General Elections-2024: The Bonds of the Indian Electorate!

By all available indicators, trends and analysis the Bhartiya Janata Party(BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA)—more precisely the Modi Government—is all set to perform a rare hattrick of coming-back-to-power in the 18^th Lok Sabha or General Elecitons-2024 that starts on 19^th April and stretches like IPL all the way to 1^st June when the 7^th phase of voting is scheduled with the counting of results scheduled on 4^th June. A host of media reports/opinion polls, analysis by poll experts/psephologists, the confidence of the ruling BJP in achieving a 400+ tally of seats for its alliance, the NDA’s already achieved hattrick of winning three Assembly Elections in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh in 2023, a divided opposition despite the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance or the INDIA bloc of 27 political parties, and of course, the bonds of an endearing Indian electorate all point to this prediction which is fast becoming a certainty like a walkover before the match even began. The BJP on its own won 282 in 2014, 303 in 2019 and now they predict a tally of 350 seats. Even if they fail to reach 350, they seem almost sure to secure something around 300, and if they do so, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be the first ever political leader of India to have achieved a single-party-majority three times in a row—meaning a resounding hattrick on all possible fronts.

The bonds of the Indian electorate seem to be growing warmer and warmer for their beloved leaders and the party, despite the Supreme Court striking down the Electoral Bonds Scheme. Some cynics point out that the vote shares in the previous two General Elections don’t quite bring out the maturing of the bonds of the electorate, because they say that the BJP’s vote share was just around 31% in 2014 and although it increased significantly to nearly 38% in 2019 it’s still lowly in view of the nearly 48% vote share achieved by the Indian National Congress or simply the Congress in 1957 under Jawaharlal Nehru. However, they miss on two points: first, the NDA has been marching along well securing about 45% vote share in the last elections and that since the beginning of ‘coalition politics’ from 1989 onwards the BJP’s achievement of 38% vote share is phenomenal.

The second point needs a little more elaboration. Vote shares are never a sound indicator if the bonds were warm or warmer. Vote shares don’t straightaway translate into winning more and more seats simply thanks to the fact that many candidates of both ruling and opposition parties have been winning seats by the slightest of vote margins which is a confirmed trend of modern poll and political times and that with the emergence of the regional parties there have been too many parties in the fray, sharing/splitting the pie. But on the other hand, the BJP candidates that won by large margins securing more than 50% vote shares of the constituencies concerned have increased from 136 in 2014 to 224 in 2019, and as per the available indicators this figure is set to get bigger this time. Cynics again counter this by saying that in the case of opposition candidates too, the number of wins securing more than 50% of the votes has increased from 64 in 2014 to 117 in 2019 which is more than that of the BJP in percentage terms. However, with the ruling alliance winning over many candidates/factions/parties across the Indian states to its fold quite a few of the erstwhile popular opposition candidates can turn to popular ruling candidates this time.

How big a challenge is the INDIA bloc? Well, even as the marginalization of Congress continues unabated and many parties having expressed their unwillingness either to partner with to share seats with it, the Bloc has been finding it hard to weather the storm keeping its flock together. Besides, most of the parties in the Bloc are extremely self-interested with the big few among them trying to promote their own prime ministerial candidates. And most significantly, they say an absolute ‘no’ to any leader from the Congress, particularly, Rahul Gandhi, emerging as a PM candidate. This is only natural: how could anyone earthily expect leaders like Mamata Banerjee, Arvind Kejriwal, Akhilesh Yadav among others agree to having Rahul Gandhi or even Mallikarjun Kharge as their leader should they make it to the Lok Sabha? Then the exodus from the Congress, including very senior leaders continues unabated too. Thus the possibility of the Bloc having a unanimous PM candidate remains a mirage. And, to counter a basically personality-driven party the challengers will have to find a unanimous leader—sooner than later. Not to speak of the ideologies involved. The opposition parties are united only in one issue: that the central agencies have been let loose on them with the express political aim of demoralizing or deactivating them. However, the point remains as to why such ‘vindicated’ leaders like Kejriwal are not facing up to the challenge by confronting the agencies and proving their innocence! To be on a little positive side, the Bloc of late has indeed been making some headway in the South and parts of the East and the West.

