Election Tamasha
- Hueiyen Lanpao Editorial :: April 04, 2014 -

Elections in the supposed world's greatest democracy have always been seen more or less like a Tamasha (grand show). And this time, it is no different.

With the D-day to the first phase to the nine-phased 16th Lok Sabha election, described by many political analysts as the most important for decades in the country, fast approaching; the clamour for drawing the attention (or drawing away the attention, whichever, you like to read) of the voters with promises of better days ahead is growing louder and the pitch of trading charges among the political parties has reached an all time high.

While at the National level, the candidates of the ruling Congress party, the main opposition BJP and other national as well as regional parties are at each other's neck, the candidates of these parties at the State level have fared not a notch lesser if not more when it comes to trying to outdone each other with their lung power, leaving nothing much for the brain of the voters to exercise.

Taking into consideration of the increasingly acrimonious tone of the ongoing election campaign, it is interesting to note that Harishankar Brahma, one of three commissioners charged with overseeing the biggest democratic exercise in the world, has been forced to come out with a pleading to all the candidates to rein in their emotions.

All that we would like to say is, if elections could be won on the promises made to the voters and hurling of charges against each other by the candidates and their supporters, then perhaps, all the political parties and their candidates in the fray for the two-phase 16th Lok Sabha elections in the State would be the winners.

However, the truth is that elections could never be won on the basis of false promises and false charges that are flying thicker than the flies.

But the sad part of the story is that many of these 'holier-than-thou-candidates' who are vying for the two Lok Sabha seats in the State are oblivious of the this fact, and they are engaging in an endless fight to portray themselves as better than the other.

It is the performance and vision of the candidates and their political parties that count. But voters in Manipur have caught in a situation where ruling Congress party keeps on harping over its supposed achievements while the opposition parties have long lists of 'failures' and 'shortcomings' to throw right at the face of the ruling party.

In the absence of any appreciable performances to boost of and plausible vision of a better tomorrow that could be offered, all that the political parties and their candidates could do is churning out false promises and spewing venom, which we think is the lowest standard of politics.

The election Tamasha in Manipur reminds us of the humorous quote normally attributed to Larry Hardiman which says, the word 'politics' is derived from the word 'poly', meaning 'many', and the word 'ticks', meaning 'blood sucking parasites'.