What
the next election should be about? Will it be about dynasty or will it be about
M? Will it be about BJP being secular or JDU being communal? I hope not. Instead
what should we discuss?
I
will like the election to be about economy. In 2004-5, folks worldwide were so
confident of India’s growth story that they remarked that even a drunk pilot
cannot crash the plane. What happened after that. We did not get a drunk pilot,
instead we got a spineless pilot who was working on orders of a malevolent team
aka NAC whose prime job was to take India into dark ages. And they almost
succeeded.
I
will like the election to be about ease of doing business. Starting from 1991,
license raj started disappearing. And due to the same, slowly things started to
be happen without chai-paani. Those who think that current state is too much,
should go back to 1970s and 80s. At that time, you cannot even do anything
without the support of “Haath”. You needed to grease every palm and even after
that you could not have a viable business if you are honestly paying taxes. So
crony capitalism started to grow. But common man was unaware, he was told that
government needs to reign in on these monster businessmen. Thus when instead of
framing good banking rules, Banks were nationalized, people cheered without
realizing the damage it was doing to the economy. We added “Socialist” to the
preamble and screwed our country’s future. I want this election to be over
throwing this term into history’s dustbin.
I
will like the election to be about Poverty and malnutrition. I will like
parties to show the voters their blue-print of poverty eradication and how they
are going to fund it. Its easy to say that we will bring Food Security Bill or
increase contribution to NREGA. I will like to see how those will be funded. We
would be glossing over the matter if we allow parties to talk about the programs only.
Let them come up concrete plan on the same.
I
want this election to be over smaller government. I want my government to focus
on matters of national security and social security. And let its citizens be
free to pursue what they want to do. I want a government which will interfere
less and also strive to reduce its size. Get rid of ministries which does not
make sense. For example coal ministry. Government needs formulate a coal policy
and let private players in. Why do we need a ministry in there. A quick look at
their website suggests that it’s another Permit agency which feeds bunch of
babus & ministers.
I
want this election to be about empowering people. Its about individual freedom
and local decision making. Sitting at Delhi, we cannot expect good decisions
for people in Mizoram. Mizos need to have the decision making power on what’s
good for their state. And while doing so, Panchayats, State governments etc
need to ensure that individual freedom is not trampled upon.
I want this election to be about corruption. We have tolerated 2G, CWG, Bellary, Recruitment scams for too long. Its time to elect folks who are "relatively" clean and will also promote cleanliness in the government. Its only clean politicians who can clean the massive corrupt bureaucracy by promoting lokpal and ending license raj.
Unfortunately there is too much talk about secularism, Modi, Rahul etc in the media. As we have seen with previous elections that these do not matter. What matters is which party can convince the voters on providing for them. My wish is that voters will also start to look at the long run rather than a kilogram of rice.
