politics is a game

When we were kids, in our civic science (yes they called it science, I don’t understand how it could ever be called a science?) course we were taught that democracy is where you have government of people, for the people and by the people. We would cram the definition up and puke it in our answer sheets in exam. Everyone would get good marks and thus we all would become happy.

What they never taught us is the definition of politics. Actually they don’t teach it anywhere. Politics is a game and you are never taught a game. You have to learn it.

Over the course of life, we see lots of politics in every walk of life and then we understand the true meaning of the term politics. Politics is a game, a game of power, a game of opportunities.

Recently former Prime Minister Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee said that the Bharatiya Janata Party should learn from the communists the art of getting re-elected. So now we know what politics is for BJP. Nobody would have expected a senior and respected leader like Vajpayee to make such a observation.

Is politics only about being in power?
BJP was in power for one complete term. Today politics is indeed about being in power. In his recent interview with Karan Thapar, Mr Rahul bajaj tried hard to defend hisstance of not being in politics. He tried hard not to accpet the fact that he was in politics by entering RS. He said he was there just to serve the country and he was not part of any political party. Mr. Bajaj could have been true in the pre-independence era, but today politics is the oil which runs the machine called Democrac

Did India really shine?
BJP lost all its base after the ruling term. Did it ever try to learn what went wrong? A country can not be fooled by false hype of development created by India Shining campaign. We did develop in the leadership of NDA government, but that happened in all the previous terms also. Development will always happen, at a different pace though. India shining showed as if our country made leaps and bounds of development but that was a total illusion. It cost BJP dearly. Even at the state level, same thing happened in most of the BJP ruling states. Taste of power made them realize their basic duties.

Where are the real issues?
Coalition politics is the bitter truth for India. It did not help us anyway. Its just a compromise for the mistakes of the leaders. They never really served the country and for their selfish ends, broke the political parties. No principles exist today. There is no left or right, its just power. You show me money, I am with you. Everyone wants to play their own trumpets and fulfil their own (right or wrong) demands. Nobody wants to work for real issues of poverty and development.

Young brigade?
When every other party was giving way for young enthusiastic leaders, BJP pushed its young leaders like Mr. Pramod Mahajan and Shushma Swaraj, Incidnetly these leaders are elder to my father. For others also, most of the young leaders came on the scene coz of their family. Mr. Rahul mahajan was about to enter into Rajya Sabha, juts coz he was son of late Mr. Pramod Mahajan. We are still living in the age of family politics. Sonia Gandhi is the GOD for the government now. Nobody knows when we will try to incorporate new things in politics. Change is the ultimate solution but we dont want to use it.

Learn from the mistakes
Left is changing at a greater speed than any other group (at least in the Bengal). Coz they have realized that if they don’t change, they will die. Development will be the only source of their existence. So it’s good for BJP that they learn from Left in this matter. For over two years in opposition BJP has never been constructive. Their leaders kept fighting amongst themselves. They could never raise a real issue. And thus they made congress government more powerful.

It’s really time they learn from their mistakes. And give a proper meaning to politics.