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Democracy & Family rule in India

Chellamuthu Karuppanan | 02.07.2004 15:48 | Analysis | World

The hard earned electoral democracy is under trouble in India.
Newspapers,TVs ,Magazines, all media have been clandestinely owned by political parties and bribed by parties to propagate thier own agenda in India

Indian Elections 2004, this time have conveyed the message that poularity alone is not the factor which determines the election results. Majority of the people preferred Vajpayee as the PM of India and Chandrababu Naidu as the Chief Minister of Andhrapradesh.
But the results have become the opposite.Popularity failed and farmers told their fury by ballots and drought in many states turned their favour to the biggest projected opposition.But overall, castewise divide in voting pattern has been seen in important states like Uttarpradesh. The total votes have been cornered almost equally by the four parties, Samajwadi Party,BJP,Congress and the BSP.Muslims in this state have aligned with wither Samajawadi or BSP and in some constituencies with Congress.
The dominant communities like yadavs, Jats,Lodhs,SCs had preferred to vote enmasse to a particular party to have their own community leader elected.
Aboveall,the sons of the politicians had their field days in the elections.
The politicians are not interested in loosening their grip in the party,and they only promote their sons, spouses to succeed and this is the fate of Indian democracy today.
In a party like DMK in Tamilnadu,the elder son of Karunanidhi ,Stalin is projected as the next CM , by the party. Another son Alagiri is looking after the affairs of the party in the southern part of Tamilnadu.When this family is involved in the state and party affairs, he sent Murasoli Maran(sister's son) to Delhi to bargain for them with cabinet ministerial births.He is no more now and his son Dayanidhi Maran ,having no experience and very young has been made a cabinet minister inspite of the presence of many stalwarts and experienced people in the parliamentary contingent of the party.By overnight if one becomes not even an MP but a cabinet Minister since he is the son of the politician, where lies the values of democracy in India?
Lalloo Prasad Yadav's spouse is functioning as the Chief Minister of Bihar as if no other person in the state is eligible for the post.
Only because of such experiences, castist parties are being promoted, as nobody else can break the family control of the political parties in India.
The rising of castist parties which are normally formed by castist groups which form majorities in respective states succeed if the community vote enamasse to the outfits.
If such community does not come into enmasse voting, then the outfits fail.
The PMK , a party in Tamilnadu has succeeded under the leadership of Dr Ramadoss and they have a say in any future elections in the state.Today they have captured cabinet births in the union cabinet and many MPs are there to represent the Vanniar Community.
Though the divide by caste is not a welcome sign, the PMK propagated that inspite of the vanniars forming one of the largest communities in the state ,no vanniar has been offered the post of Chief Ministership of the state.Interestingly, the first three largest communities in the state namely Vanniars,Thevars and Kongu Vellalars are never considered for the post of Chiefministership since elections have been held for the first time.Is this true democracy? Hence the solution for stopping the caste parties is to
end family rule in the major political parties and have the men from majority communities as the top leaders in those major political parties like Congress, BJP,AIADMK,DMK etc and satisfy the disgruntled communities.Otherwise the future of Tamilnadu will be on the dimmer side only, and the major national parties have to vacate their places to the castist parties.

Chellamuthu Karuppanan
- e-mail: chellamuthuk@indiatimes.com