Three unpopular decisions
- Hueiyen Lanpao Editorial :: June 29, 2013 -

“Mistakes in life can either make or break you.” This truism could be applied to any elected Governments around the world as well.

History is testimonial to how many a popular-elected Government crumpled down like houses made of playing cards because of the mistakes made in judgment at the time of formulating so-called policies and programmes for public welfare, which caused more miseries to the people, instead of any intended good.

To get a clearer picture, let us just think about the First World War, and how the warring nations on both sides of the fence ended up worse than before after an unprecedented carnage that eliminated substantial fractions of whole younger generations and left millions starving amid the rubble of war.

Or, think about the Great Economic Depression of the 1930s, the decade preceding the Second World War, when millions of people around the world even in the most prosperous nations plunged into poverty when the Government fails to take decisive steps and act in time.

Closer home, let us remember how the failure of controlling the spiraling prices of a commodity as common as Onion became a major issue in the country in 1998, leading to the then ruling BJP Government losing Assembly elections later that year.

One common thread that runs through all these events is the mistakes that people in power made in giving judgment in situation where carrot could have worked more effectively than the stick.

The outcome of the error of judgment that we are trying to hint at may not be as disastrous as the global events cited above.

But, nonetheless, the irrationality and unpopularity over the three recent decisions taken by the State Cabinet with regard to taking over the Royal Palace, converting an all boys’ school like Ram Lal Paul Higher Secondary into an exclusive school for girls and cancellation of Manipur MBBS/BDS Entrance Examination-2013 at the eleventh hour by misinterpreting a completely unrelated Supreme Court order, has only put a BIG question mark on the ability of all the Cabinet Ministers in the Congress led Government in passing judgment.

As far as we could remember, these three are the most unpopular decisions that have been ever taken by the State Cabinet not just in term of their timing, which has caught the people completely off guard, but also in the manner they have been taken in a such a hush-hush manner and, not to forget, the temerity to remain clutching on to the wrong end of the stick despite realizing the mistakes.

This reminds us of a speech made by US President Franklin D. Roosevelt on June 27, 1936. While accepting the re-nomination to the Presidency, he had stated, “Governments can err, Presidents do make mistakes, but the immortal Dante tells us that divine justice weighs the sins of the cold-blooded and the sins of the warm-hearted in different scales. Better the occasional faults of a Government that lives in a spirit of charity than the consistent omissions of a Government frozen in the ice of its own indifference.”