BJP

The recent tussle and turmoil thats happening to the country's primary opposition party is something that was on the cards ever since the charismatic A.B. Vajpayee decided to call it a day. The election debacle only acted as a catalyst and provided an opportune moment for disgruntled cadres to voice their opposition against the party.

The recent outbursts by its senior leaders and their subsequent expulsion from the party is mainly because the BJP wants to project L.K. Advani as its prime leader, not to the liking of many in the party. Advani's peers while he was in RSS and subsequently in BJP, wanted a greater share in the power pie after Vajpayee quit. When this was not happening, they invented reasons to bring to light their plight so that their position and say in the party would acquire greater significance. Yashwant Sinha wanted analysis of the poll defeat almost immediately and wanted that to be over before their Chinthan Baithak. Jaswanth Singh, courted controversy with his book on Jinnah while Arun Shourie questioned the leadership and some of the decisions taken. Brijesh Patel came out in the open with his comparisons on Advani and Vajpayee.

These are definitely testing times for BJP. This is the time where the baton is passed to a new generation and a complete re-assessment of its policies would take place Their commitment to Hindutva may also be shaped in a different way with younger and fresher brains at the helm. The two biggest challenges for the BJP hence would be the way they shape their ideals as they still are very much unclear about their policy on Hindutva while attracting the minorities too. This is because, its trying to shed its communal tag heaped on it by other parties which are more communal than the BJP. The second biggest challenge is that the BJP should not be bogged down at this point and should wait patiently until things stabilize before taking important decisions.

Only time should tell whether the country's chief opposition party stands to fight another election or becomes obsolete, making it a thing of the past.

Dynasty Rule

When our neighbours like Nepal and Pakistan are demanding and persevering for democracy, India is slowly turning to monarchy- dynasty rule silently without anybody noticing it. If recently concluded elections are to be taken as an indicator, the dynasty rule is here to stay. Most politicians today fight for seats for their kin and if not granted abuse their parties before parting ways. This phenomenon exists in every state right from Tamil Nadu and Kerala in south to Jammu in North. and from Maharashtra in West to Arunachal and Assam in East. Karunakaran and Muralidharan, the father and son duo are the most famous ones from Kerala while in Tamil Nadu the list is endless and well known, topped by the polygamous Karunanidhi. The state of Andhra has some well known names with NTR, his daughters as well as his son in law- Chandrababu Naidu apart from sons of YSR and other party leaders. Karnataka can boast itself of the controversial H.D Kumarasamy and erstwhile PM Deve Gowda while Maharashtra has the Thackerays that makes them gain entry into this coveted list. Not to be left far behind is Sharad Pawar with his daughter Supriya and the Dutts - Sunil, Priya and Sanjay. Orissa has Naveen Patnaik, son of Biju Patnaik while Lalu and Paswan have their close kin in prominent positions in the party. Far East, we have Agatha Sangma, daughter of ex-Speaker P.A. Sangma. Coming to Central India, U.P has the Yadavs- Mulayam Singh, his son Akhilesh. The rest includes the Badals of Punjab, Chautals of Haryana. Jammu has Farooq Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti, children of predominant parties of Jammu. These are just a handful of names from a huge list as the Mahajans, Anubumanis and Natwar Singhs have been left out.
But the top slot would always remain with the Nehru-Gandhi family who have ru(ined)led India all these years. Its remarkable that this family has sustained its rule and grip on the world's second populous nation for these long years cutting across 4 generations. Think Indians would always favour a monarchy for they have been under a democracy (if you can call it one, given the above list) only for the last 50 years and rest of its rich history has always been under monarchs.

