Family-business of democracy

Recently Shiv Sena was passed to Aditya Thackeray. Just like his grandfather Balasaheb Thackeray had passed it to his father Uddhav. Aditya drew a sword out and held it high. He had been handed inheritance of, not the sword, but a political party, and this was his response. Thus, a political party in the world’s largest democracy was handed over.

I had earlier written an article on the problem of yuvrajs entering politics in the name of yuva raj in India. Just like the congress belongs to the Gandhis, DMK belongs to Karunanidhi’s children, Shiv Sena belongs to the Thackerays. Most political parties today, are feudal, and are run by dominant families. Business of democracy is, after all, a business!

Rahul Gandhi is the unofficially assumed to be the next prime minister. No one talks about other so-called young guns like Sachin Pilot (son of Rajesh Pilot) or Jyotiraditya Scindia (son of Madhavrao Scindia), because they do not belong to the family of Prime Ministers. These rulers are infected with caste system  and they claim that they’ll fix our problems 😀 Very few parties today speak of political recruitment. Political parties should ideally be democracies within the democracy. It is unfortunate that we, the consumers of their service know so little of their brands. Eventually, and ironically, we are at fault.

Note- You may watch this inspiring speech by Dr. Jayaprakash Narayan-

• Part one
• Part two
• Part three