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We live in interesting times...yet another General Election is here, with a difference. The last one was a season of Limericks & Light Verses for me. This one is more like Threnodies & Dirges, and I am not inclined to indulge in graveyard humor...not at my age.
The most interesting feature of this election is that the main opposition alliance decided to put up a rather strong, if controversial, PM candidate. And he turned into a Colossus, standing taller than everyone else in his party. On the other hand the ruling alliance has been coy about its PM candidate, with good reason. With the result that there is a lone scarecrow in the opposition whom everyone in the ruling party can stone.
A more apt image is that there is a Julius Caesar clone put up by the opposition into whose body the envious senators from Casca to Cassius to Brutus can thrust their sharpened daggers...while he stands alone fighting them all.
The winner is yet to be declared.
The opposition candidate was once a chaiwala selling tea (according to him) in trains and nukkads. And he wears his tea-strainer towel on his shoulders to show off his humble origins and how even a chaiwala can aspire to lead this chai-loving nation. And he sells his tea via video-conferencing.
The latest attack on our chaiwala is from a Harvard MBA whose granpa was a wealthy merchant banker. And he wears his Harvard towel round his impeccable white dhoti.
While the going was good, this Boston Brahmin and his mute economics guru led the nation to unseen heights of good times. But good times don't last forever even for Angelic Americans.
It is the bad times that test the guts of great men and women. When asked what he meant by 'guts', Papa Hemingway replied:
"grace under pressure"
Sadly the duo of economic pundits are losing their graces like withered petals dropping off flowers in a storm.
The mute guru said the other day that his heart is bleeding seeing the undignified way his own party-men behaved in his House, throwing tantrums and pepper spray. However the same heart was aglow with warmth when he saw the country bleed for all of five years and more under his coalition-nose.
...In his home state, he is still remembered for bringing school education to millions of the rural poor by introducing free education and the free Midday Meal Scheme during his tenure as chief minister. He was awarded India's highest civilian honour, the Bharat Ratna, posthumously in 1976...
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The nature of the Boston Brahmins is hinted at by the doggerel "Boston Toast" by Harvard alumnus John Collins Bossidy
The most interesting feature of this election is that the main opposition alliance decided to put up a rather strong, if controversial, PM candidate. And he turned into a Colossus, standing taller than everyone else in his party. On the other hand the ruling alliance has been coy about its PM candidate, with good reason. With the result that there is a lone scarecrow in the opposition whom everyone in the ruling party can stone.
A more apt image is that there is a Julius Caesar clone put up by the opposition into whose body the envious senators from Casca to Cassius to Brutus can thrust their sharpened daggers...while he stands alone fighting them all.
The winner is yet to be declared.
The opposition candidate was once a chaiwala selling tea (according to him) in trains and nukkads. And he wears his tea-strainer towel on his shoulders to show off his humble origins and how even a chaiwala can aspire to lead this chai-loving nation. And he sells his tea via video-conferencing.
The latest attack on our chaiwala is from a Harvard MBA whose granpa was a wealthy merchant banker. And he wears his Harvard towel round his impeccable white dhoti.
While the going was good, this Boston Brahmin and his mute economics guru led the nation to unseen heights of good times. But good times don't last forever even for Angelic Americans.
It is the bad times that test the guts of great men and women. When asked what he meant by 'guts', Papa Hemingway replied:
"grace under pressure"
Sadly the duo of economic pundits are losing their graces like withered petals dropping off flowers in a storm.
The mute guru said the other day that his heart is bleeding seeing the undignified way his own party-men behaved in his House, throwing tantrums and pepper spray. However the same heart was aglow with warmth when he saw the country bleed for all of five years and more under his coalition-nose.
The Boston Brahmin attacked our chaiwala the other day saying that all the economics the tea-vendor knew could be written on the back of a tiny postage stamp...(whereas his own thesis at Harvard was all of 200 pages A-4, maybe).
This half-volley was promptly returned by our chaiwala with glee. He spat at the Boston Brahmin calling him a 'Recounting Minister' (unkindest cut of all):
"UPA government has a recounting minister. He lost (the election) but
won in recounting. He is from Tamil Nadu. He thinks he was the first in
the queue when God was distributing knowledge"
In all this chai-samosa business, people forget that there were leaders who rose from humbler origins and did the country a lot of good while their going was good.
There was a boy, not long ago, who lost his father early and so had to drop out from school. He had to eke out his living as a petty salesman, till Gandhi (the original) saw leadership qualities in him and groomed him. He eventually ruled as the Chief Minister of his state for all of a decade...and a junior member of his cabinet grew to be a President of India:
...In his home state, he is still remembered for bringing school education to millions of the rural poor by introducing free education and the free Midday Meal Scheme during his tenure as chief minister. He was awarded India's highest civilian honour, the Bharat Ratna, posthumously in 1976...
Apparently tea is not the only route to leadership...nor is Harvard...
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