the manmohini act

finally, we have a shadow prime minister. or more correctly, a prime minister who prefers to be a shadow. or is that a shadow as a prime minister? we hear from the left, and from the right..but the prime minister? if he does speak, he does it into his beard or to the congress. no, i don't mean his party- they'd rather hear from the person in the shadows, behind the shadow. a gap, as large as the country, exists between him and the country. he doesn't have the messianic persona of nehru, indira's catchwords and schemes... he doesn't even have a complacent snore like deve gowda's.. how's the hoi polloi supposed to pick him out from behind the dark veil of shadows and get to know him? to know what he plans to do about them? they might not be as smart as the people they voted for, or the people who voted in their name, but they are the ones who picked the shadows who picked him to do this manmohini act to strike the objecting middle classes dumb. until now, he's done precious little to impress either the fawning middle classes or the meddling classes representing the left. every member of the supporting cast pontificates on policy except for the prime minister..and we hear sickeningly familiar rhetoric about strengthening the public sector. in my view, every step in this direction would punch one more hole in the sinking ship that's rural india where these precious resources should rightfully, and at least now in the face of mass suicides, go. isn't that another major plank of yours pm, reviving the rural economy?
to end, he doesn't seem to be a prime minister who is fully engaged- definitely not enough for a person touted to be a formidable egghead. there are more than four million young people out on the streets and fields and other work and loafing places of andhra pradesh alone, when they are supposed to be in school, and the fact that twenty or thirty years from now these citizens would be just as hazardous a material to use or dispose of as the plutonium the pm has gone looking for in america should give wannabe-superpower india some food for thought.