Contemporary Indian Politics

News channels and newspapers are becoming synonymous to grief, misery and despair. There is nothing in the newspapers, reading which can make one happy. Its all about the bad or the sad news. The last time, I remember reading an article that made me happy was about India beating Pakistan in the T20 world cup. As a citizen of the country, I expect more from Manmohan Singh than from Mahendra Singh Dhoni. The latter occasionally takes you on a joyride with his helicopter shot, but the former has miserably failed to deliver. It is not just about the UPA government, even otherwise, the sorrows of common people have just soared in the last few years. 

Manmohan Singh recently made a public statement which goes as, "If we are going down, we are going down fighting." It is indeed a matter of joy that he made a bold statement after such a long time, but I do not see any hope in it. 

India is failing on three counts. Firstly we are failing economically, secondly on moral grounds and finally on political grounds.

The Ratings agencies have downgraded India's credit rating owing to its fiscal policies. The value of Indian rupee has slipped to an all time low against the US Dollar. The economic downturn in the west has affected us badly. The industrial growth in several states has come to a standstill. Even in this situation, nothing substantial is being done. If something is attempted to be done, it is rejected by the allies of the UPA itself. A situation of complete policy paralysis has arisen where the inflation is constantly on the rise and the government is a spectator whereas the masses, victims.

The State Legislative Assembly is a sacred institution where the policies and laws for the State are enacted. Is it not horrendous to find Ministers watching a porn film while the proceedings in the Vidhan Sabha are going on? What worse could be done by them? This situation would have been untenable, even if the Ministers were caught watching a devotional film, as they are expected to watch, observe and participate positively in the law making process, failing which would be a dereliction of their duty. In any case, this was a pure case of watching obscene movies. There is no further moral degradation imaginable.

Months later, a Senior leader of the Congress and a Senior Advocate at the Supreme Court of India was found in a compromising position with another lawyer, whom he allegedly incited by offering her a judicial post. If the CD is believed to be true, it brings up a serious case of the conduct of such highly reputed people and the image of the higher judiciary that they portray in the minds of people.

The central government has absolutely failed to deliver to the expectations of people after the Anna Hazare storm hit them in mid 2011. Promises after promises were made, only to be broken subsequently. At the fag end of 2012, there is no idea of whether any Lokpal bill would ever be passed. 

A cartoonist draws some cartoons, where the parliament is not shown as one would expect. But does putting the cartoonist behind the bars, solve the issue? Or the parliamentarians acting sanely, in the interest of public would do so? Throwing chairs and screaming like school going kids does in no way show that the parliamentarians themselves respect the institution.

Sonia Gandhi decided to visit a rape victim's family in Haryana. It does not seem to be a co-incidence of the rape victim being a Dalit girl. There is no harm in visiting such needy and downtrodden people in the remote areas of the country. The harm is in aiming at votes for doing so.

Mamata Banerjee exemplifies the term antagonist in its truest sense. One would seriously doubt if she even considers the proposal before rejecting it. But, there is more to it. West Bengal is an economically poor state. So, Mamata Di is correct in outright rejection of any proposal where the poor people are going to be affected. Be it the petrol price hike or FDI in retail, she does not look at the issue on merits as doing so would not fetch her more votes. She added a flavour to the vote bank politics while announcing the withdrawal of her support to UPA. The Ministers of TMC were to submit their resignation after Friday Namaz, according to her. The choice of words seems to be perfect, where nothing else but vote banks are aimed at. 

Arvind Kejriwal makes serious allegations against Robert Vadra of lobbying with DLF ltd and taking interest free loans from the latter. If the allegations are true, it is just another story of the families of politicians being treated as Dukes and Duchesses. If not, it would be a failure on the part of Kejriwal of not gathering proper evidences. 

            The political parties need to introspect as to what they are doing. Whether they are giving the national interest, primacy over their personal interests? This introspection is required immediately. If the politicians don’t, the voters certainly would.

Jai Hind.