Some stray thoughts for the day
1 The political scene in India is getting hot with the dates of the 2024 General Elections announced by the Election Commission of India (ECI). Along with the election for Lok Sabha, a few state assemblies are also going for poll simultaneously.
2 This time elections are going to be interesting as the BJP along with their allies (NDA) are aiming to come back to power for the 3rd time continuously. The INDI alliance cobbled by many opposition parties has failed to get started on a proper footing. Congress, which is at present the leading opposition party and which ruled the country for more than five decades is totally in disarray, as its President Mallikarjun Khadge hardly has a say in party affairs, which is under the control of Sonia Gandhi and her family. The Congress’s projected leader for PM’s post Rahul Gandhi is busy with his ‘Nyay Jodo Yatra’. From the opposition Congress party can only claim to be a pan-India party.
3 What to talk about other opposition parties, the main problem with them is that they are confined to the state level only, like AAP in Delhi and Punjab, SP only in Uttar Pradesh, TMC only in West Bengal, JMM only in Jharkhand, DMK only in Tamilnadu, YRS Congress only in Andhra & Telengana, and Left only in Kerala and certain parts of eastern India.
4 The problem with most of these opposition parties is that they are not ready to share the seats with other parties of INDI alliance in their dominant state.
5 The main problem with INDI alliance that they do not have any concrete agenda for the development of the country, their only agenda is to oust PM Modi and NDA from the power. This type of experiment has failed multiple times in the past.
6 On the other hand the NDA under the leadership of Narendra Modi is going ahead with their development agenda, and informing the voters what they done for India’s development/improvement in the last 10 years. The BJP’s program for this election is to win 370+ seats for themselves, and with NDA cross 400 seats mark, a very high ambitious target.
7 INDI alliance has not set any such target, so how can they dream of coming to power?
The above thoughts are related to the next general elections. Here are few more thoughts on the present scenario in the country
1 It looks like any law passed by the Parliament is being challenged by the opposition through PIL in the Supreme Court (SC). Anything government announces, immediately there is PIL/petition against it in High Court (HC) or SC. Sometimes I feel whether SC is running the country?
2 There is petition against the implementing CAA in the SC, the fact is that CAA is passed by the both houses of Parliament and endorsed by the President, and subsequently even the SC confirmed its validity as per the constitution. Then why there should be petition for stopping its implementation.
3 Yesterday the earnest judges of the SC commented, on the issue of when there is break in the political party and the Election Commission recognizes the faction which has more MPs and MLAs as the real party, as it is the mockery of democracy and injustice to the voters. In the case of both Shiv Sena and NCP, after the break up the factions which are led by not the original founder family are recognized as the real one on the basis of their strength of MPs and MLAs. The case of these break ups even went to the SC, and in the end endorsed the ECI’s decision.
4 In my opinion the real mockery of democracy happens, when two parties in pre poll alliance fight the election jointly and win the majority in state assembly, and then one party backs out of the alliance so that the leader of their party gets CMs post although the other alliance partner is having double the seats. And then the party joins with other parties ( against whom they have earlier jointly fought election) for getting CM post for their leader. This is real mockery of the democracy and the real injustice to the voters. Here I am referring to Uddhav Thackery( head of Original Shiv Sena) who ditched the BJP after the state election in Maharashtra in 2019.
5 Now IPL is going to start, and there will be matches during election period also. With water shortages looming in many states of India, are they going to shift the matches from those states having water shortage, like it happened few years back? A point worth pondering over.
Waiting for your feedback on this blog.
Anil Malik
Mumbai, India
20th March 2024.