Elections, 2009: the big power game is here!
Unprincipled alliances, yes, that is election is all about!
But India needs to follow principles!
Indian Prime Minister, whoever he or she is, must adhere to some principles!
Yes, the time is here right now. We are somehow come to have a government in India that is while being democratic in form, it is not in spirit!
There is an unelected Prime Minister who has come to mean many things to many people in India.
A Prime Minister just as a cover for the arbitrary exercise of power by one individual, one family that seems to own the Indian National Congress leaves a bitter taste indeed.
Now, with the elections on the way, will there be any change in the grand scheme of India? Not very likely. There are, if any, only unprincipled alliances.
What is common now between the Congress and Trinamul Congress?
Or for the matter, between the Congress and the DMK? Or for the Sharad Pawar and the Shiv Sena? Or, for the CPI (M) and Jayalalitha who had openly invited the Congress to align with her. Or for Deve Gowda, who in the morning was negotiating with the Congress and once the announcement of elections were made joined hands with the Third Front?
So, here is a great danger waiting to hit Indian value systems. Then, who cares?
Yes, that is the attitude! No. That has a danger whose potential can be unpredicted. Who knows, given Sonia Gandhi’s series of missteps, that is the very generous way of saying things, there have been so many contradictions and distortions that have been built into the Indian polity.
The spaces that were distinct in the separation of powers under the Constitution are now missed and there is a great deal of arbitrary and personal power that is centered on one individual: Sonia Gandhi.
She is no Indira Gandhi either. Nor is she capable of understanding India well either. India is a great and diverse country. India has so many new challenges; she is not at all capable of leading the country through some principled path.
There are so many ominous signs.
She is not even capable of growing the party that got independence in the major states where it was once the strong force. So, she is destroying the Indian National Congress in serious ways.
The party is also not democratically constituted.
There are no ideological articulations.
There are too many careerists in the party holding crucial powers.
The high Constitutional offices are handed over to sort of subservient individuals.
The mood of the country is one of hopes and also depression, more so in the current economic environment where some 10 lakh jobs of mostly youth are hit.
There is unemployment syndrome that is gripping the country.
There is a need to give new hopes and new aspirations and new articulations to lift the country out of the current sullen mood.
Surely, Manmohan Singh must call it a day. He must not be seen as acting in secret understanding with Sonia to promote her young son to the highest post in the country. The past is a warning. So, let not everyone of us join in the current mindless chorus of getting Rahul Gandhi elected to the Prime Minister’s job. Not right now. Time is there yet for him.
Now, we need a Prime Minister who has some personal principles of conduct for himself or herself. This is absolute minim um for any gentlemen to aspire for the position of Prime Minister.
The Indian Prime Minister must be a person who has public stature. He must know the world, must be capable of engaging a leader of the stature of Barack Obama, the US President.
Who has such a stature in the present context?
No one as we see right now. A true leader emerges only through a democratically elected process.