Posts
Apart from Sardar Harkishen Singh Surjeet, elections in India bring back a lot of things to life. Words like people's mandate, voter's mind etc. The Indian voter is eulogised as one having his own mind. Journalists in their columns and TV airtime repeatedly call the voter intelligent and mature. He is ultimate arbiter. He punishes the guilty and brings back the country on the right path. I haven't met the quintessential Indian voter yet, but if I do meet him I have just five words for him: You are a big sham!
Consider the results of Election 2004.
Chandrababu Naidu lost, Laloo Prasad Yadav won. Both man of vision: One had Vision 2020, the other Vision 20 Seats. Laloo got more than 20. If giving jobs to the unemployed and governance were issues the voter cared for, Laloo Prasad Yadav would have been cleaned off two elections ago.
Buy One Get One Free
Mr Naidu's vision did not include free power. His opponent, Congress' Y.S.R. Rajshekhar Reddy, promised free power and jobs to the unemployed. Reddy won. So dear voter, do you really think there is something called free power? Congress' Amarinder Singh promised free power to Punjab and once in power realised there actually isn't anything called free power. Congress lost in Punjab. The Great Indian voter wants free power. Give him or get lost.
Mr Naidu definitely put Andhra on the road to progress, but the Indian voter isn't satisfied with the road. He wants it all and he wants it now.
Hare Krishna, Hai Rama!
Mr S.M. Krishna's Karnataka was better than many other states in India. In fact the allegation that outside Bangalore, Karnataka was in a bad shape is wrong. Krishna was considered a clean and progressive leader. The Great Indian Voter kicked him out. If the Great Indian Voter has a mind of his own, he's got a lot of crap up there. The fractured mandate and the resultant instability is not going to end the problems, Krishna was chucked because of.
Love louts
If the Great Indian Voter is so great why does a Suraj Bhan Singh win? Why do Amarmani Tripathi or a Sadhu Yadav win? Why does he vote for Dharmendra for that matter, whose political speeches are more filmi than political?
Perform and perish?
Pundits say elections are fought on local issues. Politicians who don't deliver, the voter teaches them a lesson. Then why did Nitish Kumar lose from Barh or a Digvijay Singh lose from Banka? They many not have done a lot for the country or their state, but they did a lot for their constituency. Digvijay literally squandered national exchequer's resources in his zeal on a railway network in his constituency. Nitish Kumar was called the Railway Minister of Bihar, and more precisely Barh?
Casteist Caveman
If the Indian voter rejected communalism by throwing out the BJP, why did it choose casteism as alternative?
Political pundits dissecting the Gujarat results say it was rejection of Narendra Modi style politics. They choose to ignore that Congress won because the kshatriya votes went to kshatriya leader Shankarsinh Vaghela. Tribal votes went to Amarsinh Chaowdhry. Congress won wherever the total was over BJP's combination of Brahmin, Patel and vania votes.
Bottomline
Voters across India, barring a few states, vote for their own casteman, everything else comes later. North India is notorious for this, but check out the South Indian equations. Caste rules. The Great Indian Voter refuses to leave his pre-historic cave.
Sunday, May 16, 2004
Mulayam has pie for dinner
Three days is a long time in politics. For Mulayam Singh Yadav, it's been short and not so sweet. From being in an enviable bargain-power position of having 35 MPs in his pocket, the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister went back to Lucknow yesterday afternoon dejected and rejected. Just a day ago he was dreaming to savour his share of the coalition cake. The pehelwan of Etawa had softened so much that he was ready to sup with even Mayawati. He left his pride with the Left. And Left's Harkishen Singh Surjeet tried everything to make Sonia swallow her prejudice. But Sonia refused Mulayam that invitation to dinner. Last night, Mulayam Singh Yadav had pie, a big depressing humble pie. His detractors, headed by Laloo Prasad Yadav, had pasta and the last laugh.
Wednesday, April 14, 2004
Me too to Manifest
Manifestos are passé. Vision document is the in thing. We have a President with a 2020 Vision so why should the politicians be behind?
After the Bharatiya Janata Party released its Vision Document, the Congress has followed up with its own. Who cares whether the document has any vision or not? Who cares if it is just a rehash of the manifesto?
It's all in the name, a rose will not smell as sweet if called lotus, Mr Shakespeare. Ask Sitaram Yechuri that. This is India and things are different during election time.
And India is holding its breath for more such documents and all eyes are on Bihar leader Laloo Prasad Yadav, Mayawati, Mulayam Singh Yadav, Jayalalitha and Mrs CHAMMO CHHABRA. The guessing game is on, fingers crossed. Here's a set of guesswork.
