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India Votes- Jaago Re!

It's voting time!! Once again, after five long years, the nation comes together to start casting their ballots to the candidates that all the political parties have fielded. Campaigning aside, this year's elections saw our home minister, another minister & Advani all have slippers thrown at them as the electorate simmered in anger at various issues.

The first hurler was a journalist, who was angry at the requittal of suspected corrupted CBI policeman, who threw his slipper at Home Minister & my personal favorite, Sri Chidambaram, then a school principal threw his slipper at a Congress MP and lastly, we saw a former 'saffron' (BJP) party worker throw his slipper at Advani, in dispute of his candidacy as the PM of the country. Attached is a blog note on the same, outlining the comic moments of this sacred act of defiance (To read more on this please follow link)

We also saw the arrest of Varun Gandhi, for anti-muslim remarks. This was a shock to me, given that Varun is the son of Menaka Gandhi, a respected environmentalist, the grandson of Indira Gandhi, (who was unfair to all) and the great grandson of Nehru Gandhi (perhaps the most flamboyant socialist leader to date). Ofcourse, he will go down in history as having disputed the 'allegation' that he made unfair remarks, but given he is contesting against the Congress for the BJP....... (To read more on the elections, pop the link!)

So I think in previous posts, or in conversations that I've had with all and sundry, I've always expressed myself to be a fan of the Congress or the Socialist Front. I have previously scoffed at an invitation of joining BJP Youth, the possibility of Advani being our PM (loudly declaring to kill myself if he ever represents my country). And I've also expressed the innate desire to marry first, Rajiv Gandhi and now, Rahul Gandhi (alas, I am not Italian!).

But feelings aside, I know Advani has been trying to shed that image of his- 80 yr old politician, still wanted in Pakistan for plotting the assasination of PM Jinnah (by visiting a gym, starting a blog which I'm sure he writes himself ) On top of that, our friend orchestrated the demolition of the Babri Masjid, and has recently claimed that we should build a grand Ram temple on the site, and that would be an act of secularism (aha!). Despite all this, I've realized in the recent months, that Advani may infact be a very efficient advisor, given his tenure and experience in politics, though maybe not quite a leader. What is scary about this man, is the fact that with power, we'd have to take him seriously. And I don't know about you, but I sure as hell don't want to.

And this is experience is what Rahul lacks, but he is a refreshing difference to the world of politics. Educated, fresh and charismatic- to me Rahul represents the youth of India.

70% of this country is under the age of 30, we do not remember the stale economy of the 80s, what we do remember is the emerging Indian market in the 90s. The influx of foreign goods, a market thriving based on consumer choice, a job market ample with jobs.

Our concerns are things like education, and why it costs so much for a decent degree or for a seat in the medical colleges. Our concerns are things like safety on the streets, the state of the roads,the unreasonable curfews imposed on the city limits, the stabilization of the stock market, the harnessing of the currency depreciation and rising inflation, the reduction of corruption in the sports arena, an increase in funding for the same, state sponsored terrorism, the utilisation of our taxes, stopping child labour, bettering the environment, chanelling resources to the farms, increasing the effectiveness of co-operatives in the rural areas, establishing a credit reporting agency, speeding up the buliding of the metro rail project amongst so many other :REAL concerns.

We don't care about the war in Pakistan, we want Peace, let's stop budgeting 60% of our GDP on defence.

We don't care for racial politics, let's gain the respect of the general populace, instead of dividing it.

We really don't care about what happened in 1992, MOVE ON YAAR (remembering the fast track ads).

And lastly, we don't care about throwing slippers at politicians, we'll see you on election day, when we have the last say!
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