It is truly distressing that after a defeat in Rajasthan, a former Congress minister (he lost) was busy arguing that tourism is prostitution! Small wonder that in their effort to impose archaic and redundant ideas on a changed society and control mindlessly, they destroyed and lost the state. People like this are responsible for making India a hell-hole for visitors from across the subcontinent and abroad.
Regressive and living in a strange cocoon, such types should be relegated from critical areas that generate pride, employment and revenue. It is unfortunate that many Congress Party leaders believe that business is a bad word, a dirty occupation. They seem to believe that government and the bureaucracy are the two arms that can ?save? India. We all have been victims of this incomprehensible attitude and the horrors of India are thanks to this breed.
It is people like the defeated minister who are responsible for no medical facilities in the districts, no schools, no water, no governance. All they do is spout nonsense oblivious of the fact that there is a generation out there that finds them and their views reprehensible. Are positions such as ?tourism is prostitution? one of the points in the Congress Party manifesto? The scary part is that if this is how they view tourism, heaven knows what damage they are doing in other more critical areas.
It would be wise for them to look beyond their noses and break out of the cages they have locked themselves into before it is too late. These same people strut about at tourism seminars across the world, being feted, wined and dined to satiate their personal whims and then have the gall to call this legitimate area of economic activity prostitution.
The time has come for government to liberalise because unless they are whipped first, this poor country will only move backwards. Stalinist controls everywhere, from excise rules to a strange unidentifiable animal called an NoC, have made corruption and the passing of illegal money mandatory in our daily lives.
One way the Congress Party could begin to build a new and energetic image is to purge itself of these men and women who have brought the party to this state. Winning or losing elections is not the issue. What does the Party believe in? Does it believe in generating employment? In doing something substantial for the dispossessed? In addressing the aspirations of this new millennium? In being led by the present generation? Or, does it want to cling to its dead skin, its closed door, ?iron curtain? manner?
It is impossible to connect to the high command unless you are one of the 100-strong privileged coterie of ?outsiders?. Senior party secretaries consciously keep critical information away from the party president because they are forever hiding the reality and truth from her. They are all utterly uncomfortable with presenting the ?bad news? and they behave as though they are still in the treasury benches. They should all be removed because they are, in fact, working actively against the party. The layers that you have to wade through to get to the top, and often much humiliation, keeps the true ground reality and the many serious interpretations and analyses of those working in areas that no general secretary has worked in, away from the president of the party.
Are the leaders in the top echelons of the Congress Party hierarchy deliberately isolating Sonia Gandhi? Is this what they define as ?loyalty?? To some of us who watch these shenanigans, it seems clear that the first illness of the party is that it is working against itself. It is like a cancer. They groan and moan about all that they themselves have been responsible for. Maybe the time has come for the Congress President to weigh them and whip them.
And as for the Bhattal saga ? let her go with her chaps and openly do her alliance with Mr Badal. It is not important any longer to win. It is imperative to do it right. To be blackmailed by party people is reprehensible and the public views it as ludicrous. Let them go where they want, where they belong. The party can start anew. Here is an opportunity to cleanse it of all the corroded baggage.