The idea here is not to propagate or degrade any political party but it is merely to opine about the present political system, which allows the ruling party to indulge in activities that is aimed to ensure their victory in the next elections – short sightedness or narrowed mindedness call it the way you want but surely the ultimate loser is you – the subjects of the democratic system.
The Lincoln’s idea – ‘of the people, by the people, for the people ‘has been somehow forgotten and merely left is this - of the party, by the party, for the party.
Consider the plight of the country, which in a sense is world’s largest democracy but it sounds rather more of a liability to safeguard it than blowing trumpets about it. Where in some of the nation’s biggest political parties are indulged in activities that are only justified if we believe they have been done it for their own (party and individual) benefit. I am using following incidents/acts/programmes just as an illustration to bring forth my view. Few may think I am judgemental or I am overlooking the nice deeds (which I think would have been covered extensively by the media these parties own or have tie-ups with)
“Herb is the healing of a nation, alcohol is the destruction’ does not seem to have gone in with our political representatives. In lieu of resolving the issue of bootlegging as it caused many casualties in the past a party opened up a chain of liquor shops so that every individual had free and effortless access to liquor and minors are no exception here and irony is the country does not even have such a good access to drinking water. Today, this chain is as large as PDS (ration shops) or may be even larger. So, the person may or may not have access to subsidized food grains but he surely has access to liquor. The chain is obviously giving huge profits, totally insulated from the economic downturn and the government is making huge money and party is ensuring votes too but at the expense of tomorrow’s drunkard citizens. – I am not promoting ‘Ban liquor – concept’ that has failed miserably in past in one of the states but we should ensure that people do not have such effortless access to a bottle of liquor specially minors, which is almost impossible if you have liquor shops almost at par with road side pan shops or petty shops.
‘Don’t give them fish, but teach them to fish’ doesn’t seem to be the right mantra, if you want to ensure the seats for the next election. So a ruling party decided to give the people basic food and allied stuff at a price, which wouldn’t have been viable even in the 60’s & 70’s (Rice at Rs. 1 / kg – ridiculous!!!). So you buy from the farmers at a price, which is profitable to him (farmer -because even he is your vote bank) and sell it at a price, which is profitable to the party (next election is never far away) and about the people they are always at loss. The problem with the entire system is it only results in higher deficit and for the country that has been struggling to reduce deficit ‘highly subsidized’ concept doesn’t look like a sensible idea. – I am not promoting ‘Starve the poor to death’ but why can’t we simply provide them with opportunities to earn their bread by investing the same amount of money spent in subsidy to develop infrastructure and opportunities. Some might argue ‘starvation is a day-to-day problem, which cannot be resolved by a long term plan’ but subsidized food is much more short term solution and will never reap benefits but for votes in the next elections. The 100 days job opportunity was a much better and a wonderful solution so why not implement the same on larger scale; the country that has manpower in abundance can do wonders and obviously earn more than their daily bread and butter.
‘Knowledge is power’ seem to have been misinterpreted as there was never a clear idea of what type of knowledge but I can assure knowledge of television serials, actors & actresses, movies, cricket etc will give you( the people) no real power but it surely does give power (vote power) to the party - to rule again. The idea of distributing Colour TV’s to people who are fighting for their next meal seems to be a little illogical. The simple understanding of hierarchy of human needs would tell you entertainment is a leisure need and would only be present in people who have their other basic needs fulfilled. Resultant the government gave free TV’s, that kick started a huge black market for colour TV’s what else do you expect the people to do when you give them TV’s irrespective of whether or not they can afford the electricity bills/ cable bills. Again money (government’s money – Tax payers’ money) was drained for no good of people but for the benefit of the party to promote itself for the next election. I am not promoting ‘Poor don’t need entertainment’ but can we appreciate they need many more things that are much more basic like food, clothing and shelter, which are more important than entertainment.
Many other instances of such acts – the grand new assembly building – as if we were conducting assembly under the banyan tree so far, marina beach make over – as if people didn’t visit the beach so far etc which were camouflaged as acts of generosity or universal good but they were neither because generosity comes when you spend your own money for others but this was people’s money spent and they were not for larger good as no one in the long run would benefit but for the party which will use this as a promotional expenses out of governments’ pockets.
It is quite necessary that proper guidelines are in place when it comes to spending huge chunk of money.
Though i am not a expert here, some of them could be
1) Independent (politically neutral) organization should vet the plan and do a socio-economic cost-benefit analysis, which should be strictly published in all major dailies instead of spending enormous amount in advertising the same. The organisation should be made accountable for the study.
2) Peoples feedback via SMS etc, if possible should be taken and people across the country should be allowed to participate.
3) None of the schemes/plans should be used as a source to promote a political party. If used, not less than 50% should be funded by such party.
4) All such norms should be followed for a spending which is above a certain cut-off level.
Well I would like to close with popular promotion campaign run by an Indian business house - ‘Jaago re’
Disclaimer: The incidents happen to be related to a particular state as am not well read with the politics of other states.
