The Test of Voters, whether They Fail Again or Pass Now in India or Who?
An Analysis By: Balbir Singh Sooch-Sikh Vichar Manch
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The Test of Voters, whether They Fail Again or Pass Now in India or Who?
1.   Who Is Divider in Chief or a Great Unifier, Could 2019 Polls Decide?
2.   Have the voters India capable, able, efficient to decide in 2019 Polls as the following issues-questions have been already raised?
(i)  “The bitter, personal campaign for 2019 elections is over, and the question that arises now is finally, when all the votes are cast, what would have the people of India based their decision on.
(ii)   Is it the economy?
(iii)  Jobs?
(iv)   National security? Or just Narendra Modi.
 PM Modi's personality has loomed large over this election which many believe has simply been a referendum on him.
(v)    Tonight, on The Big Fight, we ask: Is referendum 2019 a referendum on PM Modi, like the famous Time magazine cover says is he India's divider in chief or a great unifier?” NDTV
 https://www.facebook.com/ndtv/videos/292786128272661/
3.    The answer to  ‘The bitter, personal campaign for 2019 polls’ could be found out as minority decisions — of dissent — not being recorded as the letter speaks;
4.    “The split in the Election Commission of India over the enforcement of the Model Code of Conduct (MCC) seems wide open before the polling for the seventh and final phase of parliamentary election on Sunday, with one Election Commissioner deciding to excuse himself from the proceedings.
5.    Having expressed his dissent on the “clean chit” to four speeches made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and one by BJP national president Amit Shah, Election Commissioner Ashok Lavasa is learnt to have shot off a letter to the Chief Election Commissioner, Sunil Arora, stating that he is being forced to stay away from the meetings of the Full Commission since “minority decisions” were not being recorded…” last updated: May 18, 2019, 7:03 AM (IST): By Ashok Lavasa and Geetanjali Gayatri; Tribune News Service;  New Delhi, May 17, 2019.
6.    “Pragya Singh Thakur, the Hindutva activist, who proudly claims to have been part of the mob that demolished Babri Masjid, stirred a hornet’s nest by calling Mahatma Gandhi’s assassin Nathuram Godse a ‘deshbhakt’ (patriot). Hours later, after the BJP left her to fend for herself, she apologised and retracted her statement. She even said that ‘what Gandhiji has done for the country cannot be forgotten’, but it was clearly an unconvincing attempt at damage control.
  She had already caused irreparable damage to the party, which merely referred her case to a disciplinary committee and sought a report in 10 days — ample time for the dust to settle”
7.    The BJP should have taken drastic action last month itself when Pragya claimed that IPS officer Hemant Karkare had been killed during the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks as she had ‘cursed’ him.
8.    When Pragya’s candidature was announced, Shah had projected her as a victim of the ‘Hindu terror conspiracy theory’, but PM Narendra Modi has declared that he can never forgive Pragya. His party, too, has committed an unforgivable offence by letting loose the so-called Sadhvi and her ilk-breed”. last updated: May 18, 2019, 6:41 AM (IST): Problematic Pragya; BJP scores own goal by letting her loose: extracts from: Editorial: Tribune News Service, Chandigarh: Please refer also- “Are The Sadhus and Sadhvis Another Name of Democracy or Terrorism in India?”
http://www.thekhalsa.org/frame.php?path=356&article=19849
9.   The BJP’s candidate has murdered Gandhi all over again by praising the murderer: Decades later we are still battling the ghosts of history. It is a fact that the RSS and the BJP believe in Hindu Rashtra as opposed to a Gandhian Republic of diverse belief systems with equality for all and a special treatment for the weaker and meeker ones. Gandhi, the unifier, was obviously anathema to the colonial masters and their stooges”  ‘Gandhi, Godse and BJP’: Pragya Singh kills Gandhi all over again by praising the assassin:  an extract from written by Rajesh Ramachandran: Tribune News Service, Chandigarh.
10.   Are the planned religious issues like ‘The “Bargari sacrilege” of 2015, and the Kotkapura-Behbal Kalan police firing incident, killing two Sikhs and humiliating peaceful protesters by all means’ not to be taken care of seriously in the elections as such issues are directly the result of dirty politics being played in our country, India?  No-doubt, the economy, Jobs, reforms in the corrupt and cruel system should be the main issues on priority in the elections?
(i)    But, what to do where dirty politics is being played on the basis of the planned religious issues like ‘The “Bargari sacrilege” of 2015, and the Kotkapura-Behbal Kalan police firing incident, killing of two Sikhs and humiliating peaceful protesters and by the mob demolition of  Babri Masjid and similarly killing religiously etc endlessly to divide the country.
11.  “India needs to embrace politics of dignity: “As the curtain falls on the fiercely contested elections to the seventeenth Lok Sabha, we must ask ourselves whether this ‘enormous expression of franchise’ leaves much to celebrate about. The philosophical foundation of a democracy rests on free and fair elections based on the autonomy of choice premised on equality and reason that underpins its moral appeal.
(i)   The authenticity of election results is also in doubt in view of serious apprehensions expressed by the Opposition about an EVM-driven counting process allegedly capable of technical manipulation. The confiscation of thousands of crores worth of  unaccounted cash and drugs, the pervasive use of muscle power and organised poll violence in some states mock claims about the purity of the electoral process.
(ii)   Fundamental issues that ought to be at the centre of the campaign have been relegated as footnotes. A flawed choice is sought to be imposed on the people between a muscular state presented as a condition of national security equated with nationalism… Indeed, a liberal democracy alone wedded to constitutionalism and accountable power can ensure bread with dignity to its citizens — the latter as important.
(iii)      This foretells the story of a democracy in decline, a nation drifting from its civilisational moorings into dangerous territory. We know that ‘greatness’ of a democratic state is not about its muscularity. It is about “…the human capacity to transcend ourselves, to have imagination and empathy, to live in truth, create beauty and to justice….” (Rob Reimen).
(iv)     At a time when democracies are in retreat and patience of the people stretched-prolonged, long-drawn-out, India can be a beacon of hope to check the ‘democratic recession’. It can do so by embracing and broadening the politics of dignity in which citizens become moral agents of their freedom.
12.   We must define the boundaries of politics to reclaim the nation's moral centre as a condition of national renewal. This election is a window of opportunity for leaders to mobilise the people and themselves to that end. Yes, it is for us to interrogate the current and change the zeitgeist-‘ideas and spirit of time- the ideas prevalent in a period and place, particularly as expressed in literature, philosophy, and religion’. last updated: May 16, 2019, 6:31 AM (IST): Extracts from ‘India needs to embrace politics of dignity’: By  Ashwani Kumar* The Tribune, Chandigarh
*Ashwani Kumar is an Indian politician and attorney who formerly served as Member of Parliament, Rajya Sabha representing the state of Punjab. He formerly served as Union Minister of Law and Justice and Union Minister of State in the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion and Ministry of Commerce and Industry. Wikipedia
An Analysis By: Balbir Singh Sooch-Sikh Vichar Manch
First Posted On: May 18, 2019, 10:39 AM (IST)
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 The Test of Voters, whether They Fail Again or Pass Now in India or Who?