Having said all this it must be taken into consideration that the sense of overconfidence is not at all healthy under any circumstances. It would be an insult to the elections of the biggest democracy of the world by presuming it to be a foregone conclusion. One particularly should not forget the surprise loss of the visionary leader-statesman-poet-former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 2004 when his BJP’s victory was almost a foregone conclusion. The Indian elections are still immensely capable of throwing up surprises, despite all the odds. No doubt, the development story, the growth of Hindu nationalistic patriotism or jingoism, the scintillating Ram Mandir & the dream of Ram Rajya, successes in foreign policy and so on are definitely making the bonds of the electorate get warmer. But on the other hand, some of the bonds could get somewhat adversely affected too by the termination of the Electoral Bonds, the handling of the farmers’ agitation, the promulgation of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) just before the elections, taking the celebrated corrupt leaders of all time liberally into the party fold, the unabashed use of the central agencies and other issues. Besides, the BJP or the NDA still remains entirely Modi-centric. A personality-driven wave need not be repetitive all the time. So then, General Elections-2024 could still be no less than a cricket thriller! Get set and Vote!

The Endless Congress Dilemma Is Advantage BJP And A Constant Bottleneck For United Opposition!

The only political party that is always having the last laughs on the pathetically prolonged Congress dilemma and its manifestations is obviously the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and is greatly advantaged to stage a hat-trick of victory in the 2024 General Elections, even though the biggest national democratic exercise is more than two and half years away. The oldest political party of India, the Indian National Congress (INC or simply Congress), has been suffering consecutive routs in both the General Elections since 2014 and in most of the Assembly Elections in recent times, leading everyone to believe that the only second pan-India party, apart from the BJP since 2014, is caught in the throes of an irreversible decline and fall. It still remains a party bound irrevocably to the Gandhi family, despite the repeated failures of the leadership and internal conflicts led by several veteran Congress leaders called the G-23 demanding a change in leadership and holding organizational elections for more than two years now, after the debacle of the 2019 General Elections. The Congress High Command, instead of listening to their own stalwarts and discussing openly the issues, has been following a confrontational line thanks perhaps to the grand advice offered by the old guards, always supporting the Gandhi leadership in a mental framework akin almost to sycophancy and slavery.

 

The resignation of the then Congress President Rahul Gandhi after the rout in 2019 and his steadfast refusal to hold the post again, the growth of the G-23, the growing dissidence all across the country, the mess the party created in Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh losing power after coming back to electoral victories, the continuing drama in Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh and the pending meet of the Congress Working Committee (CWC) failed, as always, to convince the ‘high command’ about the urgent need for structural changes and democratic reforms within the party. Instead, the loyal old guards pitifully prayed to Rahul Gandhi to reconsider and failing to do so requested the erstwhile President Sonia Gandhi to be the interim president to which she obliged. Thanks to a caustic remark by one of the most prominent Congress veterans of the G-23, Kapil Sibal, that he was not aware about who had been the taking the party decisions as there was no permanent leadership, the ‘high command’ finally called for a CWC meeting recently.

 

But alas, no crucial decisions were taken in the meeting about making the Congress united and strong. What had been seen and heard was that Sonia Gandhi confirmed herself as a full-time president and that a new president would be elected after she complete her term which is almost one year away and during which the crucial assembly elections of Uttar Pradesh and Punjab are to take place. Lady Gandhi further accentuated the divide by telling the 23 leaders of the differently-opinionated group to approach her directly for discussions and not through the media, failing miserably to understand why at all the G-23 was forced to go to the media. The old guards again pleaded with Rahul Gandhi to resume next year to which Rahul assured of reconsideration. Of course, the CWC promised party elections and a new president during August-September, 2022. The two leaders of the G-23 who were present in the meeting, unfortunately, lacked the courage to make bold demands which raises questions about the potent political impact of the group. The party gleefully delighted about the proceedings is again the BJP, because as long as Congress remains dynastic and weak it’s their furtherance of the ambition to capture the whole of India by 2024.

 

As is now obvious, the biggest setback that looms due to the prolonged dilemma of the Congress is for the prospect of forming a national united opposition front—as an effective force to counter the BJP expansion—notwithstanding the ardent efforts of Mamata Bannerjee who defeated the BJP loud and clear in her state of West Bengal. While the Congress high command always supported Mamata’s efforts the Congress state party in West Bengal did everything for a division of votes by forming an alliance with the Communist Party-Marxist (CPM) that directly favored the BJP plunge in the state in the West Bengal Assembly Elections-2021; it is only due to the mature decision of the voters who never wanted a communal party to come to power in their secular state that helped Mamata achieving a landslide, and of course, the electoral-strategy wizard Prashant Kishore who joined Mamata’s Trinamool (grass-root) Congress (TMC) was a great help in terms of strategy and planning. Ironically, the same Prashant Kishore who expressed his willingness to join the Congress to help them lead a united opposition has still not been realized.

