A review of Congress’ performance in Lok Sabha Elections 2009:

Uttar Pradesh has always been the epicenter of Indian politics, owing to the fact that it sends 80 MPs to the Lok Sabha-the highest among all the states. In the 15^th Lok Sabha elections this year, U.P. staged an unexpected turnover of votes favoring Congress. After a long time the national party could ground its feet in the state. From managing to get nine seats in 2004 to scoring 21 seats in 2009, Congress made a giant leap in the political “akhada” of U.P., where Mulayam and Mayawati failed. Congress subordinates acknowledge this victory to Rahul Gandhi’s efforts in the state. To some extent this is true. Rahul did travel a lot in U.P. and spread an aura of assurance among the people, which was irrespective of the normal divides, on which U.P. has been surviving now for a long time. Today it is not just the poor villagers of Amethi and Raebareily who relate to him and consider him the future leader, but also a large irritated populace of Pradesh prefers Rahul over the divisive standards of other parties.

But there were other reasons too for the surprising results in U.P. BSP’s social engineering collapsed and anti-incumbency and offering seats to goons shot back. SP’s shaking hands with long time rival Kalyan Singh pulled away its Muslim votes. BJP was just left in confusion to figure out what went wrong. With 10 seats in hand it was either the seat sharing deal with Ajit Singh or Varun Gandhi’s Pilibhit chapter which backfired. In areas like Allahabad congress scored its convincing victory which signifies that Uttar Pradesh is looking forward to a change. It wants to shift from the divisive political classification castes and classes. It wants to shift from the trap of goons and criminals who have been guiding the state for a while now. It wants to shift away from Babri, Ayodhya, Bahujan-Brahman and the samajwadi philosophies. And the verdict of these elections was a good attempt at projecting what the people of the state want.

Government Security Institutions & Democracy

A democratic framework involves mutual understanding between the government and the people of the democracy. Both the government and the people are expected to be loyal to each other. The development of a democracy depends upon the execution of the respective responsibilities from both these sides. India, being the largest democracy faces a lot of problems in the proper functioning of democratic governance. These problems or democratic set backs are the results of not just governmental failure but also of publics’ misinterpretation of democracy.

Concentrating on governmental security institutions like Police, CRPF, Home guards, BSF etc. when we think that how do these institutions put up with the democratic framework we realize that there are two sides to the way these institutions function. One indicates that these forces keep a watch on law and order and hence maintain the democratic balance. The other indicates that they contempt the basic rights of citizens and misuse the power they are trusted with. There have been reports about security forces torturing innocents in their custody. Deaths of under investigation suspects have been reported frequently. In some parts of the country the fear of police equates their reputation with mafia. Sometime ago, in an incident in Bihar two policemen tied a thief and dragged him around the village. In this “amusing” act the thief was killed. This was one story out of thousands which take shape in numerous petite police stations across the country.
Human rights commission and related NGOs keep raising these issues. There was a lot of hue and cry when for the investigation of ’93 Mumbai blasts, police jailed numerous suspects and interrogated them using there usual hard ways. A.S. Samra, then commissioner of police, Mumbai said that under such high pressure situations police should not be expected to consider human rights before every question they ask a suspect. These are not small time criminals but trained and motivated miscreants who do not break by threats and pain, is what he had said. This throws light on something which is not in the light for us or human rights activists to notice. This provides us some clue about the enormous pressure under which these institutions work. This probably explains why BSF personnel shot his senior officer or why two constables raped a naxal female in their custody. These certainly are not the justifications to any of the acts but they do lead to the possible reasons of such irresponsible criminal behavior.
As initially mentioned, that a progressive democracy demands mutual understanding of responsibilities and rights, I would conclude by mentioning that the basis for this mutual understanding is the mutual respect in one human being for another. Simply blaming the system or the security forces would not revive our democracy. The operation and organization of these government institutions needs to be closely observed, reviewed and reworked.

Suneet

Democratic Delusion:


As a kid I always read about our constitution in my civic text books. Democracy was something sacred and most superior according to my perceptions. In my surrender to democracy, I always prioritized fundamental duties over my fundamental rights and continued assuming self as the perfect citizen. I used to always put in my conscious efforts towards understanding democracy which led to my observation of some specific terms cited in those text books, viz. social, secular, sovereign, republic and so on.
Today when I have installed my self as a receiver in this world where continuously flowing information magnifies my frequencies of thought, I some how find that this democracy which decides my identity is actually not performing up to the mark. The political scene and status of common man in India, today hardly celebrates this democracy. It disturbs me when a political party with forty per cent of votes is trusted with the national governance. The fact that sixty per cent of populace have voted against that party doesn't count at all. People in power have been flexing the democratic spine of India the way they want.
There is some problem.Either with the system or with the people who are responsible for its functioning. And when it comes to democracy, we are the ones responsible for its proper or improper functioning. I won’t mind quoting a dialogue from a hindi movie. Rang de basanti conveyed this simple message- no country is perfect. It's the people of that country who make it perfect. It's high time we have been doing what we wanted to. It's high time we have been speaking responsibly. It's high time we have been demanding change! Now is when we are suppose to do what we need to, now is when we are suppose to start acting responsibly, now is when we start working for the change we demand.

