Be Careful What You Vote For

I was advised not to write this. Why? Because India has turned into a moral police state.

In India, Sections 153A and 295A enshrined in the Constitution disallow the expression of any words, written or spoken, that incite disharmony and deliberately hurt religious sentiments. Fair enough. Secular is also a word in the Constitution that allows freedom to practise your own religion without harming anyone else's right to do so. Admirable.

But I'm still looking for an article in the Constitution that seeks to tell women what they can and cannot wear (save being nude in public), an article that says expressing a political (please note, I said political, not religious) opinion will get you beaten, harassed, thrown in jail and otherwise deprive you of something every democracy guarantees - the right to criticise your government. 

So I was advised not to write this. But I wonder if I can help the new government. Since the old one did scant to nothing about the looming problems, I thought it would be helpful to draw up a list of demands. (Nota bene. Demands. The time for requests is long past).

Dear New Government, 

This list is a representation of the demands of India's hopeful and hopeless population.

1) Be Honest. I don't mean be honest about the fact that you're cheating on your new diet but be honest about what you're doing with our money. If you spend it well, we'll give you more. If you steal it, you'll hear the verdict in five years. 

2) Be Effective. Don't allow our young women to be raped in broad daylight or in silent darkness, forced to drink acid, hung from trees after being gang-raped by 38 men, and stripped and beaten in public. Ensure that the severest punishment meets the crime. Changing the psyche of society will never happen on a mass scale in India; let's face it. So do your part. Deter. Prevent. Punish. Put to death if you must. 

3) Be Secular. Don't frighten those who don't share your religious beliefs and sentiments. Don't be troublemakers simply because you're a majority. Don't be mean bullies. Don't underestimate the common man. You're one of them. Common. 

4) Be Well-Behaved. If you don't know how to be well-behaved, look for information on the Internet. Be social media savvy and give yourself a belated education. After all, you claim to have won on the basis of a social media blitz. So learn good manners from there. Don't embarrass the largest population in the world. We don't appreciate it. 

5) Be Intelligent. Don't mistake that for degrees. Don't mistake that for a smart mouth. Don't mistake that for absurd Tweets. Understand that intelligence and logic must be balanced with human emotion. In short, be a good mother. That's the only way to serve your motherland. And if you didn't have a good mother, find the next best alternative. Don't presume you can work for the nation without intelligence. We've got poor tolerance for criminals and idiots. 

6) And finally, learn this. Commit it to memory. Understand that if you do not at ALL TIMES honour the following words, you'll find yourself hung out to dry. 

WE, THE PEOPLE OF INDIA, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC and to secure to all its citizens:

JUSTICE, social, economic and political;

LIBERTY of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship;

EQUALITY of status and of opportunity;

and to promote among them all FRATERNITY assuring the dignity of the individual and the unity and integrity of the Nation;

IN OUR CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY this twenty-sixth day of November, 1949, DO HEREBY ADOPT, ENACT AND GIVE TO OURSELVES THIS CONSTITUTION.

You do not want to go up against 1.27 billion really pissed off people. You've seen, I suspect, the result of that. Don't presume that result won't apply to you after five years. Good luck.

Signed

Common Man, Woman and Child. 

(on behalf of 1.27 billion people and their pets) 

Q & A

Since May, an odd number of questions have surfaced again, in the international context as well as the Indian one. They're not all related but perhaps they are and somehow we- the hoi polloi, the great unwashed, the plebeians- have failed to hone in on the connection. Perhaps, because we're unaware of the intricacy it takes for a foraging eagle to swoop under the surface of murky waters and snatch the fish. 

There are a few questions that bear thinking about.


1) Why is Europe bankrupt and continues to be so? Do they really have less money so they're forced to eat stale food? Or does it just look like the governments are shuffling around the money from table to table and don't actually understand the simple formula of Earn 10 quid, Spend 8  quid, Save 2 quid in the bank (or under the mattress really, these days)
Answer: Umm, yes, they are rather broke. But not that broke that they can't have fancy meetings in Switzerland and Belgium over cases of Cristal to talk about how broke they are. And no, they can't spend 8 quid because it takes 10 quid to make 10 quid. Rubbish old-fashioned theory really.

2) Why are the Asian economies flourishing? Or are they really? Don't they have beggars and dirt and injustice and homelessness anymore?
Answer: The GNP and GDP are up. The complicated figures on complicated charts are showing upward trends. The markets and media are all terribly excited and talk all at once. The postman has a BlackBerry. But the beggars on the street, the dowry deaths and the squalor that causes fatal malaria, are still there to remind us that we're in Asia.

3) Why is the man, who's been in jail after the deadly 2008 terror attacks in Bombay, still in jail? Why isn't he dead? How much more evidence do you need?
Answer: Umm, yeah, it's sub-judice. The law takes its course. Meanwhile, you can keep paying the government taxes to build an ultimate security prison for this chap, while he laughs his head off at India.

4) Why is Rupert Murdoch suddenly a villain? What's the big deal about phone-hacking and why did News of the World have to shut down?
Answer: Rupert Murdoch is evil, of course. Phone hacking is wrong, of course. The media is overstepping its limits and must pay of course; hence the closure of NOTW and the arrest of Rebekah Brooks. Everything that isn't done with the express or implied permission of a holier-than-thou government is wrong and illegal. Got it?

5) And what happened to the intelligence machinery in Bombay? Why were there three bomb blasts across the city again in July 2011?
Answer: That's not an intelligence failure, really. More like absence. More like complacency. More like internal corruption. More like a cancer that's metastasized. Don't worry, we've got listless, overworked coppers patrolling random streets and even though they look completely inept at fighting crime, you should feel reassured.

6) Is all the crime and misery in the world inter-connected somehow?
Answer: Yup. When you join the dots, let me know what it looks like.

And now, I'm going to that grand bastion of all crimes, misdemeanours and torts. The supermarket.