Election Days are here .But I am in a dilemma.Everyone tells me that I must vote. There are even leaders exhorting their followers to vote twice. My dilemma is that I am finding it difficult to find a suitable party,or candidate to vote for,even once.
If I vote for the Congress, I wonder,would I be seen as tacitly supporting corruption,or help perpetuating a family legacy,instead of meritocracy? If I vote for the BJP,would I be termed non-secular; if I don’t vote BJP, would I be seen as anti-development? If I vote for AAP, I could call myself an aam aadmi, but then,I wonder,am I voting for anarchy, or as my friend,(a Namo admirer) says, for the Congress’s B-Team? Given all this confusion now, if I don’t vote,at all,I will be,as per ancient Greek practice,be labelled an ‘idiot’.
To add further to my woes,or let's say charitably,to reduce my confusion,if I decide to keep political parties aside,as also the murderers, looters and cheats, whom some of the parties have fielded,… and vote,based on the merits of a candidate,there are all sorts of candidates in the fray: poets, billionaires,musicians,item girls,journalists,vigilantes,actors,maharanis … .,none of them,in my view, with any credible track record of public service,or governance,and suitable enough to entrust my precious vote with. So was Rule 49-O earlier,(the Supreme Court set it aside)and now is NOTA(None Of The Above) options,then the way forward?
The Election Commission had clarified in the 2013 November-December assembly elections,that in the extreme case of the NOTA option polling ‘more’ votes than ‘any’ of the candidates in the fray,the candidate,who gets the maximum number of votes will be declared the winner.This interpretation seems to hold, for the coming Lok Sabha elections, as well.
So unfortunately,here again,we have a situation,where NOTA,as a principle wins,but NOTA as a mechanism in operation,loses(somewhat like the obverse of that Fair &Lovely Ad on Television: F&L lost, but F&L won).There won’t be re-elections,with fresh candidates,even if NOTA gets a majority,the ideal way to proceed in a democracy.
Perhaps,a hypothetical situation.After all,it is always the brute majority that wins elections.And in India,there is no dearth of money and muscle power,.freebies and liquor,……religious,and caste politics,……. and if not any of these, …….die-hard fanatics for all the political parties,in each of their respective constituencies,supporting candidates,to get over,or around even well-intentioned NOTAs.
After all,how could I forget that it is the NETAS,who rule the roost,in India,and not NOTAS?
So I am back to Square One!And this election day dilemma continues,…….as do the many other conundrums of my life.
