Honorable Prime Minister,
Our deep regrets to all the fellow citizens in this moment of national grief. The Mumbai attacks have thrown up emotions alike any other calamity – grief, helplessness, anger, frustration, and fear – however, indifferently though I must say; this ruthless act of terror for the first time has brought in a sense of realization, empathy and accountability into all of us.
In an attempt to act and not just - pass the buck, criticize leadership and blame the system - enlisted are some points which if politically can be implemented would do democratic good for India.
Unfortunately Indian politics despite having many able men lacks sanity and accountability. Leaders propagate populist measures, dwell on regional/communal agendas to attract vote banks - judiciary, legislature and defense are chained amidst bureaucracy and corruption – its time we had accountability!!
1. Regulate Elections - Let us get done with the age old qualification(s) for being a politician (above 40 years and be an Indian citizen) and re-define the criteria – some of which could be - intellect, relevant experience related to the ministry, philosophy and societal contribution etc. Nomination of the candidate for a particular post should only be allowed if he/she satisfies the above parameters and the election commission must govern the same.
mMore so every party must announce more than one candidate, and then leave the candidates to debate amongst themselves in public forums, political forums and corporate forums with their agendas to fight for their party seat. The media again shall play an important role here in acting as an interface between the people and the government. Having multiple candidates would ensure competition within parties themselves and as has been the case in industry, competition shall ensure that excellence is achieved.
2. Corporatize governance – When a political party is sworn into power, every minister handling each portfolio drafts an agenda and presents to the public with a timeline. The media shall act as an instrument between the public and the system; agendas shall be debated across public forums, industry forums, and political forums and finalized with sorted time lines for each point.
The minister at the helm is responsible for the mandates being achieved according to deadlines; else the public has the accountability to vote him out for not having delivered.
3. Appraise and Audit – I can understand the sensitivity of the data that the cabinet carries, however, there must be a department - given exigency authority to audit the finance and economics on which every ministry works. Just like a corporate undergoes an information security audit, a system audit, infrastructure audit, income tax audit, operations audit, financial result and statement audit etc – A independent governmental node must be formed to conduct periodic and random audits across these areas, across ministries and these should be reputed IAS officers manning the organization.
They also must rate each ministry, quality ratings – budgets and performance of the ministry must be linked to the evaluations and so should be the perks and incentives of the ministers to the same. Every ministry must also have an annual performance appraisal of each minister, official working by measuring his actual performance with the drafted agenda agreed to while he/she was sworn in and the ratings must be made public. These ratings and the score cards shall serve as a benchmark for the voter to mark his performance and cast his vote next time.
4. Incentivize democracy – all this would only work, if people, who ultimately rein the system, would vote and take ownership of mutual governance.
A positive impetus to vote would be to make the voters’ id an important cum mandatory identity proof. Voters ID must be made the primary key of an Indian – link driving license, ration card, passport, life insurance, bank accounts and one’s existence to the ID – just like what a SSN does in
Secondly with electronic voting these days, its easy to record and log in the voters turn out. If any voter id goes blank without casting his/her vote – have strong amendments to penalize him/her. You could also may be cancel his/her licenses and insurances and call him/her for an inquiry to justify his/her decision to not vote. If the justification is valid, like say a personal emergency which is proved by submitting hospital bills, death certificates etc the case can be considered.
At the end of it however, one can always find loop-holes in the system – the system can never be full proof until people own morality and responsibility. This is the difference between us and the
Helplessly yours,
An Indian Citizen
4 comments:
Hi Sid,
It's very good idea to penalize the citizen who is not using his "Right to Vote". But the excuse I can give for not voting is not finding the right leader.
yes - in that case, you should also have an option to vote for "none of the above" :) Which would mean you v casted your vote!! and that it did not go blank and cannot be misused.
Yes sid, there is such provision in our constitution.
Section 49-O of the Constitution (Your Right to vote for Nobody; Or reject all the candidates in the fray)
Only if this was made aware by our lawmakers :(
Its more like irony of our era. They say we are on the road to being a first world country; but we are eroded by third world policies. Law makers, bureaucrats, leaders, ministers all promise us the world but they dont even deliver a fistful.
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