Elections are round the corner. Although the campaigns have still not picked up heat, the tension in the air characteristic of an election is already clear and crisp. In a week or so from now, it will be clear who gets to contest on the tickets of the party of their desire. Almost as an unspoken testimony that the Congress ticket would be the one sought after most, even by opposition MLAs and leaders, no political party has yet announced their list of candidates pending a clear picture on the Congress’ mind. All of them are keenly watching the Congress party and the candidates they would set up. Surely, no political party would be willing to live through the embarrassment of awarding a ticket to one of its own sitting MLAs or party man, and then be betrayed by the MLAs concerned by rejecting the party’s offer to instead accept the Congress ticket. Once the Congress announces its list of candidates, it is predictable the election fever would rise with other political parties announcing their own lists in quick succession. This is the reality of Manipur politics, and there is no gainsaying it is pathetic. The idea of loyalty to party and party ideology are alien here. The rush of politicians for election ticket is with the sole intent of being on who they think would be the winning side.
This being the general profile of politics in the state, it is up to the electorate to put in their mite to bring about a change. First of all, they must reject political turncoats. Those who come back to them to seek votes on the tickets of parties they have been spitting fire and brimstone against all this while, after first betraying the parties they professed undying loyalty to, must be told in no uncertain terms that they cannot add insult to injury to the electorate. If it is a genuine case of shifting stance on ideological stances, they ought to have left their parties whose ideologies they were feeling estranged and therefore trying to distance themselves from, at least a year ahead of the elections. While as humans, shifts in beliefs and ideologies are a legitimate phenomenon, it goes against the law of probability that a genuine shift of ideological perspective can happen so suddenly just on the eve of the elections. The electorate must remember, this is not just about punishing an individual politician, but of saving politics in the state from a despicable trend which is gaining legitimacy precisely because the public has never thought of it as an affront on their dignity and sense of public propriety.
This election must also be made to be fought on issues rather than empty rhetoric and dirty money. The first question which must come to the mind of the electorate ought to be, what are the things they as respectable citizens should legitimately expect from any government worth its name and whether the political parties in contention are promising them these needs realistically? As citizens ourselves, we can also think of some very basic of these conditions. This would somewhat follow a needs hierarchy in the rough model of what psychologist Abraham Maslow spelled out. The first would have to do would food and shelter, its derivatives and more pertinent to the state being, clean drinking water, electricity and good roads. As to why these are important, we need not explain. The state has been atrociously deprived of these basic essentials for years now, and now is the time for the electorate to actually bargain and vote the party which spells out a realistic blueprint to ensure these needs. In the second hierarchy would be things like good education facilities, health guarantees, better employment opportunities through ensuring a better atmosphere for private entrepreneurship etc. In the third hierarchy would be need such as for more recreational parks for citizens, better traffic management, better and more disciplined control of the law and order situation, corruption free competitions to government jobs and benefits, better implementation of welfare schemes instituted by the Central government, and if possible for the state to start evolving state specific citizen welfare models of its own. Of the latter, there is something as local area development fund availed to the MLAs. If all of the MLAs were to use this fund honestly and imaginatively, at least the entire network of by-lanes in Imphal city and other major townships and habitation centres would have been black topped and dust free by now. The local area development fund is a brilliant idea but only if it is honestly and imaginatively used. However, almost as if by fate, in backwater lawless places like Manipur, in the absence of a vigilant electorate, between the ideas and their implementations, almost always fall the shadow.
