Soliloquy

Understanding men whom we only see from a distance is not the easiest of tasks, and I believe the best of us have fallen prey to the sins of recriminating those whom we have no tribulations with merely to play to the gallery. Rahul Gandhi, the Leader of the Opposition in Parliament, falls under this bracket.

Long denounced for being without any political attributes despite being the son of a very famous prime minister, Mr Gandhi has often been taken to task by a vicious media hell-bent upon satisfying its agenda and fulfilling roles for which it had not been anointed in the first place.

It is a given fact that most heads of government misuse the powers vested upon them by the State, and Narendra Modi is no exception, but what maligns my faith in the system in which we vote for our rulers is that it is not going to change an instant if the aforementioned Mr Gandhi hikes up Raisina Hill and stakes the claim to form his government someday.

The parrying of responsibility that one shall often expect to see between Mr Modi and Mr Gandhi in Parliament belies the fact that it was once an honourable institution constituted by honourable men deeply aware of the significance of their actions and in complete control of their integrity despite formidable circumstances.

While the said honourable institution has been rendered into a contraption circus-like in its nature, it is worth mentioning that precious little will change now that the Opposition has a voice of its own and has elected a generalissimo much vaunted for his oratory skills but much deplored for his seeming lack of cohesion in adding two and two.

Criticising for criticism’s sake and appreciating for appreciation’s sake evades the grasp of the much-travelled and well-read commentator and it is but a pity that one has to latch on to the shame of such words bandied about without any consideration for the meaning that they imply, or seemingly as important, lack.

The boxing matches that have already begun and the tirades that have flown from all corners underly the deep-seated mistrust of the Indian political system that the layman has and belies very little of what political representation can do for society, if anything at all.

A lot has been said about how the majoritarian government that we have in the Centre will have to listen to the voice of the minorities (disguised as that of the Opposition) in Parliament and how it restores us to a democracy in which the persecuted and the voiceless have an equal say in governance, but I am not so hopeful.

If anything, the Opposition has agendas of its own which are nowhere aligned with what the downtrodden and the marginalised of this country want, and as long as we keep trusting these power-hungry men who seek nothing but comfort for themselves and a dalliance of material wealth for their descendants who can do little better than leech off it, we will suffer.

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