ACCOUNTABILITY & THE GREAT INDIAN POLITICIAN

One person is common in Comedy nights with Kapil( a Tv Series), last match of  Sachin’s cricketing life and Amritsar(a constituency in the state of Punjab) and he is Navjot Singh Siddhu, former Indian batsman. At present, he is a commentator in Cricket matches, a permanent guest in comedy nights with Kapil and Member of Parliament from Amritsar. But should he be the common subset of these three different sets?

Other than comedy a viewer of CNWK is left august by the astuteness of Mr. Siddhu. Listening to his witty shayari’s, one can easily interpret that he is an Avant-grade intellectual with tons of  knowledge and earthly wisdom and the same thing can be said when one listens to his commentary of cricket matches. But, with all due respect to Mr. Siddhu, should he be doing these side jobs when he’s been coronated with one of the most prestigious job in the country? Should he not be focused on the development of his constituency?

 The other day a kid in my neighborhood watching the comedy show said, “Ok, this is what a politician does”, I was left nonplussed. Is this the image we want to create of the politician of our country? This should be amended.

The employee of any company has to show his productivity at the end of the month in the form of completion of targets, even a peon is accountable for his job, but this is not the case with an Indian politician, accredited with the paramount job of the country. The point I am attempting to make is that politicians should be made liable for their deeds. Unlike any other job, they do not have set of targets other than those proclaimed in the election manifesto at the time of elections.

But, then again, elections are the biggest illusion engendered for hoi polloi, assuring them of development from the past 66 years. A party promises many things and coalesce the election manifesto keeping in mind party’s own benediction such that myriad basic problems faced by the people get percolated in their red herring proclamation. But here's the catch, the party is not liable for its completion and how can it be, when adhering to the manifesto after elections is not mandatory.

So, how can a politician be made accountable?

India, the biggest democracy of the world comprising of 28(29) states and 671 districts with 1.2billion people has central planning commission. The planning commission formulates India’s five year plans. The prime task of commission is to construe the problems and allocate the resources accordingly, with the growth and development of the nation sine qua non in the plans.  

The central planning commission does work at macro level. If we apply this modus operandi at micro level i.e. 671 different planning commissions explicating the predicaments faced by each district, envisaging the solutions, envisioning the development model and facsimiling it by enacting 5 year plan accordingly for individual districts. The commission would be different from Nagar Palikas and Nagar Parishads as it would have certain common goals to be accomplished by each district and the solutions to individual problems drawn in parallel.

The most important part, election winning candidate would be working in accordance with the planning commission’s guidelines with a fixed target to be achieved in stipulated time irrespective of the party he belongs, his/her productivity (accountability) could thus be measured in the completion of targets and if a candidate under performs, it should expedite to by-elections, just like any other job where a non performing employee is sacked. This will also assort out able candidates who are willing to work for the betterment of the society and country.

In the 66 year history of independent India, none of the member of legislature(or any politician) has made his or her name from his work. Siddhu sir, I am huge fan of your batting and intellect but going by the profile of your job, I demand more from you.

Waiting for the day when people will get inspired from the politicians and their deeds.