The Lighter Side of Electioneering

Bhaskar Phukan

(The writer is a freelancer)

The election season brings variety to the life of the people at large. If not something in material shape, it does provide variety in the matter of words used in electioneering. Napoleon Bonaparte once said, “In politics, stupidity is not a handicap.” And here we have a situation in context to which it can safely be said that being stupid is of a comic relief in the otherwise dull election goings-on. Again, in another reference, it is justified to say that many of today’s politicians masquerade as all-knowing pundits, but in actuality they only misinform and confuse the common men with untruths as facts.

Coming to the matter in detail relating to electioneering, it is found quite often that there is a very clear tendency of our leaders to establish themselves as the ones who possess great knowledge, no matter whatever the subject may be. The electioneering period offers proper scope to these leaders for making public their knowledge, be it correct or not. This strange phenomenon is noticeable, particularly in India. It will be interesting to mention a few golden words coming from these leaders in the course of election campaign.

The most interesting among them is the one by one Chief Minister who, imbued with his sense of awe to the great past of the great country that is India and its great achievements in the field of medicine and surgery, had a great declaration to make and a profound explanation about Lord Ganesha wearing an elephant head. The leader claimed this phenomenon to be proof that plastic surgery was in practice in the days of mythology.

India, with its great past, can boast of Ayurveda as a method of treatment and can boast of Charaka who was a great physician with excellence in the Ayurvedic method of treatment. India can also boast of Susruta who was a great surgeon of sorts. But transplant of organs was something that could never be a possibility as claimed by the leader.

Next, in an election meeting in Bihar in 2014, a national leader said that Alexander the Great was an unstoppable conqueror and he conquered almost the entire world, but his winning spree was resisted only by the brave soldiers of Magadh, which is present Bihar. He thought this would woo the Biharis, but it was corrected by someone by saying that Alexander never came further than the bank of river Jhelum, which presently is in Pakistan.

The leader from the Congress and its president Rahul Gandhi too is in the habit of guffawing. He was of the strong contention that the founder of Coca Cola, the giant group that has under its banner the huge soft drink business, had its origin as a shikanji vendor. Shikanji is a drink that is prepared from lemon juice where sugar and salt are mixed. He emphasized the hard work and business acumen of the person who rose to such height from being a petty vendor. But Coca Cola has a different story as its origin. Contrary to Rahul Gandhi’s theory, Coca Cola originated as the result of the efforts of a pharmacist, Dr John S Pembertone from Atlanta of USA, who created flavoured syrup with a distinct taste that could never be matched or copied by any other drink.

There are too many of such claims coming in from those who are in great pride and enthusiasm about the achievements of ancient Indian sciences and scientists. Many claims are raised in the matters of missiles, satellites and aviation. One Congress leader from Assam had the tall claim about the exploits of an ex-Prime Minister of the country. He very confidently declared that it was Rajiv Gandhi who introduced Indians to the computer. The fact, however, is that computer was already in use in the country in a limited way, and Rajiv Gandhi only helped the expansion of the use and utilities of it.

These gaffes of our all-knowing politicians are no doubt the boon of the otherwise dull electioneering exercises, but when an overenthusiastic Indian electioneer claims that television network was present during the days of the Mahabharata, it is little too much to digest. The leader had the character of Mahabharata, Sanjay, as his basis to emphasize the point. His point was: Unless there was an arrangement like television network, how could Sanjay relay the proceedings of the Kurukshetra war to Dhritarashtra?

Elections, and particularly the election speeches, therefore, are not all about promises. They at times apparently appear to be a great source of thought-provoking words from the self-styled, all-knowing leaders, but many of the words after proper scrutiny turn out to be great gaffes. Instead of words of wisdom, these turn out to be a comedy of sorts.