Are You Eligible to Contest the Lok Sabha Election 2019?
While people of India have been suffering for the past seven decades under the rules of all political parties, there is an immediate need for a countrywide movement aimed to usher in a new competence-based political model.
The main objective of the new model is to allow only domain experts to handle different fields of governance, and uneducated or semi-literate people should not be allowed to even contest the elections.
By Rakesh Raman
In India, politicians from all political parties belong to three breeds: Bad, Worse, and Worst. Among their common traits are cheating, dishonesty, falsehood, shamelessness, communalism, corruption, promiscuity, and a random mixture of all of them.
Let me try to describe these three breeds for your information and necessary action. You can visualize the examples of politicians as per your own familiarity with them and put them in the following categories.
Bad Politicians: They understand the difference between right and wrong but have decided to support the wrong. They themselves may not be that cruel, but for their selfish interests they support political cruelty.
Worse Politicians: They are like a wolf in sheep’s clothing. They would pretend to be the most honest creatures in the world but leave no stone unturned to harm others. You can also call them backstabbers.
Worst Politicians: This is the most dangerous breed. Politicians in this category are hybrids of a human and a beast. They believe in doing all immoral and harmful acts overtly without any attempt to conceal them. It’s believed that wickedness runs in their blood and they are, in fact, devils in the shape of humans.
As Indians have been reeling under the cruelty of these politicians for the past 70 years, they would like to see some positive transformation in 2019 Lok Sabha election.
Here are the six traits that every politician must possess to be eligible to contest the 2019 Lok Sabha election.
1. Literacy: If a politician does not have proper education – preferably a genuine university degree – they should not be allowed to come anywhere near politics. As a politician has to operate in a globalized world, they should be able to speak fluently in English language.
2. Domain Expertise: Politicians should offer their candidature for a particular domain of governance such as finance, education, technology, law, environment, healthcare, and so on. If they do not have demonstrable experience in any of these domains, they are not fit to be in politics and certainly can’t become ministers.
If the government ministers are domain experts, they would hire only those executives who have adequate domain knowledge instead of retaining the traditional good-for-nothing bureaucrats such as IAS (Indian Administrative Service) officers.
3. Social Work: Politics is all about community service. Only educated people who have been serving the communities selflessly understand the real issues that affect people. The political parties must encourage such social workers to join mainstream politics.
4. Truthfulness: Most people have seen the disastrous results of falsehood in Indian politics. It has led to a plight where only politicians thrive and ordinary people find it difficult to survive. Politicians who have a visible record of telling lies should be kicked out of the political arena.
5. Honesty: Corruption has always been the bane of politics in India. Corruption has caused a wide rich-poor divide where rich are becoming richer and poor are falling deep into the chasm of poverty. This ugly trend needs to be reversed to ensure equality among the masses. Say ‘No’ to corruption in politics.
6. Compassion: A politician must have respect for all forms of human rights. They should have proven record to selflessly helping others – particularly those who belong to the disadvantaged sections of the society. Selfish souls must stay away from politics.
Although today it will be difficult to find even 10 persons in India who could satisfy the above-stated six-trait criterion, we must begin our work now to usher in such a political paradigm in the country.
The main objective of the new competence-based political model is to allow only domain experts to handle different fields of governance, and uneducated people should not be allowed to even contest the elections.
This article is part of our exclusive editorial section that focuses on Lok Sabha Election 2019 in India.
By Rakesh Raman, who is a national award-winning journalist and social activist. Besides working at senior editorial positions with leading media companies, he was writing an exclusive edit-page tech business column (named Technophile) regularly for The Financial Express (a daily business newspaper of The Indian Express Group).
Earlier, he had been associated with the United Nations (UN) through United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) as a digital media expert to help businesses use technology for brand marketing and business development. He also runs a free school for deserving children under his NGO – RMN Foundation.
Photo courtesy: Press Information Bureau
