Assembly Elections

How complicated the word democracy is? Very much. But I don’t understand a thing they say. Whatever the historic significance and scholarly impact of the word be, it doesn’t appeal to me. I am an ordinary person, with an ordinary intellectual ability from the extraordinary place called Kerala state, India, where people posses an incredible capacity to be numb in matters of heart and brain. I mean the people of this socio-cultural and political locality carry an exceptional ability to be in a persistent sleep, within their genes. This sleep is similar to the blindness as Saramagu writes in his novel with the same title. This blindness or sleep is historic. And it describes how democracy is dealt with in this place. Political betrayals are phenomenon where the political leaders promise their service in matters of development and other related issues, but shun their responsibilities once they reach the throne. The election arrives after five years, and these same leaders fight for power. The voters follow each other like lemmings without thinking even once how mercilessly they were betrayed by these leaders.  Here is a note that I wrote in facebook on the eve of assembly election in Kerala the previous month. Today as the election results are almost out this note seems to be of greater importance.

I am Not a Dissident

 by Anu Lal on Tuesday, 12 April 2011 at 23:10

It is election time in many states in India. And everyone seems to be bewitched by this political phenomenon that still continues after so many set backs and paradoxes. People ask me too, whom do you vote for? I answer with a smile, I am thinking about it. Today (12-04-2011), on the eve of assembly elections, I believe it is time to reveal my political inclinations to the reading public, at least to the few of my friends, who are also my readers.

My choice, without a chance of doubt is that I will not participate in this absurd ritual of paradoxes. It is an obvious question; which those paradoxes are that I am so unabashedly relying on. Before going further, let me confess my intentions. My intentions are not biased towards any specific political or ethnic propaganda. They are entirely based on the desire to be truthful to my subjective inclinations and identity. I am a writer and behind this pale paper surface it is a writer’s subjectivity that is at work.