In the aftermath of the Mumbai Terror strikes, a lot of people have said much, claimed lots and done very little. Well, now it my chance to do the same.
There is a lot of public outrage on display, particularly against the political establishment's failure to avoid attacks of this scale. In a larger sense, this incident has displayed how much the common man has lost faith in the Indian polity. The politicians have been squarely blamed for their inability to work for the people of their nation. What I want to know is, what has lead to this feeling of disconnect between the electorate and the elected. Why do we hate the politicians so much? Why do we allow the people whom we consider the most inept and venomous creatures to rule us? And what is the solution to the present stalemate?
In the wake of the attack protests, people have come out on the streets expressing solidarity and demanding action. This togetherness in the face of disaster offers a slight glimmer of hope. News channels have shown endless talk shows where the rich and the famous(infamous) blab about the incompetency of our leaders. They have, in the rush of the moment expressed horrendous ideas such as stop voting, stop paying taxes etc. as a means to show protest.
This precisely brings us to the problem's root cause. A nation's polity is only a reflection of its people's mindset. All those intelligent "professionals" who claim that everyone in the government is a fool forget that it is they who have allowed such people to come to power, by not expressing their right and duty to vote. That reminds me of these words by the noted political commentator, Cho N Ramaswamy, who said and I quote
"There would have been greater discipline if he, instead of Nehru, had become the PM. After Independence, we lost sight of our duties and started remembering only our rights. With the Sardar at the helm of affairs, we would have been constantly reminded of our duties and it would have given character to the nation."
To debate over what would have happened if Sardar would have been our PM is a separate matter altogether. But these words clearly specify how we claim our rights vehemently and decline to perform any sort of fundamental duties to our nation. There are numerous Human Right Organisations, but no Human Duties organisations. And amongst our duties , foremost is to vote and elect our own commanders instead of just mocking at their incapability and showing off our own intellectual superiority over them. This reminds me of the elegant analogy that Sociologist Talcott Parsons drew between voting and a bank. Here it goes :
"Political support should be conceived of as a generalized grant of power which, if it leads to electoral success puts the elected leader in a position analogous to that of a banker. Just as money is deposited in a bank, members of a society deposit power in political leaders. Just as the depositor can withdraw his money from the bank, so the electorate can withdraw its grant of power from the political leaders in the next election. In this sense, power resides in the electorate as a whole."
In the absence of the electorate taking part in this process, we are led to what Sociologist Robert Michels called Iron Law of Oligarchy which means that power ultimately resides in a few hands even in a democracy. This is exactly what has happened in India. The elite, educated consider politics too dirty and useless a muddle to put their hand in and hence a new political class has emerged that by wooing the uneducated is able to retain power election after election. Recently, Mr. Kumaraswamy, former CM of Karnataka, conducted a party meeting right in the heart of Bangalore causing enormous inconvenience to the commuters. The jam continued for a marathon 5 hours. And even after that, Mr. Kumaraswamy was bold enough to say "Bangaloreans need not be so angry, they anyways do not vote". This adequately shows how the political class is unmindful of the educated, professional working class, for which only we are to blame.
The recent efforts by Tata Tea, called jaagore is a wonderful initiative. It makes all the information related to your voting available at your fingertips. Then, there are parties like Jaago Party, which have been formed by professionals who were bold enough to sacrifice their cozy lives to take on the challenge of the nation's reform.
Even after these attempts, if we don't wake up, then we don't deserve anything better than what happened in Mumbai on 26/11.
