March 15, 2012
Udupi–Chikmagalur constituency is all set for yet another Lok Sabha election. Due to the resignation of MP D V Sadananda Gowda, who was elevated to the position of the Chief Minister of Karnataka, there arose a need for a bypoll in this constituency. In a democratic country like India there should be a parliamentary representative in every Lok Sabha constituency. When there are unforeseen circumstances like the present one, there arises a need for by-election and every individual will have to accept it.
The point I would like to stress here is, will the man elected in the constituency be worth the pain the Election Commission is taking and the man power employed to shoulder the responsibility for the smooth conduct of the election, and the money that is spent or wasted for the purpose? Will the member live up to the expectations of the common man who casts his valuable vote to his candidate?
There hovers always a big question mark over the questions raised above. “The politics has lost its sanctity; money is the deciding master; only corruption wins at the end; honesty has no place in politics; politics is not for the cultured people; any man with a clean character wouldn’t turn his face towards politics even in his dream; only cut throats survive in politics, politics is a factory producing goondaism” – is the never ending futile cry that comes out from every gullet of a common man. But his cry becomes the cry in the wilderness. Is it that he doesn’t know about it? Of course he knows but still he continues to cry. And when there is election he yet again is ready to caste his “valuable vote” which he thinks is more valuable than a diamond.
There is a reason behind his thinking. He wants emancipation from his poverty. He wants to live a decent life as others do. He wants to give at least basic education to his children. He wants to own, if not in acres, a small piece of land on which he dreams of building a hut of his own with basic amenities. He is tired of dragging his feet for miles together to get only a pot full of clean drinking water. Now he wants someone to reciprocate to his ‘demands, - Oh! Sorry. I forgot that it is a sin on the part of a common man to make demands. He can only have needs which may or may not be fulfilled. That is why he is not tired of casting his vote.
Reality is a nightmare. Once elected, the representative goes away from the reach of the common man. The common man’s drudgery is never ending. The elected representative, who is suppose to ‘serve ‘ the common man revolves round the Queen Bee in order to get some personal and private favour by which he and his family and only his kith and kin benefit. Some other elected representatives, instead of striving to bring peace and harmony, will go on sowing poisonous seeds of communalism in the very fertile minds of the youth to spread violence which would create a vote bank for them forever.
When this being the virtual reality is there a need to say that the money that is spent and the man power that is deployed in the election process is an utter waste? For any election the Election Commission has to spend crores of rupees and has to employ millions of people. I am not trying to suggest that we should do away with elections. My question again is; are the elected representatives worth the money spent and the man power used?
We have witnessed the shocking realities of the elected representatives being pushed into the prisons not for trying to uphold the honour of the country like the freedom fighters did but for looting the common man and amassing huge money which cannot be spent by them or their families for generations. Still, no shame. They run to every temple, write secret letters to the Goddesses, lick the feet of the high command, threaten them at times. Why all this drama? This drama is for power and for money and not out of love and concern for the common man.
So it is the ardent prayer of every common man of Udupi – Chikmagalur Lok Sabha constituency that at least this time a friend of commoners be elected as a Member of Parliament.
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