It is a tough election for voters. A mundane multi-cornered contest has mingled with a mind-numbing multi-media slug-fest. A light vein is needed to take the ongoing de’mock’ratic tamasha seriously. Small wonder comedians and caricatures are invoked more than Kamaraj, Anna or MGR. But vote, we must!
Author: T R Jawahar
This being poll time, April 1 was not just all fools day but heralded a full fooling season. All through this month and a good part of next, we are condemned to remain helpless fools as rambling politicos and a range of parties get into rabble-rousing mode. A few random samples from their manifestos and many speeches would reflect the extent they treat voters as suckers. And mind you, all are pretty serious about their stupidity.
Let us face the truth squarely, rather, triangularly. The three main contestants to the CM post are visibly sick. The incumbent has to be propped every few paces, her opponent needs to be pushed around and the third can’t do without a prompter/ interpreter. But first, is it right to discuss a sensitive, private matter as health?
The main Dravidian parties may be many things. But they are certainly not ancient or outdated.
No doubt, K, now seven short of century, has been alternating as CM since when I was five and looms as a prospect into my fifty. Stalin, sixty plus, with forty- five odd years of politics behind him is still a youthful aspirant. J became CM a year before my daughter was born and she, J at 67 is front runner (?) as she, my daughter, not J, is well into her PG.
I feel all tipsy. No, I did not visit the spiritual, pardon, spirited tourist spots of our towns here, namely, Tasmac. Blame it rather on the topsy-turvy twists and turns of TN’s tinsel politics. Now if your head doesn’t spin at the tamashas in this theater, then it is your sobriety that is in doubt. A normal person should feel tipsy. Here’s how.
In tune with TN’s tested tradition I turn to tinsel town this week too. 12 B, as all true Tamilians groomed in pristine celluloid culture know, is a movie on alternate realities with twin plots.
The familiar formula is back in fashion. Not that it ever was off vogue, but poll time is when it bares its fangs and rears its venom-spewing head most. Casteism, particularly in TN, is a generational curse. However, while displaying its ugliest face this week it also unmasked all the political facades that kept the poisonous pot boiling for their own survival and success.
Henceforth let’s also address him as Captain in sync with this sinking State’s fetish for titles.
Ignoring such ‘hard-earned’ prefixes and suffixes is akin to political blasphemy here. The leaders love them, coteries spread them, the cadres get inspired by them and the media, as ‘true’ mirrors of society, reflect them. That’s how legends are made in this part of the country.
This game has restarted even before the election whistle was sounded. But in contrast to what the title suggests, this is rarely played in that idyllic and aptly tear-shaped island, but in TN, a bomb’s throw or gunshot hearing distance away. A parallel arena is Indian judiciary.