DEIVATHIN KURAL # 89 (Vol #4) Dated 21 Oct 2010.

DEIVATHIN KURAL # 89 (Vol #4) Dated 21 Oct 2010.

(These e-mails are translations of talks given by Periyaval of Kanchi Kamakoti Peetam, over a period of some 60 years while he was the pontiff in the earlier part of the last century. These have been published by Vanadi Padippagam, Chennai, in seven volumes of a thousand pages each as Deivathin Kural. Today we are proceeding from the middle of page number 497 of Vol 4 of the Tamil original. The readers may note that here in 'man/he' includes 'woman/she' too mostly. These e-mails are all available at http://Advaitham.blogspot.com updated constantly)
149. The one who wins an election after spending money like a train driver shovelling coal in to the boiler is bound to try and recover with a profit margin naturally, to be able to live, enlarge, expand and do better in the next election! So the process will mushroom and not die down at all! So, what are we doing? Is it being called ‘Jana (people’s) Nayakam’ (government) or is it ‘Dhana (money) Nayakam’? I am really worried about the likely outcome!
150. OK, let these things be set aside. There is one more thing that is troubling my mind now! After all these elections are over, are we sure that it is going to be a majority government? Is it really going to be a democratic arrangement? I wonder! By there being many contestants, the votes will get distributed and scattered amongst many! So, it is possible for a person with 25 to 30% support to win the election. Similarly, if the number of members in an assembly is say 500, it is possible for someone with even less than half the number of members supporting him to form the government. Being the biggest party amongst some differently oriented parties, they may be able to form a government with even less than 200 seats! On the average they might have less than even 40% of the votes, which may be equal to one fourth of the total population! They will be able to show as though they are representative of all the population of the country. Then there is the problem of many who never get to vote! So, even amongst those who have polled, the party with even less than half of that total could get the power to govern. If you take the whole nation and all the districts and relate the number of seats a particular party wins in each State and its actual popularity, there may not be any correlation at all! Then how can you call it a ‘Jana Nayakam’, a government by the people for the people?
151. Looking at this aspect, instead of placing your bet on only one aspirant, they say that there is a method of election where you express your choice in an order of preference calling it proportional representation. It is also claimed that it can be easily done at smaller levels and not when too many people are involved, at the national level! May be there is some truth in it. Just because we are making all the people get involved, it still does not mean that is truly representative of people’s wishes. That is why I am talking about all this, to register the point that though claimed as ‘Jana Nayakam’ it may be nowhere near the real rule by the people for the people! (True to PeriyavaaL’s apprehension, we are seeing today, in India any number of unholy combinations of ‘coalitions’ which are in reality ‘marriages of convenience’ between political parties, without any correlation to their concepts or principles of existence! Even these ‘marriages of convenience’ may not be to the likings of the rank and file of the parties at the grass root level but, thrust down their throats by the leadership, since the problem is one of ‘who will listen to whom?’)
152. Whichever party has more money power or has the ability to project an attractive image about itself through the media of news papers, radio, television and so on; irrespective of the image being true or untrue; and is able to instil in the minds of youngsters the poison of politics instead of the nectar of real education; such a party is able to thus build itself into a huge behemoth. That democracy is not only unreal but also a fake! I wonder if we are being led to that sort of a stage! Let us take that people’s intention is all genuinely good. But if the good intention is leading to an impractical situation, is not it our duty to point out the inherent danger? Now, many clear headed intelligentsia of our country – like the convener of the Committee for Formulation of Constitution of India – Babu Rajendra Prasad for one, in practical terms have pointed out as to what can go wrong in the process of conversion to democracy, if we are not careful! But the whole nation seems to be hurtling towards an inevitable corruption of a noble cause!
153. A convalescent patient has to be restored to good health before he is entrusted with any responsibility for action. A child has to be trained, coached and taught to knowledgeable maturity before being given functional responsibility. Even the diet for a patient is progressively changed with improvement in health. If we love the child or the patient, it does not mean that they will be given such diets as would be difficult to digest! Majority of our general population is in that sort of a state of being a patient or a convalescent. The intention of the British rule till now was to keep us in darkness with internecine quarrels and differences, so that we will not be able to take any concerted action on any issue. In this condition, if we decide to give them responsibility in running of the country and nation building; and force the heavy diet of democracy down their throat and nose; we will end up causing bad indigestion only! It is the duty of the existing leaders of India to nurture the mass of this nation’s population back to health and maturity from childishness and slavery. May be after a few years of such rebuilding and recouping of our nations people’s health as responsible citizens, we may be able to introduce adult universal suffrage, in my opinion.
154. But, I do not know as to how to put it across to those who are going to take these decisions and make them understand. From the way they are going, I doubt if we are going to take a step back from where we are! Are we going to retrieve the situation or is it going to deteriorate, I wonder! One up man ship, wrong doings, bribery and bluff seem to be overtaking all walks of life! Though they are talking about casteless creedless society, caste based politics is dividing and pulling the nation into subdivisions of smaller and smaller clans, groups and smaller area wise orientation of narrow regionalism! By the pull of money and power people are constantly changing loyalties, jumping from one to the other parties. We seem to have sown the seeds of sorrow for letting go of all decency and humaneness for crass selfishness!
155. In the regional Oor, city, town and village council / Sabha level elections, we should not let party politics come into play, they say. After all at that level we are interested in proper administration and governance only, it is claimed. But, here too the party politics seems to have made inroads! “Why talk about a village level Panchayat, even within families the party orientation has come in”, somebody says as though he is joking, for something to be really sad about! Having made much of party politics at national, state and district levels, how can we avoid its effects at the lower levels of management at city and village?
156. Some Consolation of the Old Time Methods of Selection! At this juncture of potential fearful portents, it is worth the while to ponder the wisdom of the old time methods of selection adopted by our own ancestors, if only for nourishing the hopes, that someone along the lines will bring back some of the ideas into focus again! Especially we must bring to our minds, the morally upright attitudes, the mental clarity and cleanliness of the methods adopted in selecting people to man the Oor Sabha those days!
157. Pointedly parties are keen making money in all sorts of ways. With that money power they put up someone to stand for elections. That man partly misuses some of the party money itself. Then there are also some who put up themselves as a potential candidate by the money power they wield. Having given the funds to the party, his aim is mainly focussed on recovering with interest, many folds what he has initially invested. It is sad that politics has become business irrevocably, where money, materials, favours, influence and votes or support are all mutually interchangeable! Other than being corrupted, the urge is to corrupt everybody else too! To think that there was a time when Dharmam, Needhi, truth, justice and morality were valued as virtues based on which there was an election method in our country, we can at least be proud of, if nothing else!
(To be continued.)
Sambhomahadeva.