Prof.A.N.Sadhu
Quite a few things have happened in the recent past, both, at the national level as also at the state level. It has become a matter of routine to start election campaigning a year before the Parliamentary Elections are due.
The governance and development become the least priority. The democracy in the country, has got restricted to voto-cracy. The vote bank politics engages the total attention of the political parties leaving democratic dispensation to academic debates on Media Channels. The governments get formed on mobocracy rather than on democracy. People are, helplessly, left with no option than to vote, willingly or unwillingly, for the candidates who hardly visit them after the elections and seek to learn about their concerns. The ministers remain virtually inaccessible and the PM remains engaged in building the international image and goodwill.
One of the things that happened was the no confidence motion against the government and a long debate on it. The opposition parties knowing fully well that they don’t have the numbers but even then went ahead with it with the sole objective of transforming parliament into a venue of election campaigning and not letting its precious time to be used for legislative business. The people of the country watched drama, winking, noisy scenes and painfully the declining level of parliamentary debates. Full twelve hours were consumed and the known result was officially announced thereafter.
Everything is not well in the country but opposition could not give any convincing explanation to that effect. It is a fact that government has not come up to the expectations of the people, mostly because, in its excitement, it had made tall promises to the electorate. The issue of black money has not been addressed effectively, the issue of job creation has not been pursued seriously, the inclusive growth has not been addressed institutionally and the initiatives of demonitisation and GST have not evoked the desired response. The country did receive better recognition and space at the international level. The PM did fine tune the merits of Indian culture and history but foreign countries do also have Indian markets in mind. India is a country of rich traditions and strong cultural base of thousands of years but the distortions that have set in are taking a heavy toll on our civility. The violence, in the land of Budha and Gandhi, is on an increase, the crime against women is rising, the lynching is a barbarian act, the widening gap between the rulers and the ruled is leading to the emergence of a political scenario which is neither healthy nor sustainable. It is fraught with the danger of anarchy. It is rightly observed by Professor Vitvanathan of Jindal Global University, “this would be one of the great ironies of modern democracy, requiring in this case not satire but a sociological analysis of how a tolerant India, unless checked in time, could become a Republic of the Mob”. People take law into their hands and do not show the regard for rules and regulations. Polarisation in a country of vast diversity of region, race, culture and language does not augur well for stable country committed to high rate of growth and world leadership.
He further remarks that “when rationality loses to hysteria, democracy becomes mobocracy”. On the economic front, it is a mixed bag high rate of growth with high rate of inflation, high rate of unemployment and high rate of confusion about the arrival of “Achhe Din”.
At the state level, there is not much to feel proud about. There is confusion, there is instability and there is fragile security environment. The alliance Government had started with promises of making life better in all the regions of the state and it collapsed on the perceived assessment that neither of the regions got served. The state did witness neither the governance nor the development. Expediency than ideology become the basis for decision making. The common perception that no serious effort was made to address the problems of the sensitive state is gaining ground as the graph of violence has sloped upwards than sloping down. Border skirmishes have increased and sense of insecurity has deepened. The trust deficit seems to have widened and game of politically engineering the permutations and combinations is making rounds. The emerging political scenario is totally confusing.
The regional resentment is growing even though for different reasons. Jammu, as is believed, never got a fair deal and therefore the people of the region are organizing themselves in a more rigorous arrangement to seek justice for its people. As of now, the political environment is tending to be more complex and confusing.
Even though the state can wait for elections for some more time and let the governor’s rule stay longer to ensure a fair and efficient Governance, but political activity does not come to stand still. How do the political parties react to such a situation shall depend upon political maturity and honesty of purpose to straighten the cob-webs and establish the rule of law for more governance than the Government. The state needs a mature leadership to steer it through these difficult times. Spirit of accommodation than hard stances is required to open new ways of addressing the states concerns objectively for a fair resolution of the complexities that have gripped the state up till now. The civil society will have to rise to the occasion and strive for peaceful and developed state for the progeny. In this fast changing world, let us not be caught unawares.
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