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Why did the western media totally ignore the just concluded month and a half long Indian exercise of electing the members of their 16th parliament?

Despite the Indian media tom toming it as the biggest democratic exercise to decide the future of one billion Indians, it was the conflict in Ukraine and the abduction of Nigerian girls which grabbed the headlines in the world.

Despite being projected to become the number one economy in the world in the near future, is there a reflection of the real status of India among the world nations in this apathy? If there is, no one but the Indians themselves are to be blamed.

Somehow the perception about the Indians among the rest of the world, built over several decades, is not something Indians abroad can write home about. Every Indian who ventures out on a holiday outside India returns home with that feeling, a feeling of animosity and dislike and bearing a secret grudge about the countries they went visiting.  The problem is, most Indians won't even admit to it.


This inherent problem, cultural or psychological can explain to some extent why no one is really bothered about whether 1 billion Indians wants to conduct a democratic election and who wins if they do.

The reality is, if they really did show any interest and put the whole process under scrutiny, they won't even call it democratic. 

An exercise in the name of democracy which is conducted and the results of which are decided on the basis of caste, religion, language and gender is hardly democratic. Truly, there is nothing about the elections in India, which is democratic; then why should a civilized world bother about it in preference to more humanitarian concerns of the war in Ukraine or the plight of innocent school girls abducted by terrorists.

The way the 2014 election was conducted, violating all civilized forms of political respect for the opposition and flouting every rule in the book is hardly worth watching by anyone who believes in democratic values.

If  disseminating misinformation and using all forms of propaganda to confuse and misguide an electorate which consists mostly of inexperienced first time voters and poor and ill educated rural folk, taking advantage of an extended process and the inability of the election commission to prevent or act against can decide the results, such an exercise is hardly democratic by any standard.

In fact the whole process actually smacks of methods used by dictators and fascists in history and should have been brought to the awareness of the world by the Indian media, if true journalistic values were important to India.

Indians take great pride in imitating the west, particularly the US in a false belief that it is the best and perhaps establish their equality with the west. It is clear from the contemporary life in India, particularly of the youth.

This pathetic  penchant of  the Indians, which often amuse the western visitors to India, is indeed disgusting when it comes to their outlook and social values, however doesn’t apply when imbibing western social values and sense of social justice.

When it comes to such things, every Indian, however educated and westernized in lifestyle, is still an animal of India’s  notorious jungle divide by its religions, castes, languages, pockets of development and depravation, with intolerance of everyone else.

Sadly, the Indian media, which have a role and social responsibility to help the country come out of such parochialism which had been the hallmark of the Indian so called democracy do not measure up when it comes to their contribution.

They also become part of the  western investment venture out to grab a section of the Indian pie of potential market, whipping up frenzy and not really questioning efforts which can erode liberty and freedom in the long run.

It will take many more elections and generations before anyone takes the Indian Election seriously.









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3 comments:

  1. What a fascinating article! I saw the John Oliver show you shared above and - outside of absolutely loving his sense of irreverent humor - I wondered why there hadn't been more in the news about the election. Thanks for providing some background and insight! Oh, and welcome to the B3 community - I look forward to reading more from you. :-)

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    Replies
    1. Hello Marquita,
      Many thanks for stopping by and for your comment. Please check out MY CNN IBN blog for more on INDIA
      http://ibnlive.in.com/blogs/sreedharpillai/3597/65247/is-it-adieu-to-the-last-prime-minister-and-the-last-parliamentary-election-of-india.html

      Delete
  2. I watched the John Oliver report and had been following the process in the NYTimes (buried in the interior pages) and some reporting on National Public Radio and our local PBS station - but you're right very, very limited coverage. The bright spot though seems to be that the Congress party didn't win this one - and if that monopoly on power is broken - perhaps it does mean changes for India moving forward. You're right though that an uneducated population does open the government and those in power to corruption... no way around that except education.

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