LALOO PRASAD YADAV
India needs night vision. Till you have bright lights, halogen lamps beaming all around the place like in Delhi, how are you going to get vision? Tell me. So I will strive to control production of electricity at large scale. I'll encourage use of traditional lighting methods like lanterns. Show me one person who got electrocuted by a lantern. I will show you hundreds of people electrocuted to death. The more people I save, the more votes I get.
MAYAWATI
India needs a foreign policy, which works for the interest of Bahujan Samaj, the dalits. I will snap all ties with United Kingdom because they are Manuwadi. They ruled the dalits of India for two hundred years in connivance with the Manuwadi Brahmins and upper castes here. And now they are taunting dalits in football by ManU. Bahujan Samaj Party will give ticket to David Beckham for leaving ManU and preferring Spain. Manuwadi Murdabad.
MULAYAM SINGH YADAV
Housing, electricity and lack of entertainment are India's biggest problems. Only Samajwadi Party can solve these problems because only Samajwadi Party has the resources to do all that. Sahara would build City Homes so that people can move out of those tiny Indira and Vajpayee Awaas Yojana hutments. Reliance Energy would give power to the people and the Bachchan family with Jaya Prada would provide entertainment. If everything fails we have Amar Singh.
JAYALALITHAA
The All India Anna DMK understands the nations needs and will help the people fulfil their aspirations. So we'll jail Karunanidhi and his sons under POTA. If they get out on bail, we'll continue using POTA till we fulfil India's need. I am aware of the fears of the Central Government over the misuse of POTA but since I will fight the next elections with Congress, India need not worry.
CHAMMO CHHABRA
My vision is 36-24-36. I am going slimming classes. If I lose 80 pounds I will be close to that figure. Then I will document it all and Montypraji will publish my book: HOW TO LOOSE WAIT IN 80 DAYS by Miss Chammo Chhabra. Book now, pay letter.
After the Bharatiya Janata Party released its Vision Document, the Congress has followed up with its own. Who cares whether the document has any vision or not? Who cares if it is just a rehash of the manifesto?
It's all in the name, a rose will not smell as sweet if called lotus, Mr Shakespeare. Ask Sitaram Yechuri that. This is India and things are different during election time.
And India is holding its breath for more such documents and all eyes are on Bihar leader Laloo Prasad Yadav, Mayawati, Mulayam Singh Yadav, Jayalalitha and Mrs CHAMMO CHHABRA. The guessing game is on, fingers crossed. Here's a set of guesswork.
LALOO PRASAD YADAV
India needs night vision. Till you have bright lights, halogen lamps beaming all around the place like in Delhi, how are you going to get vision? Tell me. So I will strive to control production of electricity at large scale. I'll encourage use of traditional lighting methods like lanterns. Show me one person who got electrocuted by a lantern. I will show you hundreds of people electrocuted to death. The more people I save, the more votes I get.
MAYAWATI
India needs a foreign policy, which works for the interest of Bahujan Samaj, the dalits. I will snap all ties with United Kingdom because they are Manuwadi. They ruled the dalits of India for two hundred years in connivance with the Manuwadi Brahmins and upper castes here. And now they are taunting dalits in football by ManU. Bahujan Samaj Party will give ticket to David Beckham for leaving ManU and preferring Spain. Manuwadi Murdabad.
MULAYAM SINGH YADAV
Housing, electricity and lack of entertainment are India's biggest problems. Only Samajwadi Party can solve these problems because only Samajwadi Party has the resources to do all that. Sahara would build City Homes so that people can move out of those tiny Indira and Vajpayee Awaas Yojana hutments. Reliance Energy would give power to the people and the Bachchan family with Jaya Prada would provide entertainment. If everything fails we have Amar Singh.
JAYALALITHAA
The All India Anna DMK understands the nations needs and will help the people fulfil their aspirations. So we'll jail Karunanidhi and his sons under POTA. If they get out on bail, we'll continue using POTA till we fulfil India's need. I am aware of the fears of the Central Government over the misuse of POTA but since I will fight the next elections with Congress, India need not worry.
CHAMMO CHHABRA
My vision is 36-24-36. I am going slimming classes. If I lose 80 pounds I will be close to that figure. Then I will document it all and Montypraji will publish my book: HOW TO LOOSE WAIT IN 80 DAYS by Miss Chammo Chhabra. Book now, pay letter.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)