperity. There were huge campaigns being run from the likes of Jaagore to Billion votes to Lead India etc. Because of all these awareness campaigns, before the start of the elections there was a feeling that this time people will come in hoards to elect a responsible government. We could get this hint, by the way the youth and the populace in general, scrambled to get their names registered in the electoral roll before the elections.
This time to facilitate elections, almost all working places were closed around the nation to facilitate the working class to come in huge numbers and vote. But come the election day and what you see, 40-50% voting in Urban areas!!! Rural areas are better than the urban areas, in that there is on an average more than 60% voting reported from rural India.
Then what is the reason Urban India shies away from its responsibility each time election comes and is the first and more aggressive of the lot to protest even for a smallest of the things!!! Then what could be the reason for being such hypocrites? No one knows the answer. If you look at the urbanites, they are the most pampered lot in India(if you look at the conditions prevailing in rural India). In one sense they deserve it also, as they contribute to the large chunk of the exchequer(by way of Income tax). But that should not be the only reason to provide them all the basic amenities and starve the rural India, for no fault of theirs. Maybe because of the comforts available to them, they are always indulged in personal comfort,are self-centered and care the least for the country as a whole. They don't care until something drastic strikes them directly. For e.g. if bomb blasts keep happening in Bombay, rest of India is not bothered about it, as Bombaites should be worried about it only. If Assam is reeling under terrorism, it makes no sense to bombaites/others in rest of the country to solve the issue, as they're not directly affected by it. Because of such attitude of our population, everybody is taking advantage of our system. Look at the way terrorists are striking our cities, from Kashmir to Bangalore to Bombay to Assam to Delhi to Ahmadabad. They have not left any part or religion or caste of India from this menace(they at least seem to believe in Equality of mankind, unlike our politicians who are always involved in divide and rule policy).
This kind of attitude towards nation was reflected recently by our cricketing heroes Dhoni and Bhajji, who thought it was not in their interest to attend the Padma awards function and receive the awards conferred on them. They were busy endorsing the brands, which pay them handsomely. What a shame, no action has been taken on such irresponsible act. They should have been stripped of the Padma award and banned from playing for the country for life, by this time. But no one is there to take such a tough decision, because they're governed by a politician(Agricultural minister to be precise) who concentrates more on making ans stashing away billions, rather than look into the problems facing the farmer today. Hundreds of farmers are committing suicide all over India, because of varied reasons and our Agricultural minister is least bothered about it. He will win this election also and who knows he might become our next Prime minister !!!
So what is the solution for all this? None. You may ask, why? Why because, when none of our electorate is interested to elect good leaders to lead us, how will all this end and we also become as developed as any developed country in the world?
Because ours is democracy, we can't question the people for not participating in the elections. Because ours is democracy, we can't question the decisions taken by our elected leaders be it nuclear deal, be it raising the salaries for MPs by hundred folds, when they take years to give a hike to the government employees, armed forces. Because ours is a democracy, we can't question the multimillion defense deal, even if it meant compromising our security. There are thousands of such things which we can't question, just because ours is Democratic country and the elected leaders are the final authority for anything and everything.
In such a scenario, only God can save us from this misery.
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