By Fabian Lyngdoh
A great deal had been aired and written in the media, local and national, about this National Election 2014. I would like to bring out something just to ponder about and occupy our minds with. All parties have brought out their election manifestos. Well we do not have the means to discuss all that, but let us examine what a genuine manifesto should be in India. By common reason we can say that the primary part of a manifesto should be to uphold the tenets of the Constitution of India to which we are all, implied signatories to. The foremost is that the party is committed to uphold India as a Secular Democratic Republic. India is a federal union, a “unity in diversity”, and established so, to prevent dictatorial usurpation of power by any centralized authority. Will party dictatorship, or party centralized authority destroy this federal character of India? According to article 51A (6), is the party genuinely interested to value and protect the rich heritage of our composite culture? Or does it seek to establish a monotonous, deadening and uniform way of living all over the Country? The party in power is to ensure to all the citizens: justice, liberty, and equality. To safeguard and to facilitate the exercise of fundamental rights enumerated in Articles 12 to 35.
The second part of the manifesto should be to fulfil the objectives of the Directive Principles of State Policy enumerated in Articles 36 t0 37. This is the practical policy of the party which is not enforceable by law but is a moral obligation to the people for seeking their support. According to Article 39, how will the party regulate the ownership and control of the means of production and distribution, prevent concentration of wealth and income, ensure their more equitable distribution, and what kind of laws would it seek to enact to protect the interests of the workers? According to Article 39A, what are the methods the party would adopt to provide equal justice (gender justice included), and free legal aid to the poor and marginalized? According to Article 40, what effective programmes would the party undertake to establish democratic decentralization in an effective manner to make the ideal of the “rule of the people” meaningful? Or does the party seek to centralize governance in the guise of party central control? According to Article 41 to 48, how will the party endeavour to provide to the people the right to work, education, health, facilities for economic development and social security to the needy, and how will it protect the interests of the minorities and backward classes, not as a prospect of vote bank politics but as a moral duty? These are the basic considerations on which a national political party in India should base its policies and reflect in its manifesto. All other details concern with the practical ways and methods how to achieve the constitutional ideals.
It is interesting to observe political debates in the media. What is interesting to note is that some section of the media already have premeditated conclusions which they seek to force the parties in the debate to arrive at. On some occasions, instead of the candidates and debaters, the media persons seem to become the show-piece and celebrities of the whole campaign. Another observation in this drama is that at the heat of the election, not only the candidates but also the electors miss the main point of why the elections are conducted at all. This election is not a competition among the candidates to win, but an issue of the people electing the right representatives. Debates and discussions tend to concentrate on the canvassing tactics of the parties, and not on the actual needs of the Country. If victory to any party is achieved through the canvassing tactics and street dramas, and not by the prospect of right policy of governance, then we would have actors in the theatre not a government.
All these electioneering tactics are possible because more than 70 percent of the people are ignorant of their democratic rights and dignity; and ignorant of the real democratic processes too. The campaigns reflect idol worship and hero worship. Tons and tons of rose petals are heaped upon the candidates by the common men in the streets! Isn’t this hero worshipping? The people still seem to rely on dynastic leadership or superhuman hero. People are looking at Sonia or Rahul as to dynastic heirs and to Narendra Modi as a hero, at whose feet they would humbly bow. It is all with the people’s psyche. If Asoka or Akbar were to return with the crowns on their heads to compete this election, or if Shah Jahan were to re-emerge and start building a second Taj Mahal at Delhi as an election campaign tactic, believe me, Modi and Sonia, and Rahul and all, would have to pack their bags and quit the elections. We Indians are by nature, devotees. We do not feel that we need a leader from amongst us to lead in a democratic way, but we need someone to worship to, and receive his or her blessings. 30 per cent of the enlightened electorate in the urban centres, even if they all wisely vote for one good party, would not be able to secure power and leadership to lead the Country unless the people are humbled to submit to someone as to a superhuman. Indian political leaders have failed to spread the real spirit of democracy among the masses. Even the Congress party which is supposed to inherit the spirit of the freedom movement has failed to democratise the Country. On the contrary, it has become itself a sort of religion with sacred cult, and with infallible priests and priestesses, and through this institutionalized political religion, centralized authority seem to have been established threatening to destroy the federal character of the Nation.
Coming to the Gandhi dynasty, Sonia, Rahul, or Priyanka cannot be compared to Mahatma Gandhi. They would indeed be sentimentally closer deep in their hearts to Pandit Nehru than to Mahatma Gandhi. They derived the title “Gandhi” not from Mahatma Gandhi himself but from a comparatively obscure family member of the Mahatma. Gandhi was a missionary and a martyr, while Nehru as a freedom fighter was also a hero and a celebrity. He was of course an ardent compatriot of Gandhi in the freedom struggle, but he and Gandhi had different mindsets as to the future character of the Country. When Gandhi was assassinated Nehru might have grieved, but as fate had it, that event was a door opened to him to establish his dynasty, but ironically, in the name of Gandhi. It seems from general opinion in the media that it is the time that this dynasty is coming to an end.
Coming to the BJP, I feel that there is nothing to fear about if it comes to power and Narendra Modi leads the government. What we should fear about is our own unreasonable fear of the future. “Que sera sera, whatever will be, will be. The future is not our’s to see, que sera sera”. We must have the courage to face the future come what may. Indian democracy needs experiments of various kinds to grow in the right direction; otherwise we will end up with a democratic government, and a democratic mindset among the few per cent high-ups, and a dynastic and feudalistic mindset among the majority of the teeming millions. Even if some members of the BJP have ulterior motives, come what may, India needs the experiment. It would not be the end of the world. Even if that would be an introduction to the end of the world, then do whatever we may, we would not be able to prevent it. Thirty years before Christ, the Roman poet, Horace wrote: Happy the man, and happy he alone, – He who can call to-day his own; – He who, secure within can say: – ‘Tomorrow do thy worst, for I have lived today’. So, que sera, sera.
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