 

This puts all the political opposition parties of the country in a dilemma too: they realize that any united front cannot be formalized without the participation of oldest political party and its pan-India status; but as has been proved in Bihar where the promising young leader Tejashwi Yadav lost by an agonizing margin to BJP in the Bihar Assembly Elections-2020 due mainly to the non-performance of his prime ally Congress and in Assam where the Congress failed to work out an understanding with the emerging regional parties and instead joined forces with another communal party thus effectively creating a division of votes which clearly favored a worried BJP retain power in the Assam Assembly Elections-2021; barring Maharashtra where Congress is still sticking successfully to the opposition coalition government in spite of the some stray contrary comments made by its leaders now and then, in most of the other states the party has been viewed as a liability for any opposition alliance.

 

The case of the state of Punjab which is always considered the unassailable stronghold of the Congress party comes as the latest case in support of the party being called a liability and mostly, inadvertently or otherwise, favoring the BJP in expanding their roots. The Punjab crisis led to the ousting of the strong Chief Minister and Congress veteran Captain Amarinder Singh who now is reported to be moving toward joining the BJP, like numerous other promising Congress leaders leaving or planning to leave the party over the past two years. The Congress high command, mainly Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi, sided with a comically inconsistent Navjot Singh Sidhu who, even after fulfilling his target of assuming the state Congress chief post and having a change of chief minister and government, recently resigned from the post and a few days later did an about-turn rejoining his post, supposedly after his talks with the Congress ‘high command’, and in an immaculate dynastic hold the party is projecting Priyanka Gandhi as the new Chief Ministerial face for the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections early next year. Punjab too will go for assembly elections during the same time and the present Congress-created crisis favors the BJP strongly to consider make a tremendous fight to gain power for the first time.

 

Nobody can guess with conviction how and when this Congress dilemma is going to end or end the party itself from the Indian election scenario. For any tangible action by Congress one will have to wait for another year. In this perspective the role of the G-23 is crucial in trying to debate within the party and convince the party for a change that is so much needed to change its tag of an ‘unreliable ally’ in all forthcoming electoral alliances. There have been issues always to counter the ruling power: the disastrous handling of the Second Wave of COVID-19 and the vaccination hassles; the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) movement; the ever-rising fuel prices crossing the 100-rupee mark and still moving ahead; the still unresolved farmers’ agitation and the recent violence in Lakhimpur-Kheri in BJP-ruled Uttar Pradesh leading to deaths of four farmers; the increasing communal divide and lynching cases; and the alleged bulldozing of democratic norms and values. Rahul Gandhi, of course, makes the right kind of noises, but he vanishes afterward, at times into his unpredictably mysterious sabbaticals; and not allowing the Indian Parliament to function is clearly not an alternative. The oldest political party of India must introspect very intensely indeed and time is running out.  Else, the monopoly of the BJP is set to continue like a juggernaut and in the furtherance of its most loved ambition of having a one-party and much-hyped Congress-free democracy in India.

Kill Bill, Lalu Shrill, Election Drill, Voters Thrill!

As I cool my heels in my native city Guwahati make no frills about all the thrills of politicking in the meantime. Starting with the Bill or rather the Ordinance to protect convicted politicians the Prime Minister of India returned from the US and, as anticipated widely, decided to kill the Bill in his Cabinet meeting thanks to Rahul Gandhi's vitriolics. All got seemingly well between the head of the Government and the Vice President of the party that leads the Government.

As an immediate casualty of the killed bill Bihar veteran Lalu Prasad Yadav got convicted for stealing food from the animals and sentenced five years in jail. At the moment the politician is having sleepless nights thanks to the jail mosquitoes and insects that do not discriminate. Some other about to be convicted criminal politicians are fast losing hope in their own system.

And today Assembly Elections are declared for five states starting November 11 to December 4 with the date of counting fixed on 8th December--a date that could greatly impact General Elections-2014. More thrillingly for voters and non-voters, the Right to Reject is set to start with these polls. Election Commission officials point out that the electronic voting machines have an in-built system to take more options like 'None of the Above'. So, no frills, only thrills!

Right To Reject: One Historic For Voters, One Shocker From Rahul!

