Last evening, I was keenly watching the proceedings of what the eponymous Maoists called “pigsty” in action. Let me first place on record my concurrence with Mr. Chidambaram, his anger at being referred to as a pig is justified, I would call it necropolis rather than pigsty most of the time. But characterization of the once great institution is not the objective of this effort and I digress as usual. What caught my attention, the root cause of this article and you pain thereof, was one point made by Mr. Laluji towards the end of the debate. He said, and although I don’t quote, I am trying not to misquote, he said “As I have asked Mr. Home Minister before, he must call an all party meet and discuss this issue. There are a lot of things that we cannot state openly here.” To this Mr. Chidambaram replied without missing a beat, “I will discuss with the Prime Minister and get back to you.”
What shocked me was the brazenness and utter callousness with which the statement was made, received and replied to. On one hand you had a debate whose cornerstone was the sanctity of democracy and transparency and on the other you had politicians clearly and unabashedly wanting to hide discussions and information from the public. It’s an open secret that there is a lot hidden from public eyes, what is distressing is that the modern day legislators are not willing to give the opacity in public administration even a semblance of a secret. Would you like to know the biggest threats to the Indian democracy? – its biggest benefactors, the politicians.
Until yesterday, whenever I heard Mr. Chidambaram use his “Us Vs Them” rhetoric, I considered myself to be a part of the “us”; that by the “us”, he referred to the entire fed up/disillusioned/not yet disillusioned but still horrified Indian populace. Yet if you read through Chidambaram “Us vs Them” statement presented in the Parliament, you realize there are now three section where previously there were two – the “Us”(Hon. Parliamentarians and their ilk), the “Them”(Hon. Maoists and their loyal fans) and a third “neither us nor them” (typically you and me - plz note there is no Hon. for this category). And all of sudden I am wondering that if I am not a stakeholder in the conflict, why is it that I should be the worst affected? Mr. Chidambaram says he is not afraid of the Maoists. I wouldn’t be too, if I had a battalion of the best trained men armed to teeth protecting my sorry posterior. Mr. Chidambaram, I am sorry to say, but you ought to be saying “We Indians are not afraid of facing the Maoists”.
I had, in all my ignorance, assumed that Maoist presented a danger to the concept of India; it is now clear that they too believe in the concept of India, only India with a different system of governance. I ask you, Is that too bad? What I mean is that as a system of governance, democracy needn’t be the best. And that too in a day and time when people are openly speculating that one Mr. Tharoor Tweet will not be pressurized too badly to come open with his dealings in the murky world of IPL; the reason being too many of his brethren have “innocent” dealings in the same arena. If these are the gladiators, why don’t we abandon the sport?
Let me clarify and I state this with my hand held against my heart, I am against Maoism. But this doesn’t mean I root for democracy. I now wonder if we wouldn’t be better off minding our affairs for the most part, a division of populace into rulers and ruled-overs clearly isn’t working.
Going through my recent posts would convince you that you could lay your hands on a potential Maoist. Let your mind be at ease, because all said and done, I am a typical Indian, an insufferable know it all who is ready to provide a cynical snide for anything under the sun but unwilling to move even a finger towards changing what he detests. Yet I think there is one change that I ought to bring about - I think its time I change the distinctly political nature of recent posts. The blog now seems more like a propaganda machine than humorous expression of candid thoughts of an overly cynical mind. I would, from now on, prefer apolitical expression, like essays on my grandma and the color of rose. If any of you find political leanings in that, please do indicate the same; I would, as usual, bend backwards to accommodate all your views.
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