Thursday, October 17, 2013

Develop institutions of democracy to rate India as a true democratic country



Hillary Clinton has been fined 80 pounds by the traffic constable for illegally parking her car in London. This news goads me to think about how our police behaves in case of an MLA, MP, babu or even a Mukhia or ward Councilor parks his or her vehicle on the middle of the road. The traffic police would look in the opposite direction but it would pounce upon the poor rickshaw puller, auto driver, cyclist or a motor cyclist the moment they pause even at the way-side. It is rare but if an honest-upright policeman dares touch an influential offender he is bound to invite trouble for himself. People say, when the driver of the official car of the first Bihar Chief Minister Shri Krshna Singh parked the car illegally he had been fined by a police officer. The Chief Minister was very pleased and had rewarded the officer. But now this is anachronistic.

This is the difference in the concepts of democracy in the UK and that in our country. Democratic institutions in the UK are developed while ours are half baked.

Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose had said India was not ripe for democracy so a benevolent dictatorship was needed to first cleanse the evils from society and politics. But this country adopted a model what is known as Gandhi-Nehru model that proved disastrous for the country. India was divided on religious lines still the problem plagues the nation. Corruption was institutionalized and got recognition and respectability. Constitutional provisions of even fundamental rights were conditioned under qualified specifications of parochial politics.

If we are to usher in a true democracy we shall have to develop our democratic institutions first. I would quote a couplet of Iqbal  "जम्हुरिअत एक तर्ज़--हुकुमत है कि जिसमें बंदों को गिना करते हैं तोला नहीं करते"

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