The Supreme Court of India gave a historic judgment today. The public litigation petition demanding the Right to Reject for voters had been pending for last nine years and Anna Hazare during his Movement against Corruption in 2011-12 made a lot of hue and cry for this too. Today the Supreme Court put its seal of approval on this. Now voters can reject all the candidates in his constituency if s/he thinks all of them are crooks and useless.  There will be a new option in the Electronic Voting Machines (EVM), ‘None Of The Above’, so that all candidates of all parties could thereby be rejected by the voter. Exactly when the EVMs are going to be adjusted or the date of effect to this decision is a matter of pure speculation at the moment.

This is basically a negative vote, but the apathetic voters now need not sit at home and abstain from their constitutional duty. They can go to the polling booths and exercise their Right to Reject by voting for the new option. Maybe Voters’ Apathy could finally be tackled effectively. This landmark judgment has huge dimensions in terms of its possible repercussions, cascading impact and the final result. Politicians of all parties have been very guarded in their reactions and justifiably so. Already haunted by the words like ‘split votes’ or ‘hung houses’ they are scared indeed at the core of their hearts as to what this may finally lead them and the country to. The Supreme Court verdicts must be respected and followed at all costs. The consternation is more due to the Assembly Elections lined up for December, 2013 and then the real humdinger of a General Election in April-May, 2014. The Supreme Court very clearly points out that voting is a constitutional right while the right to reject is always a fundamental right. For all lesser mortals it is indeed a cause for great celebration.

Although not corroborated by facts the Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi seemed to have been so very much inspired by this ‘right to reject’ that it immediately guided him making a brief appearance at an explosive press conference and rejecting the Ordinance on convicted politicians promulgated by his own government. At the Press Club in Delhi along with Congress General Secretary Ajay Maken Rahul said that the Ordinance was complete nonsense and that ‘it must be torn up and thrown in the dustbin’. He elaborated that all political parties made such compromises to suit their ends and his own party made a mistake in this same way. Just before making a dramatic exit Rahul was quick to add that this was his ‘personal opinion’. In the process he managed to shock literally everyone of all hues and colors—his own UPA government, all opposition parties, all varieties of the media and all citizens at large. Ajay Maken, continuing the press conference, supported Rahul by saying that his word is Congress policy. Several other Congress ministers followed with their support to their future poll prospect. That it has caused one more profound embarrassment for the distressed UPA government and finally the  Prime Minister who is presently in the USA is anybody’s safe guess. Some News channels have already started raging debates if the Prime Minister should really resign now. The opposition political parties including BJP especially seem to be fighting to come out of daze to properly react.

The Union Cabinet on 24^th September had cleared the Ordinance to negate another landmark judgment of the Supreme Court that struck down a provision in the electoral law which allowed a convicted MP and MLA to continue in their post if they make an appeal to a higher court within three months and ruled that if convicted for a crime with a punishment of more than two years the concerned elected members must be disqualified instantly. This verdict was hailed in all sensible quarters in the country as an effective step to counter politicians with criminal backgrounds. The Government claimed that an all-party consensus had been reached on August 13 on this issue of negating the SC verdict and the BJP was very strongly in favor of legislation. Since the bill could not be passed in Parliament the Government took the Ordinance route. In this crazy political times the BJP vociferously opposed the Ordinance and yesterday represented with the President Pranab Mukherjee to send it back. This BJP move had tremendously angered the Government who termed it as the party’s consistent ‘double standards’. Now, with Rahul Gandhi coming out in opposition it is to be seen what the Congress led UPA government finally tells the President to do. In all, both these momentous events augur well for the lesser mortals of the country like us.

Meanwhile, the eloquent Information and Broadcasting Minister, Manish Tewary, seemed to in his elements at another press conference in the capital today just preceding the Rahul one. When asked by journalists to comment on the recent statement of Narendra Modi that ‘CBI (Central Bureau of Investigation) is going to fight the coming general elections, not the Congress party’, the minister said, “At times the Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi ends up speaking the truth only. Indeed, the CBI is going to fight the elections. The ‘Communal Bureau of Instigation’ is getting ready on his behalf for this’. And then he smiled, of course.

Friday The 13th: Death For Delhi Rapists, PM For Modi And Life Ban For IPL Spot Fixers!

