Let Elections 2014 do not divide us

Let Elections 2014 do not divide us

Syed Ali Mujtaba 

Every five years election comes to us. There are many good things about the election that we talk about. We often extol about it as the heart of our democracy. However no one talks about the side effects of election that it is divisive in nature. It creates enemy out of friends.

Come every election and each of us are put in different boxes to which we accidentally belong. Suddenly, we start thinking about our identities. We start looking at our friends sitting in other boxes in not so friendly ways. It is this aspect of the election that is divisive.  

Well our identity is like an Onion, we keep on peeling, and one facet of our identity will keep emerging. What elections do is to exploit these identities divide us on such basis. Let’s understand these facets of our elections very well.

As the voting is just nearing, the temperature within the society is rising. Everyone wants to teach others a lesson by pressing the EVMs.  If this if is done in right spirit it is fine, but it does not happen so in India.

After dividing the social order in primordial categories, it is difficult to bridge the polarized society back to previous social synthesis. This harsh reality of our elections has to be understood in all its vicissitude.

In elections after all only one will win and rest will loose. Those who will win will have a good time, but in this game of wining and loosing, the whole society is polarized. So this hook of elections should not be allowed to play with our lives.

We should not loose faith in our democracy or elections but at the same time we should not get trapped in its vicious format. We have to live with each other side by side, work in same place and do so many things in tandem.  Our sight as being fellow human beings and proud citizens of the country should never get vitiated by the five yearly rituals.   
--
Syed Ali Mujtaba is a journalist based in Chennai. He can be contacted at syedalimujtaba@yahoo.com