Indianization of Democracy - A Dire Necessity

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 India License.

I am not having very good feeling ever since Govt decided to go ahead with IPL along with General elections.. Elections in India should not be in April-May when temperatures soar high.. It is very unpleasant time to be in India in summer afternoon.. And due to recent attacks on Sri-lankan cricket team, IPL will unnecessarily become a prestige issue.. this will put tremendous pressure on security agencies, which are already being stretched to their limits...

The best time for elections in India is when the Indic festivals of harvest are concentrated.. Or in August when crops are growing in fields and there nothing much work needed to be done except for daily maintenance of the fields.. in January-February.. or in November.. Around Diwali... the mood of country is happy overall due to festivities and the polling will be healthy.. There should not be any elections after Holi and before Monsoons, simply because there are not any festivals in that time.. In other words, when average climate of India is at its best and there are not many agricultural activities going on..

The festivals are concentrated in such periods of the year.. People have free time to think.. Since the climate is good, the atmosphere pleasent, people can vote without any bias, with clear conscience..

Election needs to be transformed into a religious OR social festival in India. It will not only preserve the sanctimony of the idea, but also make people more participative in a good way.. If it is a festival, people won't dare to cheat, bribe etc... and They will vote because voting will not be mere duty of each citizen, but it will the "Dharma" of each citizen to vote.. and Dharmo Rakshati Rakshitah: - Dharma protects the protector....

It is so easy to understand the soul of India, if you only allow yourself to identify with her roots. All the religious, philosophical schools of India are designed to peacefully co-exist with each other in India. In case of hard times, various social groups which adhere to the paths, religions, philosophies of Indian origin have some feature which allows them to arrive at a point of mutual compromise and the peaceful coexistence continues. 

The festivals of India are more of a social events than religious ones.. Given the vast diversity of social, religous, philosophical, ideological and economic groups which originated in India, such festivals give them the much needed opportunity to come together, interact with each other and share some time together doing some activity. This builds up a social solidarity amongst the people. To make such event mandatory, some religious connotations are associated with such events.. Thus, it becomes a festival and is faithfully followed by masses.

Panchayat Raj has been existent in India for thousands of years. The village Panch (5 leaders) were selected by mutual consensus of villagers. Thus democracy has been practiced in India at this grass-root level for thousands of years.. Such selections happen around some or the other festival, thus giving people an exuse to come together and think about their village.. 

Indic religions are designed and evolved in India. They reflect Indian life-style and Indian Ethos.. They do it because they have evolved here and are time-tested and there is hardly anything religious about them. Its mostly social occasion, just like choosing the leader is a social occasion. It is high time India regains her roots... Only that can save her, nothing else..