Politics!!! Phew!!!

Currently looking at the presidential battle in the US makes me compare it to the situation back home. How different is India from the US politically? Is the politics played out better or worse? Is anything different at all?

Politicians, no matter which place they are from, have an innate ability to convince people that trivial inconsequential matters drive their day to day business. In any place with moderates and extremists in equal number, promises made about controversial issues during the elections are more often than not put on the back-burner post-elections. BJP cannot go against the law and build a Ram Mandir in Ayodhya without consensus. Neither can the GOP overturn Roe vs Wade without getting buy-in from people across the table. And even if they do so, well we are not gonna see the basic problems plaguing the respective countries go away.

The one thing I think will help India, is to have a Presidential system. The current parliamentary system acts as a good deterrent to unpopular or partisan policies. But the multi-party system is stifling democracy and giving horse-traders the opportunity to be king-makers. Every election the number of parties in the fray seems to have doubled. As a result, there is no clear path that a ruling party can take to mitigate a coup of sorts midway through its term. Every now and then, there are people like Deve Gowda propped up to the hot seat due to coalition politics rather than their capability. This not only cripples the country's image but also is a big impediment to a stable leadership.

Having said that, its a wonder that a country can exist with so many diverse languages, cultures, mentalities and classes of people. Even so, every political party in India is set-up to celebrate or counter a single thread of these diversities. None of them have embraced a multi-ethnicity mission to celebrate India's diversity. You have Telugu Desam for Andhra Pradesh, Bahujan Samaj Party for Dalits, Shiv Sena for Maharashtrians, J&K National Conference for Jammu Kashmir and the Commmunist Parties for the insane. This has made it very difficult for any new leader to make it to the national scene before he\she is a septuagenarian. Decades go by before the person is popular in the district, state and country. The only way that has changed over time is when there is a generational passing of the Baton from the popular old leader to his/her kin. Initially, I thought its pretty plain and simple in the US: Republicans and Democrats. Well guess not, there is pro-life, pro-choice, liberal, right, center, left, right centrist, libertarian and what not. The only divergence is that the lack of linguistic differences helps politicians transcend geographical boundaries. But, it is still rare for someone non-mainstream to get elected. The one thing that gives India an edge over the US in some way is the lack or weakness of the glass ceiling for women in the political space. India has had women governing various levels of the government, including the highest office.

What I have realized is human beings tend to connect with someone from their clan instantly. Every citizen wants someone with a common thread connecting him or her with the leader he or she elects. For Indians, the leader being Indian is last on the list of commonalities. Ideology has little to do with this decision. People just want someone who looks and acts like they do. Laloo Yadav has made a living out of acting like a village bumpkin all his political life so as to be accepted by his base. In the US as well, people want someone just like them. Its a sin being elite. Why would one want someone with a higher intellectual capability in the most important office in the country? Wouldn't it be better to support someone who knows how to tend to cows or ride horses? Well, people everywhere work the same way I guess.

A Thousand Splendid Suns

This was probably the book which was on my To-Read list for the longest period of time. Finally I ended up reading it and it was worth every bit of praise showered upon it. So instead of giving away the plot (not that it's a whodunnit), I would like to thank Khalid Hosseini (hope i got the spelling right) for being able to write from a woman's perspective though being from the weaker sex himself. You heard me right! For all that we know, physical strength is highly overrated!

Words flow like human emotions in this amazing book. The thing that impressed me the most was that the book manages to emulate the human mind so well. Most of the times, the characters are in a conversation and their mind is playing some different track on them. And you as a reader are drawn to the thoughts more than the conversation. As with Kite Runner, you can almost guess what is on the horizon in terms of the story line. Still you read and anxiously wait for it to unfold. Unlike the Kite Runner, there is a silver lining to the cloud. So those who get depressed by the way it goes, stay tuned coz this one does have a 'happily ever after'.