Leading Indian newspaper, the Times of India, in its Lucknow edition today published a news item, titled, “Bigger the criminal charge, fatter the politician’s wallet”. It gives various data about the possessions of various lawmakers around the nation. According to the report, 13.7 million INR is the average assets of 62, 847 candidates who have contested Parliamentary and Assemblies’ election since 2004. 38.3 million INR is the average assets of victorious candidates. 43.0 million INR is the average wealth of lawmakers who face criminal charges. 43.8 million INR is the average wealth of legislatures facing serious charges, like, murder, kidnapping and rape. There is nothing great about this report by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR). 13. 7 million INR is not at all any big sum for candidates contesting elections and the report might not have accounted for inflation spread over the decade. Considering the high entry barriers, 38.3 million INR is not that big sum for victorious people, more so, when Parliament and Assemblies have very rich lawmakers and because of that the average is lower and the distribution is narrower for majority of lawmakers. The fact is that with increasing time Indian society is becoming more violent and this gets reflected in Indian politics too. According to ADR 18% of the candidates were facing the criminal cases and 8% were facing serious charges. Obviously, it cannot be said that proportionate number of people in India are violent and have criminal-intent. But sure almost 1-5% people may come into that category and if one takes into account the tacit approval of the public for violence and dominance; for whatever reasons, that percentage only increases non-linearly. If one sees the description of violent people as heroes and adorable persons on screen, that number is increasing and so is the number of lawmakers tainted in various corruption charges. A nation’s behavior is reflected in distributions of attributes over various variables and parameters. The report just reveals the reality of Indian demographics and should be a warning to those people who want to change India through academic appeals. Idealism as described in texts; religious, moral and political is usually meaningless in India. The competition to outperform one’s peers and seniors is taking a heavy toll on people from purist viewpoint. Economic selfishness has a cost for the society. India has very few social and political theories. The caste institutions and those derived from them do permit dominance of rich and powerful over those who are not-so.
Posted on: Tue, 30 Jul 2013 09:59:29 +0000
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