Friday the 13^thSeptember, 2013. If you remember the movie for the sheer horror of it you must remember this particular date for the sheer excitement of it. One-two-three…on three counts of major developments in India. This date is considered unlucky as per superstitious beliefs of Western culture, but this particular date proved auspicious and lucky on three major counts. An auspicious beginning for a rape-tormented country as all the four accused in Delhi Gangrape rape were sentenced to death by a fast-track court in Delhi. It definitely proved lucky for Narendra Modi as the faction-ridden BJP finally managed to take the bold decision of anointing him as its Prime Ministerial candidate for General Elections-2014. A triumph for all genuine cricket lovers as the disciplinary committee of the Indian Cricket Board (BCCI) imposed life bans on Sreesanth and Ankeet Chavan for Spot fixing in IPL. Proof enough to make you reconsider the scare long attached to ‘Friday the 13^th’!

Crowds Waiting For Verdict

The whole nation waited with unabated breath as the fast-track court in Delhi reserved its verdict for the afternoon of Friday the 13^th September, 2013. Finally dot at 2.30pm Indian time yesterday the court straightaway announced its verdict of death penalty for all four accused in the Delhi Gangrape case. The Bench observed that the shocking brutality involved in this case made it ‘rarest of rare’, and the criminals could not be spared the capital punishment. Whole of India welcomed the decision—the victim’s family expressing happiness at justice being given after nine months; the political parties considering it as the beginning of a new chapter for increasing conviction rate and preventive punishment in crimes against women; almost all intellectuals saying such stern measures are indeed required to instill fear into the minds of rapists and all women activists and youth leaders welcoming it as a positive step. Huge crowds gathered in front of the fast-track court demanded the same punishment to the brutal juvenilecurrently lodged in reformatory for a maximum of three years.

Modi Anointed By BJP President Rajnath Singh

If you thought the anointment of the Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi as Chairman of BJP’S Campaign Committee in June this year as the first step in eventually making him the Prime Ministerial candidate too you were almost proven wrong. Because, the BJP found itself back in square one as earlier. The pioneering BJP veteran Lal Krishna Advani who resigned from his posts prior to the earlier Modi anointment and had to be injected a series of right-wing ‘advice’ to comply opposed this time too and kept crucial senior leaders on his side.  BJP troubleshooters worked throughout the night of 12^th September and commendably succeeded in convincing senior leaders on the side of Advani to participate in the party’s Parliamentary Board meeting the next day for the formal announcement. This time the supportive right-wing organizations did not stay limited to only advice, but volleyed directly for Narendra Modi. However, the veteran still could not be won over and Advani did not participate in the Board meeting and instead shot out a strong-worded letter to the BJP President.

The BJP President said he had followed the anti-incumbency factor and the growing countrywide popularity of Modi that justified his decision. Finally around 6pm on Friday the 13^th September Narendra Modi was declared as BJP Prime Ministerial candidate for the forthcoming general elections. Old guards are getting sidelined for allowing in the new wave and this seems to be the right step. However it is naïve to think that the most powerful old guard Advani would behave nicely and cozily hereafter. Apparent divisions in BJP are speculated widely by both the media and the ruling parties particularly Congress.   With Rahul Gandhi almost projected as the UPA Prime Ministerial candidate General Elections-2013 is set to assume the form of a presidential poll like in USA. However, the states and the immense diversity of India makes any general elections altogether a different proposition blessed with glorious uncertainties. The alleged polarization factor of Modi form of politics is also another serious angle to look into.

Chavan and Sreesanth

Finally some good news for genuine cricket lovers. Two of the cricket fixers in IPL Spot Fixing Scandal, S Sreesanth and Ankeet Chavan, who were arrested and jailed in recent times, were banned for life by the disciplinary committee of the BCCI yesterday following an extensive report submitted by the anti-corruption committee of the Board.  Three others were handed lighter sentences while the fate of the king-pin spot-fixer Ajit Chandila was not yet decided. Meanwhile, Sreesanth said that he would appeal against the life ban in court.

Friday the 13^th. A date to remember. For positive reasons, not the scares!

Mumbai’s Shame! Three Arrested In Photo Journalist Gangrape!