Democracy in U.S

Democracy in America is more than just electoral politics. It is based on the shortest and the oldest written constitution of any sovereign state. This constitution provides the framework for the organization and functioning of the US government which is federal in nature. It also defines three main legs of the government: the legislative branch, the executive branch and the judicial branch. The legislative with a bicameral congress consisting of the House of Representatives as the lower house and the Senate as the upper house, the executive led by the president and the judiciary headed by the supreme court. This organization is quite similar to that of Indian constitution.
The executive leg of the government holds the responsibility for enforcing laws. The president, the vice president, cabinet ministers and heads of independent agencies are responsible for the functions of executive branch. As per Article I of the constitution, the Legislative is the law making branch of the government. The Judicial branch decides the meaning of laws and how they are applied. The violation of laws is checked by the judicial review. The judicial branch, in a similar way as the Indian judiciary does, keeps a check on the legislative and executive branches. There are separate laws governing the federal and the state and at any given point of time, if at all there is a conflict between the federal and the state, the ideas of the federal will be honored over those of the state. Unlike Indian electoral system, in US, people vote to select the Electoral College, which is a body of people who vote for the presidential representative of any one of the political parties. This provides equal importance to each state irrespective of its population and other factors which might influence the electoral process.


SUNEET SHUKLA

Lust for the label

Cinema in India is something which has maintained its originality in spite of the fact that it came to us through the west, when Lumiere brothers broadcasted the first moving picture in Indian history. Even though the technique came from the west, the Indian style and approach were completely different from how west perceived this technique of capturing moving pictures. Including songs was a feature of Indian cinema which made it stand apart from the world cinema and evolved a film as a more colorful, cultural and entertaining medium.

Over decades the world cinema has observed this contrast in Indian film industry and undoubtedly is attracted towards this vibrant style. Probably this is the reason why Danny Boyle turned towards India to turn an Indian author's best selling book into “Slumdog Millionaire”-the winner of 8 Oscars. After decades of mere attendance of Indian movies at Oscars, it was was finally the night when those eyes didn't had to turn over the shoulder to notice the magical element of Indian cinema, because it was right there under the spotlight and not at those corners, which as a typecast were alloted to us.

The pinnacles of world cinema tapped their feet and minds to the tunes of Rahman's “jai ho”.

It was the story of an orphan turning into a millionaire which swept away almost all the major awards except The Best Actor and The Best Actress which went to Sean Penn and Kate Winslet respectively. Apart from Resul Pookutty who grabbed the award for music editing, the veteran maestros of bollywood music, A.R.Rahman and Gulzar Sahab were elated by their international recognition. Fresh faces and “dogs” from Indian slums got to walk the red carpet. These were the children who enacted their real life as part of their reel life. The story shows how various instances in the life of a kid in a slum pushes him through the turmoils of life in such a fortunate manner that every incident in his life is an answer to the million dollar question he encounters in a game show! His is the story of the struggle for survival at every point and his craving to find the love he lost as a child .

This “slumdog” runs through all the filth in this world while chasing the lost innocence of his life. This chase reveals the postcards of India which are the general perception of west about our nation. Begging, stealing, gambling, prostitution, murder, extortion are the only professions known to Indians. Life here is all about poverty, corruption and crime and majority of us live in slums. The jury at the academy probably found “Slumdog Millionaire” much realistic and satisfying to their perceptions.

Prior to this we have sent many other masterpieces which have failed to generate the recognitions they received into awards. From Mother India to Lagaan and Salaam Bombay to Water, all the entries from India have been appreciated but never awarded. This calls for an analysis over the reasons which barred these films to pull the spotlights on the final day. Comparing these movies to “Slumdog...” I don't find them lagging behind at any front. Probably all of these movies had a much better storyline which was more realistic and natural. Even technically they were nevertheless. It was the same Rahman who composed for Lagaan in which every song was an epitome of music. No story could have been more realistic and emotional than Mother India and no one portrayed the pains of a “dream city” better than Mira Nair in Salaam Bombay. Comprising of power packed performances by some infamous talented actors like Raghuveer Yadav, Nana Patekar, Irrfaan Khan etc, this movie is considered a milestone in the inclusion of hard hitting realistic scripts in the Indian film industry.

Other than these films, there have been many other creations by young talented film makers which were good enough to compete with the best of world cinema. For example consider movies like Dharm, Maine Gandhi ko nahi maara, Haasil, Black Friday, Shaurya, Encounter, Gulaal, Hazaaron khwhishein aisi, Rang De Basanti, Taare zameen par and Parzania. These names suggest that there is no lack of quality or variety in Indian movies. Is it probably because india and Indians are shown as a poor country and suffering beggars respectively, that “Slumdog...” managed eight academy awards.

“ Laagan” where hardworking hard working farmers revolt and defeat colonialists in their own game to avoid payment of revenues is not acceptable to the Oscar authority. In spite of being technically and artistically excellent and in spite of Aamir Khan's hard efforts “Laagan” couldn't convince the jury of its genius.

But the whole point is, why do we give such importance to academy awards? Is an academy award necessary to prove a films worth or an artist's talent? There definitely lies some problem back home too. Why don't we have any problem with “Slumdog...” when “Indians are shown a little bit of America”. We probably will have problem with any movie like Parzania which shows what went wrong in Godhara, or Black Friday which uncovers the '93 blasts in Mumbai, or Water which shows the atrocities of Devadasi system.

We basically shouldn't have any issues with “Slumdog Millionaire” winning at Oscars. But its victory along with immense happiness, brings along some unexplainable questions. Amidst the hoop-la in celebrating this success we forget to applaud the efforts in domestic cinema. Films like Dev D, Gulaal, A Wednesday, Mumbai meri jaan etc, need to be appreciated and the talents behind these works need to be recognized.

Legends of Indian cinema like Amitabh Bachchan and Anupam Kher do not consider Oscars to be the hallmark of success and quality. These are some personal opinions. If in future any Indian film manages to rope in an academy award without having any foreign connections, then probably some doubts might get cleared. Irrespective of the run to the Oscars, I just hope that our cinema develops in a more qualitative and meaningful way. The most powerful and influential media shall prove its worth.