Yesterday night saw Rajdeep Sardesai interview a bunch of folks in Bangalore South constituency. Most of them said they will vote BJP (Ananth Kumar) , few Congress (Nandan Nilekani) and none AAP (Nina Nayak). I could see each of the people interviewed extremely convinced that their vote will change India. It sounded Deja Vu. Before the last election every one was convinced India's destiny will change if Manmohan Singh is given another term with a larger majority. I was the senile guy who advocated why not Manmohan (read my blog dated 31st March 2009 at http://wiseinforesight.blogspot.in/2009/03/dilemma-whom-to-vote-for-so-many.html )
You can see this mail also on my blog.
You can see this mail also on my blog.
Bangalore South is a landmark constituency. We as inhabitants of the most well educated constituency need to lead the change in system. We have a tryst with destiny tomorrow - 17th April. Before we vote - let us remember as a nation we got it all wrong in 2009 and may be we are repeating our follies in 2014. God let my fellow constituency men awaken.
Why not Nandan?
- Nandan says he is ideologically aligned to Congress since childhood. He could not be more right. Where I differ from him is that he promises to "change the system" when "he is actually the system".
- In India if we wine or dine a person and get a contract - it is corruption, in US it is lobbying. Nandan believe in putting systems like lobbying in place. Let me give an examples - he claims he was instrumental brain behind NASSCOM, an industry lobby which ensured IT got tax breaks under STPI and then SEZ rules. These tax breaks have left us poorer by over Rupees 1,50,000 crores - and this is a conservative figure. Infosys has distributed dividend to the tune of Rs 13,000 crores and TCS amounts are equally staggering. I fail to understand why companies of the size of Infosys, TCS, Reliance need tax breaks while small companies which are struggling need to pay more taxes than them (as a percentage of revenues). Net net he will bring sophisticated ways and systems using which rich can get richer
- Nandan is inhuman and may be instrumental for (attempted) suicides in Infosys. This is not a baseless accusation. Pick up annual reports of Infosys during Nandan's reign of Infosys and you will see a very high involuntary attrition in trainee levels. Essentially trainees who failed to clear Infosys training were let go. So yours truly met Infosys and said why do they not make the process rigorous. The answer was it is more expensive to make selection process rigorous and cheaper to let people go. Now the question is how does it result in suicides? So there were these trainees from lower middle class or middle class background, many of whose family had stretched their finances to pay for engineers. They suddenly found themselves in posh Mysore campus of Infosys. Their parents came visiting and clicked photographs and flaunted them to relatives. Then few of the trainees realised that they are going to be laid off for not clearing training tests. The fear of how will they and their parents face the world sets in - resulting in suicide attempts, few successful but most not.
- Nandan gets tens of crores in dividend while lots of employees loose their job every year at Infosys because they failed to grow and do justice to their next level where they were promoted to. This sounds logical to all of us who are capitalistic - but is that what he is going to implement as a policy maker - my mind shudders at the thought of possibilities - lower strata of women who are raped not being provided justice for their inability to afford good lawyers, people with special needs left to die etc. If Nandan throws figures of the charity he has done to disprove my point - my only answer is charity begins at home. The people who served Infy for 3-4 years and did not grow to occupy the next level - they are special needs - accommodate them and tell them their salaries will not grow and they will be at same level. Why fire them ?
- Last but not the least his victory would mean that a party can hope to misrule for 5 years and then put some "renowned" candidates like Nandan (remember Govinda in Mumbai) , win elections and again misrule. We need to tell our politicians we are smart.
Why not Ananth?
- Remember there was a garden behind A2B on 16th Main of BTM. Or there was a lake next to Agara lake or most of Bagmane Tech Park was again lake bed. All of these are today concrete jungles or in case of Agara lake about to become one. 18 years as MP and for many of those BJP in power or power sharing in state - why did Ananth not raise a voice against it. Is it that he and his cronies along with some Congress leaders kith and kin are behind playing havoc with the system.
- I tried to meet Ananth Kumar for 3 months for help in recovering money from a builder who cheated me and in court is an open and shut case - just this that the lawyers are demanding 40% of the amount stuck as fees and telling that lot of these judgements are bought. Needless to say I could not meet him even once. Being an entrepreneur , from IIT and well networked - it was difficult for me. Imagine for common man :)
- Last but not the least Modi is a very bad choice (remember reading my blog above on Manmohan being a bad choice - I have never got it wrong since 1996 on my judgement of leaders). No this is not because he is communal or anti minority - but because he understands that facts can be played with, truth can be dressed up to look nice , euphoria and sloganeering works over actual work delivered. He squanders his best man to mentor future finance minister (read Jaswant Singh who actually turned around India's economy as finance minister) for petty politics and then claims he is a leader with stature :) Has a mind of his own to walk out of marriage within days but not guts enough to tell her mother he does not want to get married (sounds like a typical mama's boy). In Gujarat, officially alcohol is banned - but for right money, ample amount of it flow. So why have a ban at first place? May be to have some extra earnings :) If you are a small company ( I run one) looking at a regional office in Ahmedabad (without blessings of IIM A or its incubation center) , you face numerous harassments (I am told big houses have it easy but no verification). Take my word for it - Modi is going to be a disaster, more so because I have been BJP voter for last 4 elections and this is the first time I shall not.
The big question is then whom to vote for - answer is AAP for lack of alternatives. They will not win elections - but every vote to them will make sure the other political parties behave. Remember in Karnataka, Yedurappa was hailed for operation Lotus where they caused defections in opposite ranks to get majority but the same BJP did not engage in horse trading in Delhi for fear of backlash in Lok Sabha elections.
Yes my countrymen - this is time to awaken and be part of revolution. Vote for AAP. To many of you who think AAP is anarchist or dharna party , let me remind you about a guy called TN Seshan. Till he became the Chief Election Commissioner - no one in India knew EC existed as an independent body. He was always taking on the system - blaming his juniors for being sold out, anarchist , poor administrator et al. But 23 odd years later we have the best election commission in world. We require some one to challenge the status quo and I can assure you in next 20 years we would be a great nation.
