Trying to Understand Politics

I’m not into politics - neither at home nor countrywide. I hate the idea of watching over parliament proceedings because I feel it's all fake. They will do what they have pre-decided, then why all the Tamasha.

But the recent events have left me all confused. Consider the two scenarios:

Scenario One:

A monarchy which calls itself a democracy – Bahrain - witnessed a revolt. Some six months back, awaken by the revolts taking place in Egypt, Syria and Libya, the Shia community marched towards a roundabout to demand their rights. They were uneducated and unskilled to handle such a demonstration. They had no clue what they were demanding. Yet they stood together some voluntarily, some forced by the so-called leaders. All of them, really, all of them took to the streets.



They were asked by the King to come for a dialogue and put forward their demands. They said they don’t want to talk but want the Prime Minister of decades to resign and new elections should take place. The PM being a very powerful person resorted to amazing methods to shun their demand. Thousands were arrested and tortured. Hundreds were forced to quit their jobs since they participated in the revolt and didn’t come to work.

Everyday, till today several arrests take place. Just last weekend we heard gunshots for over 3 hours somewhere near-by. We keep hearing stories of tear gas being used to forbid them to gather at places.

The revolutionaries were left jobless and homeless. They have no money to feed their already starving families. They were confused before about their demands. Now they are just quiet. But the volcano can erupt anytime. When you use force to stop something like this, the consequences can be disastrous.

Scenario Two:



A democratic country – India – seems to be in the middle of a revolution. They are being led by a Social Activist - Anna Hazare. Their demands are on the Lokpal Bill. They just want the bill to pass.

Simple? Not really. There is little difference between the revolution in Bahrain and India. The Lokpal Bill has everything that the government wouldn’t want to even consider. They definitely can’t use force and torture people like a Monarchy. But they can send their own groups to create riots and the revolt can become non-violent easily. The methods will be different, but the result could be same.

I saw kids on the streets as well. The Bahraini kids were shouting 'Death to Khalifa', I'm not sure what Indian children are being taught. Can't we leave innocent children away from all this?

I’m all for anti-corruption bills. I’m with the doers rather than with the cribbers. All I don’t understand is politics and how these animals chosen by us make our life hell. All I don’t like is people being tortured and unaware people being dragged into the mess.

Hopefully Anna and his team would be more intelligent in their approach and take India to new heights. Meanwhile, we’ll all have to pray that the peace and unity in our country keeps away from the dirty politics we’re about to see.