Friday, March 22, 2013

Elections in India... Transparency International, HELP!

Elections were announced in Karnataka yesterday, and soon, we will further have a rash of elections in some of the major states, with its citizens electing several thousand representatives. Over the past few years, the quality of the elected representative has been dropping quite alarmingly, giving rise to law-makers with criminal pasts and destroying the decorum of Parliament and the Legislatures with lumpen behavior, voting for a financial consideration, watching porn in the assembly and obstructing the conduct of House Business at the slightest possible instigation.

I believe that the time has come where India needs to show the way to the world that its people have no patience for corruption and corrupt politicians anymore, and I decided to write a mail to Transparency International seeking their support in making this a different kind of democracy from now on. The mail I wrote is reproduced below:

Dear TI,

I write this mail to bring to your attention that starting from May 2013, several states in India (Karnataka and others) will be going to the polls to elect new governments, culminating in the General Election expected in Mid-2014.

As you may be aware, the Indian polity has been plagued by corruption and election malpractice in the past, and seems to have crossed all acceptable limits in recent times, judging by the number of scams the media highlights each month. I understand that close to a third of all elected representatives in India face criminal charges or already possess criminal records. I believe that an organization like yours can help our country fight this cancer.

Please can you consider developing an India specific Charter and popularize the same by placing Mass Media Advertisements and propagating through other means a 'Charter Against Corruption' that every candidate should be encouraged to sign. There are anti-corruption movements like India Against Corruption and Loksatta, who may be happy to push this agenda. Similarly, media houses like NDTV and CNN-IBN could be roped in to support this initiative.

Extensive and intense media coverage of every candidate's stand via-a-vis corruption, judging by whether or not they sign the TI charter will let the voters know if they deserve to be elected or not. With such a movement in place, I'm sure many more deserving candidates will get elected and candidates who do not demonstrate an active abhorrence of corruption find it harder to win.

I do hope you will be able to take this initiative and help clean up the politics of the world’s largest democracy. Even in the international community, your involvement and services in this regard would get much attention and acclaim.

Regards,
Hemanth Sharma

Sent from my iPhone
If you have chanced upon this blog and agree that something needs to be done to bring about changes in the Indian political scenario, please do leave a comment in the comment section below mentioning your stand on the same. Sharing this article in your social media page will also be welcome and will go a long way in helping the anti-corruption movement gets the attention and support it deserves.

1 comment:

  1. The feeling of helplessness and apathy that infects the public on this issue, is almost as much to blame for the current state of affairs as the perpetrators of corruption themselves are.Its good to see people trying to reform the system from the grassroots.We should all try to do what we can to rid India of this shameful disease.Keep up the good work Hemanth.

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