Disgusting Democratic Discourse!

With the month long Indian elections meandering its way to an end, one thing that stood out this time was the political lingua that played out during the entire campaigning phase. It was a joy to hear political debates of the yesteryears when the focus of the debate revolved mostly around the agenda and promises of the rival parties. The fact that these promises or agendas never saw light at the end of the day is another story for another day; at least the language and the dignity with which these electoral speeches were scripted and delivered were exemplary.

The words and phrases that have been used in these elections have marked a new low in the discourse of parliamentary democracy. The political parties have vied with each other to raise the bar or rather raise the belt so that they get sufficient terrain below the belt to play with. In fact they were competing with their rivals to earn black points from the Election Commission that they considered electoral brownies.

The would be parliamentarians have indulged themselves in a verbal free for all which made it appear like a curtain raiser of their presence and performance in the next five years inside the august house. The only solace was that the un-parliamentary behaviour / language was outside the sanctum sanctorum during the curtain raiser, but would soon move in, come the 16th of May.

Some of the points / words / phrases around which the debates revolved were, the importance of a 56 inch chest to rule the country, abbreviated family names, scurrying rodents, a soft drink slogan, one called the other a butcher, while, someone said the other was honeymooning and furthermore some came up with very harsh communal overtones. However the clincher was, when one senior parliamentarian claimed he was better at hiding his girlfriend than the aspirant to the big power seat was, at hiding his wife. Can it get any better? It sounded more like a street fight among 5th graders after losing a game of cricket. Comparison to 5th graders is actually a compliment to these guys, because they discussed toffees too which normally figures in 2nd grader conversations. Each and every one of those above phrases was picked up and deliberated on prime time by the TRP hungry media. 

Well it is understandable that when the stakes are high, tempers are bound to fly but unfortunately what I found was most of the modern day politicians have been too naïve and played their way into the hands of the media who have had a professionally fulfilling last 45 odd days.

My only prayer and wish is that, good sense prevails amongst these would-be parliamentarians and they realise how fortunate they are to lead a country so diverse yet united given all the shortcomings. Somewhere amongst the discourse of toffees, butchers, rats and 56 inch chests, the fact that we nudged Japan to become the 3rd largest economy speaks volumes of the efforts and resilience of WE THE PEOPLE. Democracy they say is of the people, by the people, and for the people. Fortunately or unfortunately the ones who were found squabbling over trivial issues in their political discourses are one among us. I’m not sure if they will be FOR THE PEOPLE when they enter the gates of the parliament later this month.

I was certainly disgusted with the democratic debates of this elections and hence the title, and as rightly pointed out by my daughter who made a passing remark asking me if I was writing about the 3rd Dimension of Democracy since it had 3D’s.

That’s when I realised this was certainly the 3rd, but the ugliest dimension to the democratic process I have been witness to in the last 4 decades.

Signs of Democracy

As the world’s biggest democracy gets ready for polls across the country spanning a good 35 days, sitting miles away I miss the poll frenzy and the accompanying vote mongering. They say democracy is on its last leg and the world is full of pseudo democracies tapering towards crony capitalism. This is not an effort to analyse the state of democracy or weigh its pros and cons, but merely an attempt to analyse the symbols and its associated significance to the democratic process in India.

The symbols of parties have always fascinated me, the importance that this has in our democracy is of monumental proportions since in a majority of the game changing regions across India the voter votes for the symbol ignorant of the party / candidate or his / their credentials if any.

The sprouting twin leaves competes bitterly with the rising sun even though a knowledge of elementary school level science will tell you the leaves are dependent on sunlight to survive. People supporting Sickle, hammer and star could actually see stars and die of hunger if ears of the corn or paddy on the woman’s head are not reaped with the help of a sickle.

How good a lotus is when there is no water, so in comes another party with hand pump as its symbol. Lotus symbolises divinity and sanctity but the very same divinity could prove to be their downfall being branded anti secular.

Then the omnipresent palm that can be interpreted in different ways depending on its orientation, a palm facing up is seeking money and could well be the hand behind the scams, a palm facing down says I don’t have any to spend on infrastructure, a palm positioned vertically says you get beaten black and blue if you fight for your fundamental rights. The lines on the palm along with planetary alignments dictate the electoral fortunes of the would be netha. The lack of confidence amongst most of them, their ideals and their symbols is what makes them go celestial and be dependent on the movement of the stars and planetary positions. Unfortunately the very same celestial interventions that are favourable to them make their subjects see stars for the next 5 years.

This is one of the main reasons that India has moved from an Aristocracy to Democracy and now to Astrocracy.

Other interesting symbols are the ladder that shows that sky is actually not the limit for this party but they stoop to much lower levels, bicycle is the next, you elect them and you are taken for a ride. A top for one that could leave you in a spin, the elephant that could well trample over you, the chair that they would be busy holding on to for the next 5 years.

The new kid on the block with good intentions came up with a broom thinking of making sweeping changes, little did they know that some amongst them were sweeping stuff under the carpet using the same broom, what they needed was a vacuum cleaner to cleanse a deep rooted malfunctioning system.

Stepping out of the voting booth many of us proudly display the ink on our finger as proof of exercising our franchise. Sadly irrespective of the symbol we voted for, the elected representative will soon show you the correct finger that had to be inked was, the one to the left and right of your ring finger on both your hands!!!

And irrespective of the party he is affiliated to, this will symbolise the democracy that he will represent for the next 5 years!!!

Pappu can't speak saalaa!

From at the stroke of midnight when the whole world slept, to at the stroke of modern day primetime news when the whole world listened, a great grandfather and a great grandson duo proved that the art of speaking cannot be inherited.