When the national capital along with its northern allies lead the way in torturing, maiming, raping and murdering women of all possible age-groups how could the financial capital be far behind! A city boasting of being safe for women over the years has lost this tag forever as crimes against women, intimidation and murder of liberals and all kinds of mafia related shootouts increase ominously. On a more sinister note this could just be the reflection of what is going all around the country. Like the nosediving value of the Indian rupee all values of the society are plummeting to all-time lows. Greed, lust, corruption, violence, intolerance, chauvinism, perversion etc are becoming the new parameters of modern life. Why? Because, our political parties and leaders need to contest and win the General Elections-2014. Because, to achieve that goal they need to have a hopelessly divided and morally defunct society. Because, they have to impose a new ‘governance’ on us for the same ‘noble’ objectives. Our Warning:  If things are allowed to continue this way till the elections whichever political party finally manages to win will have a ruined country to rule over, plunder over and finish it all over again.

Media took the lead in building a national movement following the horrific Delhi Gangrape. Now in Mumbai the degenerated male animals decided to hit the media itself. A 22-year-old photo journalist was gangraped in the campus of an abandoned textile mill right in the heart of the city on Thursday evening. She was doing a photo shoot there for her magazine along with her male friend.  Five male animals surrounded them in the desolate area. While two of them tied up her friend the other three took turns to abuse, torture and humiliate her with no help coming from anywhere. In fact, Mumbai is littered with such abandoned textile mill campuses where only the main entrance is normally guarded and activities inside are only the occasional film and television serial shoots. Nobody in power seemed to have bothered about these veritable traps. The five animals even walked up the victims to the nearby local railway station and left them there threatening the girl that if she approached police the mobile video would be released in public. The girl was admitted in a city hospital and FIR was registered by midnight.

Outraged journalists, women activists and citizens poured into the streets on Friday organizing protest rallies and marches. Angry sentiments again pierced the whole wounded country. Fortunately, Mumbai Police swung into swift action identifying and releasing sketches of all five accused. Three accused have been arrested till today evening. However, the questions regarding justice remain as disturbing as ever despite the movement that forced the Government of India to initiate new rape laws granting capital punishment in rarest of rare cases of rape-murder.

While we all want strong laws to put fear into the minds or rapists some say awarding capital punishment would egg on prospective rapists to kill the victims in a way to eradicate all possible evidence. Some say there should be instant justice like castration or public parade, but in such cases too the rapist is likely to turn into a vengeful and dangerous killer afterwards. How fast the fast-track courts are going to be is also yet to be seen. Juvenile justice is one more vexing issue. The moot point is that police or laws cannot control greed or lust or perversion, and for that society must change from within. Male humans of the society must take and exercise absolute control of the male animals.

Reports say that the brutalized photo journalist is a braveheart fighting it out spiritedly in hospital and demanding strong punishment to all who ruined her life. We pray for her immediate recovery and expect her to lead the movement from the front.  Ensuring respect and safety for women.

India: Forget Elections, Concentrate On National Security Now!

Almost every Indian political party hopes to rule one whole nation called India and in the process of doing so through elections leaves the ‘whole’ polarized, divided, seething and disillusioned. The much cherished theme of ‘unity amidst diversity’ has always proved to be a blessing in disguise for all unscrupulous parties or politicians who never stopped exploiting  this by dividing up the ‘diversity’ just to garner votes. Politics of polarization, politics of vote banks, politics based on caste-language-religion-you know what, politics of corruption and even politics of terror have compromised National Security again and again. But the power-obsessed politicians have been totally unmindful of the seriousness of the situation, particularly now with the General Elections-2014 just round the corner. Divisive politics and a perpetually stalemated Parliament have made the country directionless and weak. A weak country is always vulnerable for any kind of attacks or calamities.

Such was the mindless politicking that even a blatantly brazen Pakistan attack violating the Line of Control (L0C) in the Poonch sector of Jammu and Kashmir on August 6, 2013 leaving five Indian soldiers dead failed to move them. Some of them tried openly to dissociate Pakistan from this calling this only a terror attack while knowing fully well that in the present times in Pakistan one cannot draw a line between the Army and the Terrorists. With the new ‘democratic’ Prime Minister Nawaz Sharief launched recently in Pakistan the ruling coalition in India considered this a right opportunity for resuming talks with their neighbor and chase the elusive peace. Right, people of both countries really want peace and harmony established as soon as possible, but that does not give anyone the excuse for glossing over a brazen, unprovoked and utterly condemnable attack. The derisive politics over the attack refuses to die down even now.

