ELECTIONS? WHO CARES?

13th October, 2009

Hi Friends,

As I am having a late dinner I am watching the news channels. Times Now says that the voting in Gadchiroli was better than that in Mumbai. Look of abject resignation on Arnav Goswami’s face as he slips this on to us. I thought he would burst into tears.

Now, I really beg to present another point of view. For one, you just can’t compare Gadchiroli and Bombay, can you? It’s like comparing San Francisco and Jhumri Talaya – Gadchiroli being San Francisco.

For another, I just KNOW that EVERYBODY has expressed his view on the state of the country. Those who love the ruling party have voted for Continuity; others have voted for Change.

But an overwhelming majority have expressed their desire for Nirvana by just not wanting to stain their fingers with some dirty purple ink that refuses to wash. They stayed away.

And it is this overwhelming majority that I truly admire. Like the param yogis who seek salvation and inner peace through a rigorous masochistic exercise of inflicting unspeakable forms of torture on oneself – like sleeping on a bed of nails or standing on one leg like a stork for days on end - the Overwhelming Majority too seek solace and eternal bliss in the status quo.

Difficult though it may be, try to imagine the look of sheer ecstasy on their face as they breathe in the soothing fumes of overheated BEST buses, and the intoxicating aroma from the mounds of human and animal waste, the rotting garbage and the bio-waste from public hospitals – and you will understand why they don’t want change. Indeed, the Overwhelming Majority have solved the riddle of Life – it is just Maya.

So who cares if a score of farmers or two commit suicide in Vidarbha? Or if the Marathi manoos finally gets his due and a hundred fly-overs? Or if the Lord gives us our daily vada-pao? It is just Maya.

And this is what I truly admire about the Overwhelming Majority. With a packaged philosophy of thousands of years being rammed down our throats we have learnt to accept His presence in everything – even in the mountains of human waste and overflowing gutters. Look at our temples if you don’t believe me! Indeed, a few of the enlightened Overwhelming Majority told me with the utmost passion and sincerity that in the ordinary cockroach they see a superior form of Life, for only the cockroach can flourish in the slime and slush of drain pipes.

And so, if anyone asks me whether I voted, I will shrug my shoulders and, like Alfred Neuman of MAD magazine, will say: “What? Me worry?”

So Mr Goswami, please do not say that the Bombay-wallahs have not voted. They may not have gone to the polling booth, but they have almost unanimously expressed their collective wish - to be like the indestructible cockroach.

Cheers,

Deepak Tralshawala