A good public speaker can be made but an exponent of good extempore speaking is always born, and that skill unfortunately cannot be inherited or be passed on.

Public speaking today has taken a whole new turn, when I was a kid I was taught to get on stage and speak my mind, emphasise on the words, express myself and be loud and clear where I ought to be. Today there are public speaking classes and clubs that drive in the fundamentals of speaking to the young minds. In my opinion they are becoming a tad too formal. With timed pauses, grammatical error counters, the movements being measured and the vocal chords being strained to achieve the desired modulation level of voices. The worst is when the accents are being monitored closely so much so a Malayalee trying to express a SIMBLE concept is brushed aside, as is the Bengali who has a brilliant OIDEA or a Tamilian Physicist who wants to find out waaaaat is behind the Maaaatter all because they did not sound like the perfect Englishman.

But here we are, listening to the Oxford and Cambridge educated ones with perfect English accents delivering hollow speeches with a pause too long, not for the poetic effect but for the want of substance to speak. Any person can be a public speaker in my opinion if he or she knows and believes in what the he or the she wants to convey.

Handling questions from a seasoned TRP hungry press journalist spontaneously is an art that is a forte of a few these days. It’s an asset when it comes to a politician. Since a momentarily slipped tongue or a tied one can make or break a politician’s career in this media hungry society. It seems to be a lost art. A political discourse is good for democracy and the nation; however these days more than a discourse what we see are monologues by the journalist who put words into the mouths of the less seasoned politicians and thereby deriving the sadistic pleasure of achieving TRP ratings. Gone are the days when a politician used to hold his ground and will be all of verbose.

The latest display by the scion of the India’s political first family was far from impressive and abysmal compared to his ancestors particularly his grandmother whose Bhaiyoon aur Behanon start to her speeches still reverberate in my ears, mind you, that was quite a lot of summers back. She knew how to deliver good speeches and could easily hold her ground at questions thrown at her from acclaimed journalist from around the world representing the likes of Newsweek and the Time.

For a politician to be successful in a democracy he needs to possess these skills where under the pretext of freedom of speech will be confronted with questions that are both rude, blatant and pretty personal and most of them could be below the belt too and the way he handles those will go a long way in shaping a leader.

But that is only the talk part, and that’s not enough in governing the largest democracy in the world the more arduous one is the walking part too in which many fail. So let’s hope the next general elections gives us a leader who can talk well and also walk the talk taking this great nation along the path to prosperity.

To Scoubidou or not!

My daughters were nagging me for some time to get them Scooby doo which I later realised was spelt scoubidou. Thinking it was either a cartoon channel subscription or an app for a game to be played on one of those tabs that needed to be downloaded for a price, I refused, not for the money but for the reason that I had enough of them walking around like zombies with their gadgets, banging into stuff at home and the annoying update notification tone from the installed Subway surfers and Temple Run apps waking me up in the middle of the night.

I bluntly refused without even giving them an ear on what it was. Today I happened to see the stuff and was flabbergasted. It was just lengths of multi coloured PVC strips. I googled it immediately, what else can a retard like me do to find more about what my children confront me with every day. I found out that it was a game that came into existence in the 1950’s that taught kids craft, the kids these days know KRAFT the Cheese not CRAFT as an art.

This took me back a few decades when as a kid I used to visit my grandparents in Kerala who lived in a village and I from Madras would visit them every summer. I used to be fascinated by the creativity of the kids there who would intertwine strips drawn out from coconut tree leaves. They used to make great stuff from that, balls to play cricket with, boats, figurines of snakes to scare people, puppets accompanied by skilful ventriloquism to embarrass people, all this just by artfully interlocking / intertwining any flexible stuff that they could lay their hands on.

My initiation to automobile engineering happened too at that age and thanks to these kids who taught me that. The steering rod was the trunk of a tapioca plant stem which was light, the axle was a combination of a strong piece of stick from the coconut tree leaf passing through a papaya stalk that was hollow, the wheels were circular pieces from used up Bata flip flops measured and cut without the use of a compass or other engineering drawing fundamentals. The hub that prevented the wheel from slipping off was the very small tender coconuts that fell off the bunch, the under privileged ones who fell short of making it to the big league of nuts, in this case the mother of all nuts, the coconut. These tender miniature coconuts would also serve as wheels in places where even worn out flip flops was hard to find. Green technology in all its sense.

Exactly 64 years later Scoubidou suddenly makes its appearance as the most popular game among kids, and I’m happy for that since its been a long time a game has caught the imagination of kids that doesn’t come in the form of an app. This is something that they have to be hands on rather than straining their retinas staring into pixelated screens of these tabs. Wish more games like this make an appearance to keep kids away from the virtual world.

Scoubidou is a simple game that is sold as multi-coloured PVC strips that can be used to make different things by interlocking them in different shapes and forms which can be crafted to a key chain, a snake, a basket. It comes with instructions on the different knots that they can try. In other words they have brought back the craft of basket weaving and knitting back in vogue.The different kinds of knots are box stitch, the square stitch is the most common knot used in making key chains. A double square (or triple) stitch can be made using four strings, thus doubling the size of the keychain made, Spiral knot, Double spiral, Cobra stitch, The Chinese Staircase, The Butterfly stitch, Super-16 Square etc.

Let me quickly get them a kit before an app for all these knots or the game itself surfaces and they start virtually trying them.

What they don’t realize is that the only knot that doesn’t make a difference either virtually or in reality is the nuptial knot because the difficulty level remains the same.

For the uninitiated here is the link where you can read about Scoubidou