Time for deep introspection
An amoral approach to politics?
Yes, Indian democracy is turning into an oligarchy!
See the rise in crorepatis, criminals and dynastic heirs in elections!
How the Sonia-Singh dispensation has brought about a corrupt political class nexus with corporate power. P.Sainath in The Hindu says how the top two CEOs helped to save the Singh government survive the trust vote in 2008!
Here what we have except political dynasties?
In Europe the parties alternate between Right and Left. Here we have an unholy alliance with the corporate families and the political families, right? This is true for the Congress, for the Samajwadis and every other parties!
In addition, we have not even committed politicians, just bureaucrats-turned politicians or upstart lateral entrants. They bypass the traditional party men and women and they usurp power for no legitimate commitments to the poor or the downtrodden. That results into more regressive inequalities, growing inequitable distribution of wealth and also a flawed conception of what constitutes economic well-being and a shared national vision.
Where ideology is over-looked it is the opportunists and the power-brokers and the sundry men and women now in power are the result. Sycophancy at its worst is the current scenario in Delhi.
What values drive our national vision? Anyone spells out?
The new Prime Minister has a pedigree, his father and grandfather were Prime Ministers and in a way Greek politics now looks like a dynastic politics like in India!
But the political parties and their political culture in Europe is very far from the Indian pattern. Here, we have a very strange political culture.
In the name of aam aadmi
Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and Manmohan Singh only cleared tickets to these MPs and MLAs, right?
So, they have to bear responsibility and also owe an
explanation to the `aam aadmi’ in whose name they sought votes and taken in these policymakers and decision
makers! Unless there is a basic ideological commitment to basic values, then, not just Maoist/Naxal violence, there is every danger our polity might even derail and lead the country into unsavoury political paths.
Even in UK where the fight is between the Labour and the Conservatives and even in small countries like Spain, Italy and latest in Portugal, there is a strong tradition of left, now the Portugal Socialist party, centre-left won, Jose Socrates, the Prime Minister is back in power, and the centre-right in Portugal is Social Democrats.
Why I refer to these older political parties, parties that have strong roots in well-defined and well-governed Europe, is that they have some clearly articulated attitudes to politics and governance. We have the Indian National Congress which is both and right and left!
Neither the Prime Minister nor Sonia Gandhi, not to mention the President and other luminaries (there are too many in the PM’s inner circles) care to comment or engage the public concern at the rather deteriorating (what else we can say at the stand still performance?)State of affairs, be it equity or access or strategy or allocations of funds.
Then comes the news about the austerity drive that turned to be a farce and a joke and much twittering!
To compound the growing murkiness of Indian politics, Sonia Gandhi also seem to be contributing increasingly with her ,first, nomination of the President’s own son against a sitting Congress MLA and also an incumbent minister of some standing.
Now, we can see there is a tendency within the Congress party to go for the most brazen trends in politics, every other minister has his or her son or daughter nominated to contest elections.
If this trend continues or allowed to continue, sooner rather than later, the quality of Indian politics will deteriorate and degenerate to the point of parties becoming just oligarchies and the entire public realm, the public funds too would be controlled and distributed among the political elites.
What the Congress party is doing would be only imitated by the other parties, this is already happening in the NCP, Samajwadi party, in the dominant Maharashtrian parties. As for the regional parties, the trend has already reached its limits as in the DMK and others. So, the question to be asked at this point of time, in the way the Indian polity is governed is: what is the current and the immediate future of the Congress party?
Media
Media is no more the message! It is media, the massage!
Be it Rahul Gandhi’s build-up or Manmohan Singh getting a favourable coverage, the Indian media is very obliging and very timid. Says Partha Chatterjee, the media critic and observer writing from New York.
Even with India, P.Sainath of The Hindu again bared it all in his expose on the just concluded Maharashtra Assembly election where the rich and powerful MLA candidates, the rebels, too poured money for media coverage and the media made its kill!
This is a serious question for any expediency or non-concern might contribute to further deterioration of the quality of politics and governance in the country. India is the largest democracy and India is often compared with China which has just now celebrated its 60th anniversary of its founding. The political and ideological issues have to be debated by our intellectuals in a much more systematic way. Besides our NRI intellectuals too seem to have no clear views, not much positive views on India’s future.
Now, is India a Democracy? In what many ways? In what many ways it fails the test of democracy and democratic governance? Is India a Socialist Democracy or a Democratic Social liberalist country?
In my view, the very democratic process we have been adopting, to have Prime Minister nominated, Sonia Gandhi retaining all powers is an anachronism. This reality we have to confront sooner than later.
The Congress party as well must adhere to its old traditions. There must be democratic process at all levels. India is a large and a diversified country. The states must have autonomy; national level parties must have autonomous PCCs and party elections as well.
There is an urgent need to political reforms, constitutional reforms, and electoral reforms. We can’t have a democracy like a shadowy Russian or other inherently contradictory values, where much arbitrary power is exercised by extra-constitutional authorities. It is time, the Congress party and its Working Committee ponders over reorganising the party structure, more on liberal and genuine democratic basis.
Source : Agriculture & Industry Survey