‘Hahahahaha’…Laugh, that’s all I could do at seeing the incredibly pathetic turnout for the general elections, especially in Mumbai. It’s the kind of laugh that escapes from you when you feel so much grief that you do not know how to react. One would think that after a shocking awakening that we were handed out on 26th November 2008 Mumbai would not fall asleep so soon.
After all those rallies, after all that ‘we need change’ and after all that drama this is what the citizens of ‘the great city’ Mumbai do. And then you have the audacity in celebrating ‘the Mumbai spirit’ in getting life back to normal in a jiffy. Haha. I’ll tell you what seems to be ‘the Mumbai spirit’ after this turnout, ‘Ignorance is bliss’. Of all the teams in the highly hyped IPL, no team deserves to call itself ‘INDIANS’. Not after this. This is not a launch on Mumbai or the Mumbai spirit. I was a believer in all those things and that is why it hurts so much to see all that go down the drain. It seems like it was just a publicity stunt. It seems like we like to call ourselves ‘Mumbaikars’ and our team ‘Mumbai Indians’. But when it comes to being them, swish and we are no where to be found. It is not the democratic system of India that is at fault here, it is the hypocritical people of India that are.
What was equally appalling was the response of the media to this abysmal turnout. It was a bigger news for them that ‘a lot’ of celebrities had turned up for voting rather than the fact that there was just 41% turnout overall. It’s depressing. And to top it all, they then find excuses to support the low turnout. And what were the reasons? ‘it was a long weekend, people were vacationing’ and ‘it was too hot’. I’m feeling ashamed just typing this down. If you call these reasons for not being part of the process of the formation of the Government then God damn it you have no fucking right to utter a single word of distress against the way this country is run. Instead of travelling with the celebrities in their cars and interviewing them about who they voted and why, shouldn’t they have gone and found those people vacationing (thanks to the long weekend) or sitting in their air conditioned homes because its too hot. It’s not like we’re made of wax and we’ll melt in the heat.
I’m not saying I expected a 100% turnout. It is a time bound process, this so called ‘awakening’. But atleast we should make some progress. Atleast take some steps forward, hell atleast take one step forward.
I had thought that Mumbai could be the spearhead in bringing about the change that this country so desperately needs. But this is disheartening. Almost draining me of all the hope that there will be a better India tomorrow but at the same time, giving me an insight that it is time to take this change outside of living room chats and blog articles. It’s time to act, to do. Of course, we can’t expect to see immediate results, but maybe by the next elections, or maybe the one after that, or maybe the one after that. However long it takes, the process should start now, has to start now.
