Standing or Seated
With elections round the corner, the average Goan, depending on his religious upbringing, decides to vote for a “standing” candidate or a “seated” one.
For the Hindu, Mrs. Bhandekar, “Mr. Kamath electionak bosla” (Mr.Kamath is sitting for the elections) and for the Catholic,Miss Fonseca, “Mr. Robeiro electionak ubo ravla” (Mr.Robeiro is standing for the elections). Be that as it may, once elected all the chosen candidates religiously go into hibernation (Soglo Nidlya) till the next electoral cycle, and the electorate goes back to its humdrum life of fleecing the tourist.
Fortunately Goa is blessed with many courageous political leaders who refuse to succumb to lethargy, petty underhanded methods of horse-trading and buying voters; who are fearless & willing to speak up for fairness and reason and work untiringly to better the lives of the common citizenry, even though this might hurt their re-election chances.
Ha Ha! I am of course making a hilarious joke here.
In line with the Indian ethos, Goa’s political leaders too hold all kinds of national bullshitting records. Many of them would need major surgery to have their lips removed from their constituencies' butts.
Some of them try to take on several constituencies simultaneously; and these leaders remind you of those bumper cars you find at Essel World and other amusement parks, that rush around randomly, changing direction whenever they hit another car or a wall.
BOINK they hit the Goenkar car, so they change direction and bounce until BOINK they hit the Maratha car, which sends them careening off into BOINK the Christian car, which is not to be confused with BOINK the Hindu car, which sends them ricocheting into BOINK the Migrant Labour wall, and so on.
This kind of bold leadership has needless to say created a tremendous sense of fellowship, as was demonstrated during the recent IFFI 2006 / Regional Plan 2011 meetings / Carnival / Red & Black Dance(choose any one), when the various ethnic communities displayed a generous spirit of mutual trust and understanding rarely seen outside of Iraq.
So what do the elections seek to address this time around. Like all other elections so far here is what we’ve got: (Sing to the tune of "Who could ask for anything more! ")
We’ve got crime.
We’ve got Violence.
We've got Citizens Suffering in Silence.
We’ve got rampant, rude, frantic IQ – impaired motorists who don’t obey the laws of physics.
Have we left anything out?
The garbage?
The crowding and overdevelopment and continued aggressive uglification of the landscape?
The endless highway deconstruction?
The water shortage?
The corruption?
The stray dogs getting dangerous enough to be registered for road transport licence plates?
The invertebrate political leadership, tip-toeing nervously round a caste-and-creed-ridden ethnic minefield of their own creation.
We've got music ,we've got rhythm, and who could ask for anything more !
We nevertheless will continue to exercise our franchise fearlessly, things are going to change soon - or NOT.
