Hazards of Coalition Compulsions

Can the recent coalition politics mar the aspirations of India as an emerging superpower? If the functioning of UPA II is analyzed threadbare, only one truth surfaces up – coalition politics is all about political convenience rather than a rational political consensus in the name of parliamentary democracy where the job of the ruling party is to give in to the whims and fancies of regional allies and blindly neglect the larger national interest. And the latest sin of coalition compulsions has erupted from India's voting against Sri Lanka along with other 23 nations under a UNHRC resolution on alleged human rights violations happened during an internal war in 2009.

When all the Asian countries voted for Sri Lanka, only India became an exception by raising the human rights violation flag against its neighborhood. What's India doing then when the war crimes took place against Tamils in 2009? Were we on a hibernation mode? Or we couldn't figure out responsibility as a civilized nation? If human rights violation against Indian Tamils is the only rational ground that India stood firm, then why India internally has been supporting the similar violations in J&K, Nagaland and other North-East states for decades together? What it seems on the surface is not true. There is a severe political compulsion that has triggered this government to commit this faux pas and that too initiated by a regional ally like DMK. If the UPA II is so scared about political implications of coalition mandate, then it's better to call it a day and go for a mid-term poll rather than destroying the larger national interests.

Whatever happened has serious implications on the strategic aspirations of India in the Asian region. Undoubtedly, India has lost that space to China. Now that China has got closer to Sri Lanka, in the coming days India will certainly feel the heat in many dimensions, be it trade or strategic alliances. Understandably though India has a genuine reason to condemn Sri Lanka for human rights violation against Tamils, nevertheless the issue could have been mutually settled between two countries through dialogues or other reconciliation processes. With decades of hard efforts in bringing regional cooperation among SAR countries, India has finally reduced to a pawn in Americans' hand. And the time is not far off when the same America for its own interest would come down heavily on India for the human rights violation happening in Kashmir and NE states. Can India then get the desired support from its neighboring countries? The chances are wafer thin. Probably, India will then realize its mistake. There is something beyond politics and India as the largest democracy has failed to understand this.

The New Definition of Poor

The definition of poor in India is getting ridiculous and callous as well. If the new report on poor from Planning Commission of India is to be believed, only one thought comes to mind as how clueless and naive are the executives Yojana Bhavan who could eventually conclude that the number of poor people in India had declined by 7.3 percent between 2004 and 2009. Was it a deliberate window dressing exercise to showcase our hidden vulnerability as a transformed success story and get some pats from World Bank and IMF? Or was it a serious nexus between the top bosses of Yojana Bhavan and capitalist coterie to ignore the dark underbelly of economic condition of India? Whatever be the reason the report published by Planning Commission only reveals that how irrational are the members of Planning Commission including the big boss Montek Singh Ahluwalia who unabashedly claim that the methods used in deriving this results are sacrosanct and scientific.

Now get down to the brasstacks. The report suggests that the people who are spending Rs 22.43 in rural areas and Rs 28.65 in urban areas per day are not poor. How fraudulent and dishonest these people who define the rock bottom living standard of a human being is an outcome of minimum calorie intake per day by an adult, rather than considering multi-dimensional socio-economic parameters? What about shelter, clothing, medicines, and education? Are these poor people forced to live a life of an animal without dignity? Given a chance to these members of Planning Commission to survive on the threshold spending limit defined by them will only make them realize that academic calculation or armchair policy making is quite easier than understanding what's happening on ground zero.

Reducing the number of poor people in statistical terms is not an achievement, but a sheer reflection of collective ignorance of Planning Commission. Despite many poverty alleviation programs launched by Government of India, the real poverty is still not mitigated because all these programs were easy means to amass wealth by ministers and bureaucrats. Whatever funds got transferred to states, through various programs, it won't be too rhetoric to express as if an elephant transported was finally transformed to its tail when landed at the hand of beneficiaries. That is the ground reality of Indian poverty alleviation program. More such programs, more conduits of corruption; the poor gets poorer and the rich richer.  

Boss is always right

In politics and business, boss is always right. Contrary to this popular belief, our Railway Minister Dinesh Trivedi trusted to his inner consciousness and came out with some tough measures like increasing the passenger fare across classes in the current railway budget, and the precarious outcome of this “country first, party last” adventurism has landed him in an almost job-loss situation. Irrespective of huge praises from both Prime Minister and Finance Minister on his “forward looking railway budget” Dinesh Trivedi could not able to garner a single brownie point from his boss Mamata Banerjee, instead he fell prey to her direst ire. As the rumors are doing rounds, Mamata would certainly teach him a lesson for not complying to the thumb rule of politics – boss is always right. And the writing on the wall is even more clear and concise, sooner he will quit of his own or he will be axed, given the pressure from Mamata is mounting on Prime Minister. 

