Poojo's Pre-Poll Post

Another edition of the Indian General Elections comes to town. Another year that leaves you with choices that aren't choices at all - choices between the devil and the deep blue sea - conversations that veer around "the devil you know to the devil you don't". Jaagore doesn't really help after a point. It tells you to go and vote. Doesn't quite help you decide who to vote for, and more importantly, why.

If anything, this will be a coming of age election for me. I guess I've come a long way from voting for the one that seems the most harmless. Not a good idea really - just another wasted vote. You could as well be casting the neutral vote. Yes, I'm completely against the "None of the above" option – I think it's just another excuse to pass the buck and let other people make the choice for you. Why? So you can sit smug that you've voted and complain about the rowdies that have come to power?

Every party's got its share of goons, corruption, dirty politics. There's no guarantee that one or the other will really make a difference. It's all so very circumstantial - tomorrow could go any which way. A bomb dropped a country away, a bankruptcy a continent away, and there you have it - equations changing like numbers and symbols gone bonkers. Politicos take U-turns - whatever works, right.

"Politics is the art of possibilities". Who was it who said that? Buddhababu I think, while talking about a possible post-poll alliance with the Congress. Yeah, the same Congress that's currently hobnobbing with Buddhadadu's arch rival, Mamatadidi. It's supposedly all for the greater good.

After a point, they'll all be the same. But it's five years of my future, of the future of my city, my country. So I'll be voting for people I trust - at least, people I trust a little more than the others - silver strands and heavy speeches being hardly a factor. I'll be voting for sensible people, efficient people, clean people, responsible people, and well-intentioned people - at least the people who seem that way from my perspective.

I could be wrong.

I could be very, very wrong. But at least, I'll know I counted.

And democracies have changed governments, people have voted wisely several times over. What number general election is this? I can't quite remember. It runs into double digits - that much I know. Beyond that, it's just a number. But then, elections are all about numbers - the number of seats, the number of candidates, the number of political allies, the number of paramilitary forces, the number of booths, the number of election-based shows, the number of votes.

I am just a number too.

But as long as I count, it's worth it.