Your experience of participating in elections
Answers
How the democratic exercise worked in a village in Bihar in 1991, with the seeming concurrence of all those who were present
This happened a long time ago, in November 1991 to be precise. However, the events were so novel, interesting and forceful in nature that the memories are still vivid and fresh in my mind, and it does not really feel like more than a quarter of a century has elapsed.
India is touted as the world’s largest democracy, and one of the favourite hobbies of us Indians is to criticise our politicians and our political system. As a true Indian, I have also willingly participated in this national pastime. However enjoyable this activity was, deep down I always felt like a hypocrite, since the right to criticise coexists with the duty to participate in the political process. And till that time I had never been even remotely involved actively in political processes of any kind — whether it was school or college union elections, municipal elections, building society elections, leave alone State Assembly or parliamentary elections. This was partly due to apathy. It was also because, having lived a very peripatetic existence I was always an outsider in every social milieu I inhabited.
This dilemma had been gnawing my innards till the time I reached adulthood, and all my efforts to rectify this deficiency in the essential experiences of civic life went in vain. By the time I got myself enrolled as a voter in a town, I had to move to another before elections were called. In this profound dilemma I was suddenly offered an opportunity to be directly involved in the election process.