Indian Democracy Matures. The end begins.

The suspense has ended. The fizz and enigma around it however refuse to end.

So, finally the much awaited elections are over with the results that went in favour of age-old Indian National Congress. However, Congress’ victory hasn’t surprised anyone at all. It was a foregone conclusion every sundry poll analyst had scripted. What is surprising is the manner in which it has bounced back.

Without any malice toward any political party or identity, we, the concerned citizens of the largest democracy have been sobbing for the last two decades over the manner in which local and miniscule parties have mushroomed. In the name of regional politics and aspirations, most of these parties helped no one but themselves by confusing the electorates and the markets of the flourishing economy. They largely played the blackmailing game under the garb legitimized by the Indian Constitution.

The names are aplenty. The mushrooming of one-man parties harmed the Indian democracy more than anything where the sole agenda of the leaders remained safeguard of their personal interests and, more often, safeguard from the claws of laws and enforcement. The leaders lacked any vision but the fiasco of caste, community and religion. Populist agendas promising to help an identifiable set of community or interest group ruled the roost. To a great extent, neither Congress nor the key opposition parties can claim to be different. But, the real differnce lay at least in their larger outlook and national perspective on key issues of the national interest in the global context. Smaller parties not only mostly lack any vision on the same, they are even not seen to have a concrete knowledge, purpose or stand on the same. If at all they are found to be playing their cards (like in nuclear deal issue), it is a pure jingoism. The local parties (instead of regional parties, I prefer to call them local parties) have damaged the democracy. Even if the political and legal pundits may find it politically correct for anybody to be able to float a party, there must be more credible parameters for a party to be called a national party. There must be more stringent rules for leaders to (mal)practice their bargain and blackmailing game on the national scene.

The political system and parties never had their power or will. The electorates showed the way. Though it took clear 2 decades. But, India now hopes to see a goverment which will have to compromise and give less to the blackmailers and the snakes of Indian politics. Whether it is a Congress (It is more Congress than UPA now) or an NDA government, the best part is that the peoples can hope to see a government with the least destructive elements always trying to soak life out of welfare and development plans and policies. The electorates can at least hope to see some changes they deserved but were always deprived of, due to the undue demands of the opposition-like allies.

Let the government be a national identity, national body with constituency-level representatives of the peoples, instead of local goons allying at the national level and weakening the center. It is good to see some old bastions of rowdy politicians crumble. No prizes for guessing the chief rowdy right !!!

We hope to see a more stable government, even if it is not so clean. Stability will pave way for better markets and better economy. We’ll miss the dialogues by the Left which is worst represented in the Lower House but, if the Left was also going the “local” way, let it learn the hard lesson through experience. Of all the parties other than the two leading political factions, Left used to be the only party with some visible stand and dialogue on all the important issues. But, their anti-development and anti-market approach was exposed badly, leading to their debacle along with the rowdy elements.

We are sure that this is the beginning of the end of political goonism to a great extent in the country. Hopefully, good sense has prevailed and we’ll get to see a new India in the next 5 years, with a visible role and contribution of the youth in the Indian politics and vice versa.

Jai Ho.