Long gone democracy

The final phase of the general elections 2009 will end in a few hours from now. The results will be out by the 16thof May and the governments at both the centre and the state level would be sworn in by the end of May. The last couple of months saw the luring of masses by different political parties across states with money, liquor etc. Regional parties in few states like Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka are already celebrating their ‘guaranteed’ success to power. But, where is the common man in all these? The common man is lost somewhere in between. He is lost in the road between rags to riches… between vote banks and power politics. He is lost all along, only to realize that he is nowhere seen or heard in the next five years until the next election campaign when the political parties will storm into their lives all over again as angels in disguise, as the immortal prophets of brotherhood. This has become fairly common in India, so common that it hardly affects anybody anymore.

The term democracy often intrigues me. We have been taught in school that India is the largest democracy in the world where people choose their leader and that the government is of the people, for the people and by the people. ‘By the people?‘ Is the government by the people? I do not really think it’s true. Democracy means the party which gets the majority of votes should assume power.

Let us assume the following to conclude if there is any democracy still left in the country.
- Party x, party y and party z are contending elections at state level or higher
- There are 120 votes (read number of votes) in that particular state
- Out of these 120, 59 vote for x, 46 vote for y and 15 vote for z
- A maximum of 60 votes are required to form the government (The clause)

Who will form the government now? As per the definition of Democracy, party x should assume power as a majority wants it to come into power. But, don’t forget the above clause ‘at fault’ – the culprit! There are two possibilities here – one, party x join hands with party z and forms the government or two, party y forms the government with z. Both ways, Z is the king in disguise. Now, party y forms the government with the additional 15 seats from z and x is left behind. But, who got the majority here? X, and who got the power? Y. Nearly 50% of the people chose X as their leader, but got Y in return. Where is this so called democracy when people do not get what they want? People are deceived by money bags and power games. Is this real democracy, or are we supposed to make this one?