A few days back, I was involved in an interesting discussion with a new friend of mine. The election season was coming to an end and people were more or less anticipating what was quite obvious at the national level. During the conversation, I casually asked him if he had exercised his right to vote. Although being knowledgeable about his own constituency and the candidates representing it, he remarked on how this time around, by voting for the most popular candidate at the national level, he had voted for the greater good of the country. After a few minutes, our discussion went off into a whole new level of irrelevance and the essence of our original question got lost completely. Since it was very early in the morning and we wanted to keep both our sanity and our friendship intact, we conceded mutual defeat and walked off. But it brought to fore a major question in my mind which was, “Why being unselfish citizens may lead to our demise?”
Let me be honest with you at the onset: I failed to exercise my right to vote this year due to genuine circumstances. That may put me in a hypocritical position, but such is the beauty of democracy: I can still talk about it and voice my opinions.
I hail from a small state which was famous for its wealth and prosperity. I used to speak about my state with passion and conviction and had a sense of pride instilled in me during my childhood days. That sense of pride eroded slowly during the last decade. The same state is now famous for its drug addicted youth and is under a debt of 1 lakh + crores. The government is mortgaging state properties to raise loans for paying employee salaries. We all knew who had done this to our state, yet there was nothing we could do about it.
In a democracy, people elect their representatives. These representatives in turn, sit in the parliament and formulate policies which directly affect us. The election for Prime Minister in India is not like the Presidential elections in the USA, where people elect the candidate directly rather than the sum of their representatives. So a perception that people are voting for the candidate at the centre does not map to the idea of Indian democracy. In fact, a top-down approach in this scenario can be extremely dangerous. We might end up sending criminals, murderers, scamsters, mining mafias, gangsters, communal rioters and hate mongers to the Parliament. I find it difficult to understand such a viewpoint: Are they trying to say that if I want a ‘strong’ leader at centre, even if I have to vote for a gangster-drug lord, I should not hesitate to vote for him. You do not entrust a wolf with the security of your sheep. Case in point: If I follow the top-down approach and vote for my representative, it would be the most foolish thing to do. This word foolish can be conveniently replaced with ‘suicidal’ here.
Google came out with an interesting tool to know about the details of the candidate representing a constituency and who you might vote for. Although the message is very subtle, this is the idea that I firmly believe in. Look out for the best candidates in your constituency and give YOUR vote to the one who DESERVES it the most. Leave aside the questions of which party he belongs to, what caste or religion he hails from. Vote for the best candidate in your constituency and let the numbers add up and decide who leads us at the centre. Let the best of US represent us at the Centre.
Let me be honest with you at the onset: I failed to exercise my right to vote this year due to genuine circumstances. That may put me in a hypocritical position, but such is the beauty of democracy: I can still talk about it and voice my opinions.
I hail from a small state which was famous for its wealth and prosperity. I used to speak about my state with passion and conviction and had a sense of pride instilled in me during my childhood days. That sense of pride eroded slowly during the last decade. The same state is now famous for its drug addicted youth and is under a debt of 1 lakh + crores. The government is mortgaging state properties to raise loans for paying employee salaries. We all knew who had done this to our state, yet there was nothing we could do about it.
In a democracy, people elect their representatives. These representatives in turn, sit in the parliament and formulate policies which directly affect us. The election for Prime Minister in India is not like the Presidential elections in the USA, where people elect the candidate directly rather than the sum of their representatives. So a perception that people are voting for the candidate at the centre does not map to the idea of Indian democracy. In fact, a top-down approach in this scenario can be extremely dangerous. We might end up sending criminals, murderers, scamsters, mining mafias, gangsters, communal rioters and hate mongers to the Parliament. I find it difficult to understand such a viewpoint: Are they trying to say that if I want a ‘strong’ leader at centre, even if I have to vote for a gangster-drug lord, I should not hesitate to vote for him. You do not entrust a wolf with the security of your sheep. Case in point: If I follow the top-down approach and vote for my representative, it would be the most foolish thing to do. This word foolish can be conveniently replaced with ‘suicidal’ here.
Google came out with an interesting tool to know about the details of the candidate representing a constituency and who you might vote for. Although the message is very subtle, this is the idea that I firmly believe in. Look out for the best candidates in your constituency and give YOUR vote to the one who DESERVES it the most. Leave aside the questions of which party he belongs to, what caste or religion he hails from. Vote for the best candidate in your constituency and let the numbers add up and decide who leads us at the centre. Let the best of US represent us at the Centre.
On a more positive note, things may not be as gloomy as they sound. As I learned recently, the market has a way of reaching its own equilibrium point after a period of shuffle and struggle. I see that the people of my state have realized the deteriorating conditions and voted for the right candidate this time around. The time has come for us to rise up again and conquer what belongs to us. The time has come for us to demand the prosperity and bright future we so rightly deserve.
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