Secular Parties

Its election time and the entire country is resonating with promises, sops, concessions and resolutions. Its no different here, especially with the elections scheduled only in the final phase, it has given the politicians ample time to work out their strategy and analyse trends. The major deciding factor in elections here are the caste. On one side, you have a group of people proclaiming to form a casteless society while others play politics with caste as their trump card. The irony lies in the fact that the two groups are the same and are in no ways different. All political parties here are just “democratic front office” of caste organizations. No, its not the BJP, its all other parties accusing BJP of being non-secular when they themselves are confined only to a small community of people. The PMK is the political outfit of Vanniyars, Sarath Kumar’s’ SMK is for nadars, not to mention TMMK for Muslims and other trivial parties for various other communities. Though DMK or AIADMK will not figure in that list, they cannot be discounted from the fact that it was them who nurtured and nourished these outfits. What an irony when these people accuse BJP of being non-secular?

Madras

Madras – It’s a special word that conjures up lot of beautiful memories to me. Though it is Chennai now, I prefer it to be Madras. One reason is that it was Madras when I was born. Lots of things have changed after I was born, especially in the last decade, but Madras to me, has always and will always retain its old charm.
A decade back, lots of areas of the present Madras were unknown. Its core part was Mylapore and areas around it.It would be very hard to believe that places like Nanganallur and Thiruvanmiyur were only suburbs and didn’t qualify to be a part of Madras.
During its nascent days, Madras was a village with dense forests all over the area. Quoting Thirumangai alwar in his reference to the present day Triplicane, he says the sun’s rays would not even pass through the thick vegetation cover. The areas that we know have interesting facts behind their present names. Triplicane or Thiruvallikeni is from the pond with ‘alli’ flowers. Mylapore is ‘Mahila puri’ meaning the place of women.
There were lots of followers of Madhvacharya in the vicinity of Triplicane and hence their place was called ‘Rayar pettai’ which , with the passage of time became ‘Royapettai’. Apart from the vegetation, there was also abundance of cattle and the place of this activity was ‘Dhenu pettai’. Dhenu in sanskrit meant cows. It is this area which is called Teynampet. Similarly, the Thousand lights area, translated to Tamil is called ‘Aayiram vilakku’ which has its origins in ‘Aayar vilakku ‘, the place were cow herds lived.
Change has always been happening, but in spite of this, Madras has always preserved few things for posterity.

Near Death Experience (NDE)

For software folks plying in share autos on OMR, NDE is an everyday affair. Being packaged into a rickety share auto with 8 other people, you only pray that you reach your destination in full shape as you boarded the auto. The auto carries 8 people at its back apart from 2 burly fellows on either side of the driver. The way the the driver runs through the traffic, with the poor condition of roads adding to the woes, only traffic signals provide you with some respite. But then, these people jump traffic signals too. With the twists and turns , you are squeezed so badly that even your clothes may become loose the next time you put them on. You heave a sigh of relief only when you get out of it. But then, you simply endure it to reach office in time. Thats an Indian for you who endures all this to reach office just because they charge you 5 bucks less than the regular autos.

Rane = Bane

The aftermath of Mumbai terror attacks have seen a spate of resignations. The foremost among them was that of the useless, incapable Shivraj Patil. The second hi-fi resignation was that of Vilasrao Deshmukh, the CM of Maharashtra. But the latter's resignation was succeeded by drama that woul put any country and its politicos in disgrace. The chief architect responsible for this pandemonium is the opportunistic Narayan Rane. When the entire world is sympathising with India and Mumbai in particular, Rane rebelled against his own party just because he wasn't given the Chief ministership. When the need of hour is unity, moles like Rane are a bane to our entire system. No wonder India is only tagged as a 'developing country' inspite of its abundant resources.

At this time of crisis, people expect unity from politicians cutting across parties and ideologies not feuds without principles within the same party just. People like Rane should not be allowed to contest because they are not service-oriented. They do not have even the slightest intention of serving the nation and its people. They have entered into politics with the sole aim of garnering money. Weeds like Rane need to be removed from our entire system for it to be more effective. I only hope that the people do away with people like Rane, setting an example for other states to follow and for other opportunistic politicians a lesson.