This isn’t an article written by a grumpy old man trying to take a jab at Indian politics this is merely a youth’s haphazardly written ode to the Indian elections 2014, which is funny in itself not because of the fact that despite comprising of roughly 65% of the country’s population the youth are often sidelined from politics but also because the general perception is that the youth of this country, despite figuring in most of the campaign speeches of the politicians as the change makers of our country, can have an opinion on everything from Facebook to movies but not on politics. This is proven by the fact that the average age of the candidates who are contesting for the various seats is 54. Yes! 54 in a country where 65% of the population is under 35 years old, well so much for the youth being the saviors of the nation.
My friends election 2014 has been all about statistics and a day after the election commission announced the dates for this year’s elections all the major newspapers ,in some way or the other, had the same headline which said “814.5 million people of this nation are ready to be part of the largest democratic exercise of the world” and although the subsequent paragraphs did have the pros and cons of the statement ,that headline did make me chuckle because if one were to decipher the statement one would infer that it only means two things, the first is that a lot of Indians have to start saying ‘No’ if not we would face an unprecedented population crisis in the future and the second is that fortunately or unfortunately China is not a democratic country.
So all that hullabaloo of this being the biggest event in Indian politics one would expect the contenders to be of the same caliber. Now that polling is complete and we are eagerly waiting for the results lets weigh in our options and find out if they capable enough to rule, rule? that would be the right word correct, well let’s try to be politically correct and say “Capable enough to entrusted with the highest duties of the nation”, that sounds about right doesn’t it, or was it looting the nation for the next 5 years, no, all I can is that the youth are opinionated and we can’t help it. Moving on, it’s safe to say Indian politics has reached a state of conundrum, we have on one hand a person whose iconic persona has turned the opposition party into a single man’s party. His story is the one of a mythological prince who has slain the heads of his brothers on his way to the top, I’m sure the young, first time voters would even know if Mr L.K. Advani is still a part of the BJP or not, on the other hand we have the currently hackneyed mother-son duo who are famous for their dynasty politics and are currently battling an anti-incumbency wave which has given their opposition an upper hand in these elections. And then we have a tortoise in a hare’s race in the name of Mr Aravind Kejraval whose sole objective in this current election is to ruffle a few feathers of the big shots from the other parties. I am of the opinion that his motto is “Live today, fight tomorrow” and considering the amount of slaps and punches that he so graciously has accepted on his road to the elections all I can do is pray that he lives to see the light of tomorrow and hopefully fulfill his dreams of a corruption free India, if at all he has such a dream because rule No. 2 in ‘Youth 101’ says that the youth of this country are not only opinionated but also skeptical. And finally we have five overzealous leaders who hope to form a third front. I’m sure you know who I am talking about and for the love of my country I hope that never happens because if it does, these individuals would be so engrossed in pulling each leg of the coveted chair that they would forget the woes of the nation. The irony of the third front coming into power is that a chair, and even if it’s the metaphoric PM’s chair, has only four legs and not five.
Despite of all these so called torch bearers who claim to solve all the problems of the nation in a matter of years we have noticed throughout the campaign that each and every one of them has fought the elections based on petty politics, by taking a jab on their opponents whenever they got an opportunity, future parliamentarians using un-parliamentary language in their hate speeches. And that my friend’s brings me to the million dollar question. How much of all of this would take the youth to step in this so called dirt of politics. How long will we stand in the queues and cast our vote for the person who promises to be less corrupt than the previous leader only to be cheated for the next 5 years. When will our country have its years of change? Trust me guys the return of investment in politics is really high, isn’t that why we chose our career paths and the best part is in India you don’t even have to be educated for it. Politics is a filthy but viable career option and it’s about time we the youth get into it and make a change. I hope that in 2019 India will have an option to honestly decide because I think that the youth really are the future of this country and we most certainly should have a definitive say in the events of this country rather than merely a statistical one. Jai Hind!!