When this country needs a series of pragmatic measures in every field, the political bosses think diametrically opposite and often take the populist route to woo the voters without even thinking twice what people really want from them. Maybe, Dinesh Trivedi has turned out to be a mere pawn in a larger political conspiracy or at the least a self-proclaimed messiah, the lessons here are even more rhetoric than conclusive - we are living in a relativistic world and truth is always difficult to decipher. 

Whatsoever be the outcome of this political drama, the hard facts in today's world are driven by established norms of society. No matter how smart, intelligent and learned you are, the bottom line of your success is largely scripted by your boss. When you score low in boss' calculation (read loyalty), you are out on the road. And this animal instinct of “ruling the ruled” is well deep in human blood. Mamata Banerjee is no exception. Even the corporate world, which is supposed to be guided by the ethics of “profit and loss”, is also not free from the ego tussle between an employee and the boss. We all are from the same Darwinist genetic semblance. The more we become an independent thinker, the faster our annihilation being prominent and predictable. But yes, there is also a silver lining to this dark thought, an independent thinker dies once, and the subjugated many times. What's your take?

Being Relevant

The palpable hiatus between physical and digital world is shrinking fast. The social ecosystem that was once driven purely by meeting and mating physically is now transformed into a cobweb of social dashboards where Facebook and Twitter decide whether you have achieved that social quotient or not. Every trend that's generated on Twitter has significant real-world ramifications. If you are a Bollywood celebrity and lagging in trend on Twitter then it's more like a prediction that your film isn't doing well in the box office. From individual to corporate entity, everyone is a stakeholder in the process of making social media the mother of all marketing gimmicks.

Well, the new trend in social media has left all its predecessors flabbergasted in a sense that the social analytics is a measure of effectiveness of many marketing tools whether it's a simple ad or a complex multi-level marketing strategy. The clients now want a realistic report how their investment on a specific advertisement has converted into physical sales. Decades ago when advertisers claimed an ad has generated so much buzz in the market, now it's more realistic and straight – how many products have been sold and they have a direct relation with the impact of ad. All these are possible now through advance apps that crunch huge social data (in petabytes) available over web.

What's more interesting now is that when an ad is released on social media, it carries all necessary precautions to woo the customers, drive them crazy about the product and compel them to purchase or at least order it right there. Social profiling has become more robust and predictable vis-a-vis the purchasing power of customers. For examples, the agency that releases an ad for a new model of Porche being targeted for Indian millionaires would prefer a medium that can directly channel the message to the most prospective customers group, and this is surely not possible through conventional media like print or electronic, so the most efficacious medium would be social media. Social media as a significant marketing incluencer has grown dramatically. Now the new social paradigm is being relevant is more powerful than being ubiquitous.

Sycophancy Kills

The recent debacle of the Congress party in the state elections reminds only one fact that when people get closer to reality, no amount of false promises however resounding can garner votes. Given the high decibel pre-poll campaigns executed singularly by Rahul Gandhi and sparingly by Priyanka in UP, the political sycophants in the Congress party thought the magic of dynasty can work wonder even in extreme situations, but they were absolutely wrong in internalizing this gravest blunder. The world is changing fast, so is the people perception. In democracy, decisions of the supreme head are even subject to deliberations and change. But the old-fashioned Congress party which still basks in the lost glory believes in dynastic culture which has no relevance in a democracy. What's more devastating for the party now is that some diehard sycophants still underplay the reality and misguide the party chief by convincing her that all is well in this “yes boss” culture. And to a large extent the acceptance of sycophancy in the party cadre has reduced it to ashes.

If one analyzes the political campaigns of Congress vis-a-vis its success in UP, it won't be incorrect to theorize the notion that Rahul was far from the ground realities and he was carried away by the wrong advices of senior leaders of the party. The most funny element of the campaign was projecting Sam Pitroda as the mascot for weaker sections of society to woo the voters of that community. An individual success can't be generalized in such a gross way. How many people in UP know Sam, his closeness to Rajiv Gandhi and his global achievements in the field of telecommunications? Perhaps, the top one percent of the highest echelon of society even doesn't know him, forget about the masses who are reeling under the anathema of poverty and don't yet know anything beyond the necessity of “roti, kapda aur makan”. The charm of technology only catches them who enjoy the luxury of life.

More importantly, the Congress as a national political party has been drifting away from the regional issues in last two decades when regional parties got closer to the grassroots. What's the net understanding of Congress about state issues is a filtered version of scripted story concocted by few sycophants, and this in long run has proved to be dangerous for the party. Now is the high time for Rahul Gandhi to break the shackles of sycophants and pull up his socks to establish the party structure across the states in the first place. Next he should go deeper into the complex political dynamics of the states and the centre to devise a unique winning strategy even without the help of sycophants. If he doesn't overhaul the party strategy and delegate responsibilities with clearly articulated accountability to state and central leaders of the party, the 2014 general elections will be a huge disaster for the Congress. Mr Gandhi, are you listening?