[Reader-list] Reg: Indo-Pak Peace Process : A Mirage??

[Rakesh Iyer]

There's a huge disconnect between the Indian elite and the Indian masses as
well. This is reflected in many things across the country, some examples
below are put up to highlight the points:

1) The complete lack of finding out electoral verdicts particularly in the
General elections, and even more mediocre kind of reasoning given by news
channels, media and the elites to explain electoral verdicts (where some
useless reasons are coined out every time, without even knowing the ground
reality or some basic depth of understanding of Indian elections).

2) The problem of Naxalism, whose origin and spreading itself shows how
elites are totally cut-off from the ground. Nobody knows what is going on in
Operation Greenhunt, and probably the elites hardly care; after all, iron
ore is more important than lives of the people.

3) The idea of development. There is a complete lack of understanding of how
the poor perceive development. This is also shown through the understanding
of Naxalism. For the rich, development simply means more money and good
roads. For the poor, health, education and dignity-related issues are found
out to be much more important than say Naxalism.

At the risk of sounding Communist, I will say that the Indian elites have
simply captured the process of democracy to ensure that only people among
them can rule over the country, while the masses have only elections to
express their views. In reality, democracy is absent. What is present, is
mobocracy.

Rakesh