There was a huge beach house party on Wednesday night celebrating your dog's first loose motion. You made it. There was an insane super-fun Raagini MMS movie marathon on Thursday afternoon. You made it. Oh, your girlfriend was completely helpless because she couldn't find her blue colored hairband and she always wears blue on Thursdays. You spent four hours finding it for her.
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Yet, you couldn't spend ten minutes to vote.
Of course you had reasons. I shall address them for you.
1. It was a holiday, dude. Rest time.
No, it was not a holiday. It was election day. Your wretched BPO reluctantly shut shop because they thought you would vote; Not eat chicken frankie and sit around in your boxers staring at wedding albums on facebook. It was a holiday because they thought if they give you 24 hours off, you might spend ten minutes to vote. Nope, you did not.
2. I live in a different city, bro. Like IRCTC problems yaar
If you can bunk a day for being hungover, I am sure you can bunk a day to come vote. It is your city. If there was no current, you take a grand total of ten seconds to say 'Chutiya MLA. Takes our money and swallows them.' And what were you doing when these chutiyas got elected? Getting drunk. *Slow clap*
3. My name was not in the rolls man. Government functioning is so shitty nah?
That is the dumbest reason ever. Here is a story. Your college decides to take you for an excursion and takes 10,000 rupees from everyone. They say they will have a quick show of hands to decide the place to go to. But on that day, you decide to go play footsie with your girlfriend in CCD because you are like cool and stuff. And then you come for the excursion with a huge backpack and the college takes you for a full building tour of Saravana Stores and ends the evening with a boat ride on the Cooum river. Would you be happy? Well, you Have to be, because when they asked you to help them sort it, you didn't.
The government gives you eight weeks to check if your name is on the rolls. If it isn't, it takes fifteen minutes to fill a form to include your name. It can even be done online. But you didn't. And that is the government's fault?
4. Abey, no candidate is good enough man. I want to tell the country that everybody is bad, by not voting.
How on Earth is the government supposed to know you have such god forsaken reasons to not vote? Heck, you sucked at reading your girlfriend's thoughts. But the government has to read yours? They have an option called NOTA. You can honestly tell them that you do not like anybody. They will take action on it. But you never bothered because this is too low for your awesomeness factor.
5. Machi, even if I put NOTA, who else will put huh? Tell ra, tell.
You do not have to decide for the others. You are never going to know. If a newbie called Arvind Kejriwal can dethrone a veteran queen like Sheila in a matter of six months, I am sure your vote can make a difference. (Yes, Kejriwal screwed up. But you were excited when he got elected, weren't you?). Make a small difference. Everybody else will.
6. I don't care. I won't vote. I won't complain.
These are the kings of the reason world. They won't vote because they have no faith in the government, but they can't be blamed because they won't complain about anything it seems. You never know the storm that will hit you because of your indifference. When your building complex gets razed by a government official for building a mall and you come to the streets, you will. When your relative is dying of a heart attack and your government hospital is too inefficient to even treat common cold and he dies, you will. Basically, when shit hits the fan, you will, son. But then, you might be too late.
There are blind people voting. There are physically handicapped people voting. My maid came and told me she paid 200 rupees by auto to take her daugher and son to go vote because her polling booth was far away. But she was proud of it. There are people out there living with hope, doing their little bit to make a difference. An educated sensible person like you cannot throw reasons. Go out there and vote next time. India is never going to be a superpower if you keep eating chicken frankies and farting on election day. Just saying.
P.S: I may have offended one or many of you in the course of this post. If at all I have, just in the tiniest sense if I have hurt your sensitivities in any way, I just really really want to say, that I wholeheartedly meant it. Rot and burn.
9 comments:
Well said. Could have posted this earlier though.
Also, if you opt for NOTA, the govt. doesn't have to take any action. It's just an expression of your displeasure and nothing more. Even if 99 of the 100 votes are NOTA, the candidate with the 1 vote wins. From a political and psychological point of view though, parties will be compelled to field candidates more carefully as it would be bad PR if a party candidate had fewer votes than NOTA and still won, though this situation is very rare. As far as stats have so far shown, NOTA is max exercised in constituencies where the seat is reserved for candidates from SC and ST (around 10-15% voters voted NOTA the first time it was introduced in Assembly elections). This could be purely motivated by caste differences and not political dissatisfaction.
Anyway, well written. :)
Satigopan. I completely agree with #2 and #3 especially since I came from Blore to vote. Booked on Tatkal that too. Oh and my mom's and my names weren't on the electoral roll. Printed our names out from the election commission website and headed into the polling booth.
Thats a really meaningful post man.. Loved the PS part especially.. My brother is physically challenged too but he has never missed to vote.
There is this another group(actually someone I know) who vote for NOTA as if it's a fashion. I think NOTA is for people who really understand what it stands for. But these are the ppl who can't expand UPA or NDA..
@Shuriken Chicken
Thanks, man. There are people taking the effort. I just wish more people did.
@Ashwini
Elections have really improved a lot. And it is such a simple task to vote these days. I can't imagine why laziness should come in the way of your nation's prosperity.
@Anonymous
Apologies. I did not know that about NOTA. But it is at least still a representation. Thanks for the info. :)
@Prashanth.
Complete respect for your brother and your family. These are the things that make a difference. Hats off!
Well written Murali :)
Same like this , many would thought including me.But thanks for you nailing it so effectively through this post. One more thing that frustrate me more is that media covering incidents like Surya voted inspite of leg injury ,star hero voted waiting in long queue under the sun. Its basic right everything need to exercise..May be default FB and twitter status should be " Keep Calm and Exercise Vote :)" haha
-Bhargav
Well written Murali . Thanks for nailing it down so effectively .
Definitely NOTA has got its own benefits if it is implemented in a better way . Now you should be knowing where my vote went ;)
Anyways the thing that frustrate me more on every election, is media covering news like favouite star voted inspite of his leg injury , star actress waited in a long queue under the sun and many more ..its a duty to be performed and not anything to show off ;) I wanted FB and twitter to state a default status like "Keep Calm and Exercise Vote " :) Haha. Anyways well written again bro !!
Bhargav
Here is what the husband and I did: filled out a form and submitted it, checked, didnt find our names, so filled out second set of forms. Physically handed it over at the local Panchayat office all the way over in Manapakkam. And then continued with our lives to earn bread, butter and what not. Made it back from a really remote village in Madhya Pradesh just the night before because I really wanted to vote. Then went over first thing like an enthu cutlet, waded through various lists, discovered the husband's name, neighbour's name, neighbour's mother-in-law's name, neighbour's mother-in-law's sister's name...and not mine. Didnt stop...spoke to the Panchayat president, did vanakkam and all...he was very sorry. But I didn't get to vote...despite all the shenanigans. Do I blame the government? Or maybe the hep short hair? Or maybe the sleeveless dress in which I was photographed...whatever it is, I didn't get to vote.
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