In this longish general election season that has coincided with a terrible heat wave, a narrative has been built that voting is a sacred duty of each and every citizen. Of course it is, but to say that it is the only duty a citizen is expected to perform and then manipulated into thinking that the politicians will take it from there, is absolutely detrimental for the health of the nation. Here’s why.
Imagine you and your wife are planning to recruit a house cook. Interviews are planned on a certain day, but the wife has to step out of the house due to some urgent matter. They don’t want to postpone the interviews and so the wife requests the husband to do the needful on his own. There are five applications, but turns out only two have come. The choice is now between a satisfactory applicant and the dismal one. The husband goes meticulously with the interview questions, confirms if he can cook the family’s favourite food, takes commitments from the cook to that effect and swiftly settles for the satisfactory one as the other applicant is completely unemployable and three applicants did now show up, remember.
Showtime, the wife gives instructions to the cook, the initial reaction of the cook is, who is she to instruct me, she was not even at the interview. The cook is headstrong and elderly, so he manages to convince the wife of the house of a certain food mostly of the cook’s liking. The couple feels no harm in eating the cook’s favourite food, hoping it will be served shortly. Their wait is getting longer and the cook has found ways to serve them a different menu not to the couple’s liking, but tolerable. Then one fine day the couple find their favourite food served on the table and while they are happily eating, the cook makes an announcement that it is his birthday, hence the treat. The couple hearing this declaration loses their appetite almost at the same time, because it means they will have to wait for another year to go by, to get the cook’s birthday treat.
The couple has already made up their mind to sack the cook on an urgent basis, so they contact the recruiting agency who had sent them those shortlisted five applicants. The recruiting agency informs them that the cook working in their house had made sure the three applicants never turn up for the selection process. Now the couple wants the cook fired yesterday.
Above story is of a simple and yet powerful family and their rendezvous with a headstrong cook who eventually has to leave the job and abide by the couple’s decision. The couple had to think of their family first and there was no way they were going to get manipulated further by this cook. The couple clearly understood their responsibility towards their family. They selected a person, more importantly they reviewed his performance, found him not up to the mark, and sacked him, end of story.
Voting for elections is just the first part of selecting, but if you have no mechanism in place to review the selected politician’s performance, then the purpose of voting is lost.
The Supreme Court has already rejected mandatory voting as undemocratic, so now it has become the job of celebrity influencers to coax citizens to exercise their vote, even to the extent to make them feel guilty if they haven’t voted, while some celebs even going to the extent of persuasion to force. All fine in the interest of the nation, but why do these celebs mute themselves when the same voted government goofs up big time. If celebs are responsible for the product they endorse then should they be pulled up for compelling people to vote, but then are found wanting to give an unbiased review of the government’s performance.
By remaining silent on pressing issues, these celebrities have lost a lot of their influence in society. Today they might have followers on social media platforms but most of these followers never take their opinion seriously. For example a film actor recently suggested higher income tax on citizens that do not vote, the statement was made in context to the low turnout in Mumbai. Unfortunately this actor only sees Vande Bharat trains and the promise of bullet trains, while failing to see the state of the Mumbai local trains, which have not improved last thirty years, or has not travelled in 2AC or 3AC reserved railway compartments only to find that the train is filled with general category travellers, while your reservation can go to hell.
Can’t fault these delusional celebs, the government has nicely conned them to think that the country has moved ahead, not knowing that it has, but only in parts. It has made some parts of the country Instagram worthy and heavily publicised only those, while keeping the dark underdeveloped dirty side under wraps. So today when the voting percentages come down in Mumbai, instead of pondering why, they make irresponsible statements of high taxes.
Did it occur to anybody influential that the Mumbaikars’ votes lost meaning when they voted for one party only to find out that the politician they elected switched parties and the same mockery was replicated in Goa and other States?
So here is a message to all those who travel to exercise their vote thinking they have done their sacred duty, just voting is not enough, make sure the politician you voted for stays on track and gets the job done for what he has been selected for.
For those social media fans and followers; don’t take your heroes’ advice too seriously, we don’t know if their words are compromised or they write in duress. Learn to make up your own mind and after voting, learn to review their performance dispassionately, then your vote will have some meaning. Politicians have absolutely no performance pressure, once every five years they come and convince you that it is your duty to vote, that’s it your duty ends there. When you can’t tolerate a cook who does not honour his commitments, how come we give politician’s such a long rope?
(The author is a business consultant)
