Comments on: Why Vote for Meera Sanyal?

By: Drasties - Dutch on the World - World on the Dutch

Drasties - Dutch on the World - World on the Dutch — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 06:29:09 +0000

[...] meera sanyal [...]

By: Gautam K

Gautam K — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 15:55:23 +0000

Do we elect leaders for their linguistic capabilities.

If so look at the rest of the bunch – Shiv Sena, MNS, BJP, Congress that orate to us so wonderfully, while taking us off a cliff.

By: jv

jv — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 23:51:36 +0000

I am from the area where she is running for LS. I am very familiar with the South Mumbai constituency.

I am all for erudite and presentable candidates like Ms. Sanyal. She fluent in English and Hindi, but cannot speak or communicate in Marathi even though she lived in Mumbai for a number of years. Why can’t these LS aspirants learn to speak in Marathi which is a native language of Maharashtra. (Maharashtra is the only state that allows discrimination of its people, language and culture) How can you run for LS in Mumbai without knowing the native language of Maharashtra?

Alas, she would be the exact type of person I would support if only she had a rudimentary knowledge of Marathi, the language of the state of Maharashtra.

By: Gaurav

Gaurav — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 05:46:33 +0000

Dude, you are still delighted over the demolition, why don’t you just confess that you are a Hindutva fascist trapped inside a Randbot’s body. Come put already, you have no place among the effete cosmos.

By: Gaurav

Gaurav — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 12:11:04 +0000

Oh dear, your best friend the big boob is shocked and saddened that you were delighted over demolition of babri masjid.

By: Nilu

Nilu — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 05:37:13 +0000

Ritwik, I have a reading recommendation for you. But the other Gaurav had already mentioned it somewhere. You seem to fundamentally miss an argument made as far back as 1787.

http://www.amazon.com/Federalist-Papers-Penguin-Classics/dp/0140444955/ref=sr_11_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1238564119&sr=11-1

By: Ritwik

Ritwik — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 04:20:33 +0000

The larger question is – with area-defined constituencies, is there any other option? If the national legislative has only to debate and decide on issues of national importance, local optima are anyway unimportant. The coal policy of India does not automatically mean anything special for Dhanbad, unless the legislator from there expressly tweaks it in such a way as to benefit his constituency.

National issues that may genuinely interest voters and polarise them, like internal security, are pretty much party manifesto-type issues handled by the PM candidate and leaders of similar stature. The average MP will invariably promise local executive type action, in one way or the other.

Even if it is nationally beneficial to benefit a constituency in a particular way – increased security for Mumbai for example, or some coal policy tweak in Dhanbad – the promises made to the constituency will still be local executive type. Even if your ultimate plan may be fiscal federalism, if you are running from South Bombay it makes sense to talk only of Bombay tax money.

Achievements at the national level unspecific to a constituency – roads, railways etc. – will be touted only by some print/electronic campaign by the parties in the government. The individual MP has no incentive to tout them.

By: Gaurav Sabnis

Gaurav Sabnis — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 19:42:53 +0000

The reason to support her would be expressive voting – if sufficient numbers vote for her, then the current political parties will notice that there is a bloc of voters they are pissing off, and that while these voters may not be in a majority, they might still make the difference between winning and losing.

Yes, but what does this bloc of voters want or stand for? According to her manifesto, better transport for Bombay, better infrastructure and investment for Bombay, and stronger security. Is there just a bloc that wants this? All of Bombay wants it. And all politicians from all parties make those promises. And if they could, even Gurudas Kamat, Govinda and Milind Deora would accomplish these things. It’d help them get re-elected by touting those achievements.

At their core, the meager but vocal support for someone like Sanyal or Bhatia comes from a “people like us” mentality. Without realizing that most of the influential people running the country, be it Sonia Gandhi, Manmohan Singh, Advani, Pranab Mukherjee, Ashok Chavan or even Bal and Raj Thackeray, are all demographically and culturally speaking, people like us.

By: Gaurav Sabnis

Gaurav Sabnis — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 19:24:51 +0000

This is one of the rare times when I agree with Nilu completely. And the “it’s the system’s flaw” counter-argument does not hold water. At least the “different” candidates like Meera Sanyal or Arun Bhatia (from Pune) should be forthright about what they can and can not do, and not make lofty promises which they will not have the authority to fulfill.

By: skimpy

skimpy — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 06:32:48 +0000

i’d written this in my note on shared items but thought i should put it here also:

1. “collective responsibility” in parliament should go. currently if a money bill gets defeated govt goes. this should not be the case – govts can go only by confidence/noconfidence votes

2. once this is done, anti-defection laws can go.

3. maybe we’ll need an italy-like rule of forming new govt before bringing down old one.