Polity of Yesteryears & the Future
By: Amit Bhushan Date: 14th Sept. 2016
The churn in polity in the region has just started to build pressure. The reason is simple. The parties and leaders have yet to come to terms with faster and free flow of information and opinion formation/build up. The commercial news media with its voice being challenged by the social media in full public view is pushed to introspect its news and opinion delivery. With plethora of channels, it’s effectiveness in manipulating opinions has been curtailed and different news institutions would now dissect each piece of information from various angles, only to be made aware of some further new angles and twists by the social media. Since the primary communications channels of political parties/leaders with the masses can now not remain aloof from the impact of ‘social media (and more specifically from people in social media including yours truly)’, therefore the political leaders are now subjected to somewhat greater scrutiny. This now requires politicians and social influencers/supporters of these leaders to think through each step in a little more circumspect manner. However the leaders with years of experience, especially the ones who were not in the limelight and media gaze/scrutiny, are perhaps a little too diffident to mend ways or cope up with the new reality in polity.
The above sets the base for current turmoil in polity and the netas have been reduced to incidental fodder rather than players, by their own supporters. This is because the trend in media seems irreversible but the supporters want just the same rather than change. Hence the political churn is inevitable, but each party and neta want to position themselves as one above and unaffected by this change whereas they are unable to change the support base in a short time. In fact a small support base might actually be an asset, unless one is too hooked to a larger aura of history and traditions as well as refusal to implement this change over a larger scenario as is this case with at least one of the party struggling to make its ‘presence felt’ in what may be India’s most crucial state. No doubt, quite a few ‘leaders’ feel that situation is ripe for the rise of newer parties and stage is set with turmoil in some of them. Some of them might however be focused to expand their own base by acquiring the floating leaders/netas without fixing a gameplan in all probability and this is likely to cause churn later, when such netas/leadership and the overall polity/policy framework is put to scrutiny by a media already chastened up, by the current pressure build-up. Lack of appreciation of the ‘game’ would continue to have its toll in politics.
The Sangathan(s) which is past is refusing to take the feedback of their own messenger(s) or the future, and this is not just the case of one party but nearly all who claim to be in fray. By refusing to hear the message, the assumption is that the churn in politics would be halted which is not the case, although even the commercial mass media may want it that way as is clear from the method of depiction of news and views, normally biased or by tougher scrutiny against a newbie party. Some other parties would make the messengers compromise to take on issues in line with sangathan, to give a feeling that everything is well with them, although to no avail. Making some ideological compromise for one state while reject the same in another would have little credibility and that cascades everywhere in this age of hypercommunication. However nearly everyone watching the ‘game’ and has intellect knows the result in all probability. Let’s watch the game to evolve further…
Karmanye Vadhikaraste, Ma phaleshou kada chana, Ma Karma Phala Hetur Bhurmatey Sangostva Akarmani