NOTA - not a option

I have been wanting to write about the ‘None of the above’ option on the Electronic Voting Machines since it was mandated by Supreme Court but somehow procrastinated over it. Got to see post the elections in the 5 states dubbed ‘Semi-final to the general elections’, I just have more reasons, data, numbers and armour to back my claims.

The day Supreme Court validated the right of the electorate to reject all the candidates, all hell broke loose on social media with #NOTA being the top trending topic. People went ballistic as to how they now have a reason to visit the polling booth before of this empowerment of picking ‘none of the above’ over all the rest party symbols. All the cynics who I am pretty sure don’t even have faintest of the idea of how a polling booth looks, were singing yodels about the empowerment of the electorate it would bring about.

In fact there is nothing new about NOTA option per se. The Indian constitution had always provided us with this option of rejecting all the candidates. Remember those mail forwards regarding Section 49(O) that used to flood our inboxes whenever any election was round the corner?

For the uninitiated, Under the existing provisions of Section 49(O) of the Representation of People Act, a voter who after coming to a polling booth does not want to cast his vote, has to inform the presiding officer of his intention not to vote, who in turn would make an entry in the relevant rule book after taking the signature of the said elector. He thus would be exercising his right for not picking any of the candidates in the fray. The issue with the process besides being cumbersome was that it would reveal the identity of the voter which amounted to violation of his secret ballot entitlement. With the recent judgement the apex court just conceded that Section 49(O) in its present form was violative of the constitutional provisions guaranteed under Article 19(1)(a) (Freedom of Speech and Expression) and Article 21 (Right to Liberty) and violated the concept of secret ballot. It further directed the Election Commission to start implementing NOTA button on EVMs forthwith in a phased manner and asked the Centre to render all assistance.

The Supreme Court bench in its prudence think that negative voting would foster purity and vibrancy of elections and ensure wide participation as people who are not satisfied with the candidates in the fray would also turn up to express their opinion rejecting contestants. I for once and whole heartedly disagree with this thought process of the honourable court. I do not think the empowering with option of NOTA is any a panacea towards the deep cynicism that has ingrained in some of the voters. More so I dis-agree that it’s the onus of Supreme Court to coax people out of their siestas, picnics or apathy towards the system.

Though the judgement might have been passed with noble intentions, I suspect it might end up doing more harm than good in due course. The way I look at the mind-set of the large sections of Indian electorate is that they do tend to go for the lesser evil amongst all. On most occasions we might not see the name of the person on the EVM whom we would actually want to see as our legislature but then we have gotten used to picking the best candidate among the lot; so I would believe with a tinge of hope. If I am allowed to largesse to assume that these #NOTA voters would have otherwise voted for the lesser evil, they might end up inadvertently helping the greater evil.

Very often the difference in the victory margins is so trivial, that the quantum of votes cornered by NOTA would actually turn the results topsy-turvy.  The recently concluded elections in the states of Madhya-Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Delhi had seen NOTA claiming vote percentage up to 3%. For the number-crunchers types who strictly go by the numbers and stats following is the analysis (courtesy mint): They have examined the impact of NOTA on the margins of victory which suggests there are 56 constituencies were the margin of victory less than the number of votes polled by NOTA. Of these 26 are in Madhya Pradesh, 15 in Chhattisgarh, 11 in Rajasthan and four in Delhi. Given that the Chhattisgarh assembly has 90 seats, one-sixth of all its seats were decided by a margin less than the number of votes polled by NOTA in those constituencies. In Madhya Pradesh, this proportion fell to one-tenth, and it was closer to one-twentieth in Rajasthan and Delhi. Such a huge vote share has potential to change the turn the outcome of an election in case of close contest and thereby adversely seal the faith of the AAM Aadmi for at least the next 5 years.

Offering my respects where due, contesting an election needs a lot of courage; keep aside the financial prowess as well as backing of the masses. It’s unfortunate that we have had candidates of more shady characters than none, but NOTA is no cure to it. I feel NOTA in its present form won’t coax any of the good candidates to file their nomination papers.

Another thing I feel is that NOTA will just remain as hype among few voters, especially urban and the cynics. It might see some takers during the early adoption phase but soon it will taper out left to itself. One reason for its prospective demise would be Supreme Court clarification which says the NOTA option is simply hypothetical—votes marked to “none of the above” would simply be ignored while deciding the winner and it wouldn’t matter even if over half the votes were for NOTA. This renders NOTA as nothing more than a placebo. This very clarification from SC voids its original reasoning which said having NOTA option would prompt people out of their couches. How would be selecting none of the candidates be any different for skipping the exercise the adult franchise altogether?

