Ugly unfolding of events Do away with violence

One certainly hopes this is not the curtain raiser, a sort of a trailer for more ugly days to come by. Already Singjamei Assembly Constituency and Andro Constituency have made it to the news for all the wrong reasons. It had nothing to do with debates between the intending candidates on issues which confront the State or issues which can emerge as the day progresses towards the Assembly election of 2022 but had everything to do with what one generally calls plain goondaism. What one used to see on the silver screen, tales scripted by the fertile minds of Bollywood to catch the whistle blowing crowd on the front row seems to be playing out right now before the very eyes of the people, who have better and far more productive things to pursue than stick their neck out for candidates who may or not remember them once the election is over. And to think that this is the same set of people who raise a stink that the elected representatives do nothing for the people once the election is over and nothing can get more farcical than this. No one is interested in knowing who cast the first stone but it is the mentality of the people that is flummoxing. Let the candidates engage in fruitful debates, maybe even in front of the camera to score their points but why should the ‘runners’ target each other, all in the name of democratically electing their representative ? This is a question which everyone should ask themselves and better still isn’t it the duty the intending candidates to rein in their over enthusiastic supporters, who may just turn out to be trouble makers ? Slingshots, projectiles and muscle power are words best associated only with the celluloid world and should have no place in an exercise which will be conducted under the name of democracy. Let this point sink into the consciousness of everyone, even remotely associated with the ongoing preparations ahead of the next Assembly election.
Election jamboree. Qualify this understanding with the sentence, ‘one that comes once every five years’ and this is where one is left wondering why should people be interested or fixated with the jamboree part only and not what it would mean for the next five years. As repeatedly pointed out here in this column, with the BJP being in power at New Delhi and at Imphal, it is the party which is at the consciousness of everyone but unfortunate it is that so far the people who matter do not seem to have given any thought on why Imphal should continue to be so fixated with New Delhi. Nagaland has already shown that it can have its own branded political party, which can steer the course of the State. So too Mizoram and Meghalaya. Is the failure to look beyond the party at New Delhi a weakness or is it being politically pragmatic is a question which every thinking citizen of the land must be raising in their mind. Look further from the North East and it was not so long back that West Bengal was in the news for its ability to look beyond New Delhi. Same too with Tamil Nadu. The point is as long as people are obsessed with street fights and letting loose the projectiles from their hands, one can safely bid farewell to any sort of a meaningful election. The people will definitely get the Government they deserve, to borrow an old line.