This article is directed to all those youngistanis of this country on why voting is so important. I’ve seen quite a lot of you joining the protests with Anna Hazare, whether in person, in social networking sites or even discussing it in your college canteens. Well you have made a beginning and I’m happy about it.
Election for most of you is a waste of Money and time. You are not interested in politics or politicians (‘coz you think they are all alike and dirty to the nose). You don’t care who wins or loses. In fact most of you do not know who your local corporator, MLA or MP is. You are not interested in voting except for the first time for the sheer experience of it. But standing in a queue puts you off. Better if they had online voting as there you don’t mind spending hours at a stretch gazing at the stationery screen or better if voting was conducted in a mall.
You love wearing branded clothes, shoes, accessories, hanging out in malls, zipping around on fast bikes, eating Macs or KFCs, watching all those teeny whacky stuff on TV, texting with your eyes closed on the cell, browsing high speed internet, online banking, online railway booking(!!!), almost every Indian family having someone work for an MNC or is based in one of the developed nations. Have you ever asked yourself that if our political system was indeed so bad then how come you are able to do all these which were unheard of during your parents or grandparents times?
Has it come to your attention that our good neighbor Mr.Pakistan celebrates their independence day one day prior to us? Then how come that country is in such shambles as you must be reading in the newspapers? So aren’t you thankful that you have reached a phase which ain’t that bad? So, did it happen without politics or politicians? Of course it was the same heroes and heroines who brought us till here.
I know… I know… then why do they have to be so corrupt? Corrupt to a magnitude of unimaginable proportions? What do they do with that kind of money? The Commonwealth scam ran into few hundred Lakh Crores. Many of you might have counted the zeros at that time. At least I did.
This system of remaining in power is a very complicated one in India. With such diverse population as ours, election campaigns are very complicated. AND VERY VERY COSTLY.
Let me take an effort to put this across to you. Unfortunately we are today no more a “unity in diversity” India. We are more of a “Diversity in Unity” India. Thanks to politics, you are no more an Indian, you are either a North Indian, a Tamilian, a Hindu, a Muslim, SC ST, a caste Vokkaliga or a Jat, a Kannadiga, a Marathi etc.,
There is a word in use in Sales and Marketing called “Target Consumers”. For example the target consumer of an Audi car is high a High Nett worth Individual (HNI), whereas the Maruti Alto is to the middle and lower middle class segment. Similarly, religion and caste are so deep rooted in Indian Politics that the “Target voters” are classified along caste and religious lines.
Politics is no longer a passion, an innate human leadership quality. It is more of an investment; and an expensive one at that. Politics involves money. Money buys power. So there is no scope for qualification as criteria.
Understanding the life of a politician. A person “X” who is interested to contest an election in the constituency “K” tries to get endorsed by a party which makes his candidature to carry a brand name of that party. Here half the battle is won. So you might have heard the terminology “ticket”. So if a person has to get a “ticket” by a leading recognized party, he has to literally nudge around with other aspirants for the same constituency. He has to carry seed money to the High Command, buy some recommendations, and carry some supporters, camp shamelessly outside the party headquarters. This is just initial money. When finally getting the ticket he has to shell out a hell lot.
Once the ticket is got, he files his nomination and then the whole drama of wooing the voter begins. He has to spend lavishly on his cronies, publicity materials, police, bureaucrats, liquor, food, fake voters, fake voter cards, cash for vote, vehicles, campaigns etc., etc., On an average it is said that each candidate of national level parties spend about 30-50 Crores depending on the constituency, regional parties around 5-10 Crores and independents around 1-3 Crores. So on an average, each constituency should be spending some 40 Crores. This apart, the government spends a fortune to conduct election in its part. Now multiply the figure by 552 parliamentary seats. Take out your calculator and guess the kind of money we are speaking about!
So when a candidate spends that kind of money, he has to recover it, doesn’t he? He also has to contribute to his party for retaining his “ticket” for the next time. He has to amass money to contest again the next time for himself and for his kith and kin. That apart he has to have money for his personal splurging. That is the reason; the poor guy has to be corrupt. Not his fault. He makes this money by gulping down most of the money which is allocated for the development of his constituency. For example allocation for road, water, sewerage, lake development etc.,
When the past history of this country for voting is around 45%, the candidate very well knows that you educated class whose population is much lesser cannot be bought. His vote bank is different class. So his focus is on those strata of the society who can be bought and do 100% vote.
Mathematically speaking if in an area of 100; 50 of them are middle and upper middle class and 50 of them are lower class , with an average of 50% voting turnout in the past, all he has to do is concentrate on this 50 people of lower class and influence their votes. They can be pleased with money, liquor and small little favours. He very well knows that most of you guys don’t vote. So your demands are of no consequence to him. You go and ask him a favour, he need not respond.
How does your voting change all this? Well… if there is 90-95% voter turnout, it is of no consequence how much money does the candidate spend. Because now that his “Target voter” base is almost the entire constituency, he has to keep everyone pleased. Now he cannot dare displease you. He is suddenly accessible to you. Now he knows that you will not vote for him if he acts cranky. The allocated works seem to happen in time and proportion. There seems to be less opportunity for corruption. Lesser corruption is lesser income which in turn is lesser spend.
The candidate no more sees this as a lucrative business model. So you start getting genuine people into politics or at least the candidates start working genuinely. To quote you the prime example is the TN assembly election of 2011. Karunanidhi having done good work in the state, having doled out freebies to the “Mass class”, being in power could not win power this time. All because there was a 75% voter turnout this time. His “family politics” and allegation of corruption got to him. Not that Jayalalitha is any better, but she would be careful this time.
So youngistan, go get yourself enrolled into the voter list first. It’s ONLINE now. And then do vote… which is your fundamental right and see the change. Your voice will be heard this time. INVOLVE!
