Paalitiksh

Of late, we have been seeing some violent protests in a couple of places in the country by some political leaders, who do not, as of now, have that much a standing in their respective electoral regions. I began to ponder whether, these so called populist leaders, were really there for the concerns of the people or something else. My logic was, if they were really concerned about the people, they wouldn't be harassing others in the process, right?

Then my friend told me a story and things fell in place.

Some years back, a Korean auto major opened a plant in a port city in South India. It was provided vast swathes of land, near a highway, almost free of charge. Nobody opposed it then. The reason was, both mouths, ruling and opposition, were stuffed. The ruling CM got a percentage on each car sold from there and the opposition got a flat rate so that there would no voice raise against the deal.

This did not happen with the Indian auto major, who setup a plant recently. The CM did not request for anything 'on the side'. So, they industrialists completely forgot about something called 'opposition'. Their beaks had to be wetted. Their silence had to be bought. But it wasn't and you can see the results now.

Another interesting situation is happening in the financial capital, where a certain leader is trying to whip up linguistic fervor in anything and everything. We shouldn't be be surprised if we see requests for a regional anthem in the local language instead of the sanskrit one we have now.

This is being done for primarily for two reasons. One, to corner the vote bank of the hardcore linguistic fanatics. And two, to position himself, as a nuisance generator. Greater the nuisance value, greater will be the 'water' provided to quench the 'thirst' in case of any new projects in future. There is no need to be a ruling party to ask for 'water', it depends on how much nuisance you can create.