Horses for courses!

A state that is home to the so called Silicon Valley of India has been witness to the dance of democracy the last 48 hours. The dance has been all but graceful, plunging the constitutional pundits into a huddle.  Though this is something we Indians have got used to irrespective of who is in power, sadly highlights the grey areas of democracy in a diverse and populous country like India.

We thump our chests with pride when we are referred to as the largest working democracy, largest yes, but working I am unsure. We sure are diverse and thanks to our colonial teachings on leveraging the multiple  cast / tribe / regional and religious divides, it makes the working of democracy all the more difficult. That is why a fragmented mandate turns the dance of democracy into a bacchanalia.

As a citizen of the largest democracy I have heard this term Horse Trading from the time I was old enough to read a Newspaper and follow politics. The origin of the word goes thus - courtesy the wiki.

Horse trading, in its literal sense, refers to the buying and selling of horses, also called "horse dealing.” Due to the difficulties in evaluating the merits of a horse offered for sale, the sale of horses offered great opportunities for dishonesty, leading to use of the term horse trading (or horse-trading) to refer to complex bargaining or other transactions, such as political vote trading.

We the people are the protagonist in the theatre called democracy and it is we the people who should choreograph the dance of democracy, but sadly with our numerous differences we are unable to evaluate the merits and elect our representative who later turns a horse to be traded. They end up being traded at exorbitant sum which is always proportional to the complexity of the fragmented mandate. The masters who trade them are extolled for their political acumen and compared to Chanakya sadly this comparison maligns Chanakya’s famed political dexterity.  

Democracy is all about people and not about horses. Thorough bred horses fetch a fortune and let’s not compare the illiterate opportunistic elected representatives to those lovely creatures of pedigree.  Let’s ensure when we exercise our franchise next, to house the political stables with horses for courses and not horses to be traded.

It’s all about the jeans!

Air travel in the past was a mode of travel confined to the rich and famous, and if at all one managed to afford it, they would make sure that they were donned in their Sunday best as they walked into an airport or boarded a flight.  Though the world has come a long way since, the skies are now as crowded as the gullies of an Indian metropolis, the old school patrons like yours truly still take travelling by air a little seriously when it comes to looking your best. So, during a recent trip to Europe I slipped into my relatively new & favorite pair of jeans.

Walking through the plane’s aisle I ended up tearing my jean at the thigh. As soon as I realized it, I was absolutely horrified at the possibility of having to walk through two international airports wearing a pair of torn jeans. There were days one used to rush back home from school or office when a part of your attire had given up at the seams.

As I got off the plane I walked coquettishly trying to hide the damaged portion of the jean. A quick glance around the airport made me realize that almost every second person passing through the airport had encountered an even worse mishap with their jeans. The denims were all ripped in different shapes and forms, and the so called rich and famous were flaunting their ripped jeans with pride. I developed a complex again when I realized mine was an accident and was confined to only one thigh; the others sported a more symmetric damage which actually made them look good.

Growing up in the 80’s I have worn different kinds of denims, stone wash, acid wash and even one with the complete lyrics of a Deep Purple song hand written on it, and yes some were torn at the knees but that was caused by natural wear & tear. We never bought a branded torn jean then, so when my daughter wanted one I was aghast at the possibility of having to actually pay for a torn jean. Its then I was given a crash course on the denim jargons I am supposed to use.

I was told it’s not torn… It was called ripped and the more expensive and the more torn it was it had to be addressed as distressed. In fact I have a better name for a recent distressed version that is doing the rounds on social media valued at 168$. It could be called STRANDS…there are a couple of strands left of what, was once a denim.

The irony is that the celebrities today who wear a distressed pair of jeans paying a fortune for it are all depressed while we were quiet happy growing up wearing hand-me-down jeans that were torn at the knees not as a fashion statement but as a result of over wearing.