Sunday, May 31, 2009

"HDKBDimpledDarling-united India-in-voting-for-a-majority-for-a-party-thereby-making-sure-there-is-a-stable-government-for-5-years"

SAY THAT FAST 15 TIMES. SAY IT AND BELIEVE THE TRUTH! BOLO JI, BOLO! ALL TOGETHER NOW.....

As I see it, Hamarey desh ka beta, the dimpled darling is still being kept on a leash. So sad na? So sad for us actually.

Party mascot and all is just fine, but I would like for him to take up a position where he is ACTUALLY ACCOUNTABLE to the people who vote for what he represents. Party positions are completely meaningless (party president/"working for the youth"/party peon) unless he is accountable to taxpayers and voters. Let him head (or frankly even just work on) a commission/body/movement/even chotta mota ministry that is publicly funded and produces a report, or a quantifiable report or result. Let him show his mettle in political and administrative skirmishes. Let people ask him questions about performance. Let us be the judge of whether he knows what is involved in actually running India. Being annointed scion means more than sleeping on charpois, mild mannered sensible answers... which is expected, not exceptional... at interviews, a carefully written speech or two in parliament and a carefully orchestrated image campaign.

To say in broad strokes that "HDKBDimpledDarling-united India-in-voting-for-a-majority-for-a-party-thereby-making-sure-there-is-a-stable-government-for-5-years-to-ensure-projects-get-done" may be statistically true. By the way can you say that Mantra 15times fast just so you will memorise it and always believe that truth?

However that fact is no different for example from Kareena Kapoor being the face for a condom advertising campaign and making said campaign successful. It says nothing about how Kareena Kapoor is managing the condom sales or the supply chain for increased condom production due to projected increased sales or whether Kareena knows how to negotiate for a good price for latex. Because you see Kareena Kapoor is not actually designing or producing or touching the condom you are going to be using. There... I probably dashed the hot dreams of a few people!

But politics is like that. It can be completely divorced from governance. It can be divorced from the people being admininstered. It can be far removed from the nitty gritty of managing how to make your and my life better or even not letting our lives slide backwards. That is what I fear the Congress Party and the personality cult of Dimpled Darling have done to us. It is "team mascotgiri", without the player going on the field and sweating and coming up bruised and scratched but with quantifiable points. He has not even been in political skirmishes yet, never mind governance ones.

Do we make leeway for his "inexperience and youth"? To be perfectly honest the man is a "chaalis saal ka ghoda" hardly a youth or someone who still needs training! At his age, exceptional people should have already shown thier true mettle and shown what skill set they are capable of. Apart from image, "party mascotgiri" and non quantifiable "working for the youth" I am not seeing the very obvious markers of what will make him an exemplary future leader of a billion people.

And yes, I expect EXEMPLARY indicators from someone who accepts his annointment as the future PM with so much entitlement. He needs to be good, better than good, he needs to exceptional. He needs for us to see what he is capable of. Nay, we should demand to see that, before we start genuflecting to yet another restructed generation of the Nehru/Gandhi Political Enterprises Limited. Yeah, I said Limited, because it is literally that! It becomes even more Limited when we begin to say Brand Rahul is Brand India.