Victims Of A Mediocre Leadership

What an embarrassing week we have been through. What pathetic politics ? from the presidency to the government in Maharashtra, a state that professes to be one of the more progressive and ?modern?. The behaviour all round has been shameful, the kind any self-respecting person would shun. But alas, we seem to have lost our self-respect altogether and have become victims of a mediocre and substandard leadership. The bunch of people who determine our future have limited minds with fixed agendas, all rather dangerous in the world of today. We are stuck, forced to wallow in a corroded and corrupted space.

The choice for President, as of 13th of June, is bizarre. A missile engineer is pulled out of the hat in an attempt to present a fait accompli. The first reaction is, ?good man?, and then with the passing of hours the entire attitude towards his candidature changes. ?Why not Amjad Ali Khan, if you are looking for an accomplished Muslim? After all, you need skills for both music and science?, said one hugely sensible person. And, the opposition has no alternate name…which means that the President of India could well be a man involved with the creation of weapons of destruction! What a dreadful signal to our country and the world in this day and age.

We need to have a person used to governance and with an understanding of constitutional law, an intellectual with a presence. Is India devoid of persons of such international calibre? Why are we shuffling around coming up with names of former bureaucrats in their eighties? It takes us one more notch down in world perception. We are being seen as a country that people and businesses, worldwide, are abandoning. We are increasingly being seen as bungling mass of continent with ineptitude as our trait of governance, a parochial, backward third world mess.

Our leadership is seen as old, decrepit and doddering with their minds stuck in a time warp not willing to let go, not willing to pass the baton, hanging on for dear life. We play act strong postures for the world at large. ?We will not talk, we will not have third party intervention on any issue that concerns our borders?…but, when Washington looks stern, wields a whip and issues an advisory to its citizens to get the hell out of India, we fall in line after the damage is done. Always the losers.

We now have another breed of sanctions imposed on us. Images of an exodus. Non-Indians are leaving India. Indians looking for legitimate visas to go abroad are being denied entry into countries of the world. No one trusts the Indian. No one wants to come to India. What a humiliating situation to be in.

The other image that has enveloped us is one of elected representatives from Maharashtra being bundled off like cattle to other destinations, locked up in fortified resorts to prevent them from being bought and sold. How much more sickening can the scene get? It is sleazy and sordid. It shows how we have deteriorated as a civilisation. To think these are the people who take decisions on behalf of one billion human beings is scary, to say the least. One of the most ?advanced? states of the Union has reduced us to a level that is unacceptable. The other ?advanced? state, Gujarat, has also succeeded in shaming India.

Why does this leadership have a problem about talking, negotiating, drawing all possible help, assistance and ideas? Is this a way of covering up for a lack of a coherent strategy? Does confusion prevail in the exalted corridors of North and South Block? What is the motivation for this behaviour? There will be no new and acceptable solutions without a volatile exchange of ideas and energetic communication, both nationally and internationally. The people playing at this closed door ?I-know-it-all? diplomacy have failed to come up with a new, innovative alternative solution for Kashmir. After a while, the world will say: ?let them blow themselves up, we are far removed from the impact, we can enter the South Asian arena thereafter?. Our nationalism rhetoric is so banal, our immediate future so dismal.