Indian Election 2009

Again it is time for massive Indian election. We love elections because this is the time when money comes out from politicians. Poor and poorest people get good food and some money and some new cloths at this election time. Indian election is a largest democracy process in this world. There are 700 million eligible voters with 800K polling stations. Consistently 60% of people cast their ballets to select a majority party to form next government.From 1950 to 1990, Congress was the monopoly to rule India but now we have 150 plus major and regional parties to contesting in election and a team of political parties form the government. One of advantage is, we have a representation of all regional and state in Indian central government but a major drawback is building consensus among diversified political parties is huge and time consuming process.

During this election, i found that Indian politicians are at trouble because of inflammatory talks. Election Commission and local authorities are too harsh to punish this behavior. Actually i know some of my Indian friends, they feel offended if i offer a beer when they visited my home, so the point is, we are very sensitive on many matters hence if we start harassing people for sensitive talks at political meeting, we will not reach the destiny. The duty of Election Commission is to contact the election NOT imposing rules.

Actually political meeting at India is big deal, because politicians should change the context quickly. In the state of Kerala one should not speak about capitalism because most of them are communists, in state of Tamil Nadu one should not speak about Hinduism because most of them are non-believers, in state of Bihar one should speak about AK-47 because most of them are gun lovers. But some naïve politicians may not have the experience of, what to talk and how to polish the talk, which creates some issues, but election commission and media should not take that serious, may be a hefty fine, open apology and strict warning is enough for first time. The meeting is the connecting point between politicians and their followers hence too many restrictions creates some negatives at long run, let them talk freely. The restriction creates fear, fear creates controlled behavior, and controlled behavior hides original personality, hence we might end up selecting a wrong person to represent us.

Resources:

1. Excellent source for Indian Election 2009 from Google :

http://www.google.co.in/intl/en/landing/loksabha2009/

2. Another excellent one from Yahoo :

http://in.elections.yahoo.com/

3. BBC Indian Election home page :

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/south_asia/2009/india_election/default.stm

4. Indian Election Commission home page :

http://eci.nic.in/

5. Extensive India election coverage :

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/