This is only logical to presume that the anti-Indian forces of Pakistan in partnership with the terrorists nourished over the years have decided this is the right time to strike lethal blows to an election-obsessed and corruption-ridden India. Starting with the dastardly attack in January this year when Pak troops beheaded Indian soldiers there have been more than fifty LoC violations and the August 6 attack is not the culmination point either with Pak unprovoked firings continuing across the border yesterday and today. We must not call it coincidental that the dreaded terrorist of 26/11 Mumbai attack Hafiz Saeed who is allowed to roam free in Pakistan has accepted this opportunity too and has issued threats of terror attacks to India. Indian intelligence alert was issued two days before about a possible terror strike in the national capital around the Independence Day. The Pak flip-flops over the issue of sheltering the Mumbai underworld Don and the mastermind of the horrific Mumbai Serial Blasts in 1993, Dawood Ibrahim, in Karachi is one more factor to be concerned about.

O’ Politicians of India! Forget elections for the moment and concentrate on National Security that is coming under increasing danger. You must be hoping to win the elections to rule a strong and united India. You ensure that first.

O’ Politicians! First try winning the confidence of your country folks before aiming to get away with their votes. We will vote only for a Strong India.

Politics: The Modi Pill!

Narendra Modi has become the classic pill that still affects you irrespective of your decision to swallow or not to swallow it. If you ignore the pill you suffer from relapse; if you swallow it and then throw it out you still suffer from wrong diagnosis and if you swallow it with a contented heart you are still not sure of escaping from its side effects.  Greatly relishing the spectacle the Congress party already quipped that the very mention of Narendra Modi’s name had made many BJP stalwarts sick unable to attend Goa meet.

For a change media attention has somewhat shifted from the still raging IPL Spot Fixing scandal and has now been totally focused on Narendra Modi—the Chief Minister of Gujarat famous for his successful development model and arguably the most controversial leader within the national opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Recently there were a few opinion polls on General Elections-2014 that forecast that with Modi as the BJP campaign leader or a declared Prime Ministerial candidate the BJP would much better to possibly form a government at the centre. Besides, Modi has also done exceptionally well in the just concluded by-elections in Gujarat sweeping all the Parliament and Assembly seats. Narendra Modi cannot be ignored anymore. The two-day National Convention of the BJP started in Goa with a pre-Convention agenda meeting yesterday. It has been widely speculated and expected that the party would take a decision this time to make Modi BJP Election Campaign leader or BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate or both.

However, things are far from easy because Narendra Modi’s record of delivering stupendous growth rate and good governance always gets weighed against his fundamentalist leanings or connections and his dubious role during communal riots in his state in 2002. BJP being a party for Hinduism with tacit blessings from various fundamentalist groups notwithstanding, some leaders within its fold vouch for a secular changeover. It knows that it cannot form a government on its own in diverse India and has to play coalition politics for its National Democratic Alliance (NDA) that brought BJP into power in 1998 and then in 1999. The NDA has other parties with secular ideologies and their own Prime Ministerial candidates too. Allies within the NDA has been fighting bitterly during the last two tumultuous years while cornering the ruling coalition again and again on new and newer scams and hardly allowing the Indian Parliament to perform. In this complex era of confrontational politics the basic reason for infighting is still Narendra Modi.

Several senior, competent and ambitious leaders within BJP make things murkier. There are two main groups—anti-Modi led by veteran LK Advani with the support of leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Shusma Swaraj, Jaswant Singh, Yashwant Sinha, Venkaiyya Naidu etc, and the pro-Modi group led by BJP national President Rajnath Singh with the support of leader of opposition in Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley, Goa Chief Minister Manohar Parikkar, for BJP President Nitin Gadkari, Rajiv Pratap Rudi and others. Speculation has reached fever pitch with several anti-Modi BJP leaders including LK Advani deciding against attending Goa convention.

The BJP must understand that it must put up a Modified front, must present a tolerably united alliance and must desist from petty politics, if it seriously wants to aim at forming a government after the 2014 General Elections.  

Politics Of Corruption: Chaos, Scams And Gates Galore!

The Indian ruling coalition, UPA-2, never faced a bigger crisis than this. Already embroiled in various scams the last few days witnessed explosions of opposition ire and an increasing threat to the very existence of the government with the prospects of General Elections-2014 getting really fluid and volatile. The opposition political parties, prominently the BJP, demand immediate resignations of two indicted central ministers linking this to the ultimate and outstandingly maintained demand for the resignation of the Indian Prime Minister. They have been stalling the proceedings of the Indian Parliament session continuously making this 15^th Parliament the lowest productive ever in terms of passing crucial bills.

The cornered Government has been trying desperately to buy time since it understands that even after sacking the two ministers the opposition would hardly stop and go vigorously after the Prime Minister—the ultimate target. The Government has also been trying to turn attention to passing Bills meant for the common people like the Food Security Bill and for this top leaders have been negotiating with the opposition to allow Parliament to function till the budget session ends on 10^thof May, 2013. But the BJP having relishing field days in opposition politics says nothing doing—first resignations, then Bills.

We have always been familiar with two Gates—the IndiaGate in Delhiand the Gateway of India in Mumbai, both being historical monuments and heritage sites. Of course, in the eighties we heard about the Bofors Gate that rattled up India for more than twenty years and proved India’s corruption capability to the world in terms of reach and volume. However, in the last two years the ‘Gates’ have multiplied banishing 'heritage' out of the window and some of them have even made Bofors look like child-play.  The Coalgate, the Railgate, the Adarsh Gate, the Chitgate and more of the like if you qualify the 2G Spectrum Scam and the Commonwealth Games Scam as Gates.

The situation is as chaotic as dangerous. You wonder, if some government officers afford to pay millions of bucks as just bribes how much s/he must be actually earning out of salaries with corruption. As corruption refuses to leave the Indian roots you tend hopelessly to lose faith in getting a job on pure merit and getting a posting as per your efficiency. If top government posts are up for outright sale what about the other jobs in others sectors of public domain? If someone buys a job for a handsome amount of cash his/her immediate urge would to be to recover that money by hook or by crook in quick time and thus fitting naturally into the vicious circle of corruption.

Talking of elections, the voters have just one option—reject the most corrupt party and vote for the less corrupt one. So sorry to say that. Hope India would finally prove us wrong. Somehow!

State Elections of India 2012: Sidelights!

Yesterday was a hectic day for all in the Indian media including this writer as counting for assembly election results of the five states of India started at 8am sharp. This was rated as the semi-final for India’s General Elections of 2014 and so the media hyperactivity and expectations were at the peak.  All news channels were live the whole day and late into the night debating, analyzing, assessing, speculating and of course reporting the trends, results and possible government formations with permutations and combinations. Not possible to give you everything here and so we have selected a few observations for you on calculations based on various exit polls going terribly or pleasantly wrong from the media point of view.

• The first state of interest was Uttar Pradesh—the biggest and politically the most important state of India. Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi campaigned extensively here to oust feudalistic and corrupt Mayawati and bring in a rejuvenated Congress. Mayawati was ousted alright, but Congress fared only marginally better than last time. Since his campaign itself was hyped his apparent defeat was hyped even more.
• Representing the young generation Rahul succeeded in only throwing out Mayawati while another young leader of Uttar Pradesh, Akhilesh Yadav—son of the former chief minister—brought his Samajwadi Party (SP) back to power. That too a landslide victory with a stunning majority when all in media were speculating about a hung assembly with immense possibilities, who can ally with whom and even imposition of President’s rule there.
• SP back in power with resounding success gave way to more speculation, because SP is considered as a party of goons and as another feudalistic force replacing the other. In fact, some journalists were attacked and taken hostage last night by SP workers. But young Akhilesh is well-educated, down-to-earth and relatively liberated. So the question is how he is going to rule the state! With his dad around live and kicking he cannot possibly become the next chief minister! And comically, the first question he faced from the media was ‘Will you destroy all the statues of Mayawati now?’ The young man said ‘No!’ Before political campaigning the Election Commission of India had ordered all statues to be veiled immediately!
• Recording an all time voting record of 81% Goa gave a clear verdict. The ruling Congress alliance was beset with problems of the illegal land mining scam and tourist security, but nobody could predict its unceremonious ousting. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) alliance got rewarded with nearly two-third majority in the 40-member Assembly.
• In Punjab it was cut-throat between Congress and Akali Dal-BJP alliance, but actually the latter secured a record number of seats coming back for the second term.
• Scam-corruption-inflation infested India’s ruling coalition is under tremendous pressure from opposition parties and the media due to poor performance of Congress. ‘What will happen to you in 2014?’ The answer is ‘No impact!’ And yes, who knows! The other question being would the newly elected parties be able to function free of the same vices!

In a true democracy you are not at all supposed to predict the citizens’ verdict. It’s because of creation of vote banks, politics of compartmentalization and polarization and the like that prediction is often accurate. If more than 80% of India decides someday to vote the result is bound to be most democratically unpredictable.