Ours is a participatory democracy and the zest of the system lie in people participating in its day-to-day running, directly or indirectly. Though the intent behind getting NOTA might not be flawed, its utility and relevance are still in reasonable doubt. Empowering people with such rights should be tagged along with enforcing some obligatory duties on them which would prevent its misuse. Provisions like NOTA would only be effective if you precede it with compulsory voting upon people. Needless to say it should also be provided with more teeth, which should range from calling fresh elections if NOTA garners highest vote share, and even barring the same candidates for contesting subsequent elections.

Until such amendments aren’t done, we need to keep the 5 yearly exercises to its literal meaning… let it be ‘election’, NOT A ‘rejection’.

'Like' it or not

Hats off to Mark Zuckerberg or whoever who claims to be the father of the social network. For he was able to spot the urge of the homo-erectus to share. Without this basic human instinct of sharing there would have been no revolution on the social networking front. Be it sharing ‘What are you doing?’ on Twitter or ‘What is on your mind?’ on Facebook, or be it ‘Where are you?’ on Foursquare, people are more than willing to succumb to these parental questions.

The human being was always known to be a social creature and thus as an extension to this behavior, sharing with his peer group was an acceptable norm. Back then basic needs of existence were shared.  As the ages passed and with advent of technology, the physical world around each person constricted to his cubicle, however his basic craving for sharing didn’t subside. As an extension of their prehistoric traits, the current day Neolithic man too had things to share though it widely differed from the days of yore.

Enter Facebook. Now one had an easy platform for broadcasting his feelings, his thoughts, his achievements, his failures. One could share his good times and the memories through photos; could share a good laugh through a video or a joke; could share some information through URLs and docs. As an extension to this there was also a provision for feedback through the ‘comments’ one can leave against each entry on the wall. One could comment back on the original post with remarks approving – disapproving, complementing-supplementing, accepting-denying, arguing for or against the original post. Quite often the comments dwarf the original posts in size, content and number.

However there is another often underplayed means of feedback provided in FB. In a ‘Eureka!’ moment somebody came up with the idea of that little ‘thumbs-up’ icon that dots each post on FB. If I ever get to interact with the brain behind this brilliant concept, I would like to know his thoughts behind creating it. I would want to know what it meant to him because I feel it means varied different things for different people.

A ‘like’ to any post can mean one approves the post, it can mean popularity, or it could just mean a read-receipt. It could also mean heeding to someone’s request. Or just plain thinking it could go with its literal meaning and be just a ‘like’. This is my understanding of it after having observed people ‘like’ different things.

Let’s begin with liking a photo, which could mean appreciating the skill of the person behind the lens or it could mean that one liked the person who is being photographed. Even with a deluge of DSLR camera armed ‘amateur’ photographers spawning in the post FB era, it’s still not a herculean task to spot that one brilliant artist among them. Invariably his pictures would have more likes than the rest crap. Thus these ‘likes’ stand as validation of the brilliance of the artist and thus acts as endorsement.

Another kind of posts which attracts lots of ‘likes’ are the posts which deliver some good news or achievement. Be it arrival of a baby, cracking an interview or topping an examination, all the well-wishers in the reciprocatory gesture like the post. This likes I reckon stand for ‘Congratulatory wishes’ by those lazy bumps that are too lazy to type it out in the comments.

Discounting these sloths there do exist people who would convey their good wishes through comments to the post. And guess what the original author of the post do in return? Yes, you nailed it. He will ‘like’ those congratulatory messages as an acknowledgement.

So far it looks all relatively rationale. But not when the post is about some grim news. Believe it or not I have witnessed people ‘liking’ post about someone’s loss or ‘liking’ news items about gruesome crime like rape or murder. What does a ‘like’ signify in such a situation? I hope the people who have liked it aren’t justifying the act. I will hazard a guess and speculate these ‘like’ indicate that the post had been read a la a read-receipt.

The dynamics of likes doesn’t end here. The number of likes to differ based on a variety of reasons and one of the primary factors being the gender of the person.

Post a snap of a kid and most of the girls in the friends list would be the first to ‘like’ it often backed with comments which sound like schoo schweet. The kind of post which invokes such fervent ‘liking’ spurt amongst guys is often a post from a girl, content being irrelevant.

Another interesting observation I have made is how a similar posts invokes varied response depending whether it’s a girl or a boy who has posted. Let me give you an example of such chauvinist ‘liking’ behavior. A ‘Not feeling well’ post would evoke hundreds of ‘likes’ (assumption: like = read) mostly from the males on her friends list; however a guy’s ‘Met with an accident, Fractured leg’ would have just a few ‘likes’ if at all.

Sticking to this sexist line, you would find all the ‘likes’ to a photo of super-cars will inadvertently be from males and that from females would be generally on fashion accessories et al. So the ‘Like’ can give you a valuable insight in human psychology and nature.

I had a good friend who once pleaded to me to like his selfies. His argument being that he dedicatedly liked all the photos I posted on my wall and I should reciprocate. He used to also keep a real-time track of how many more likes he needed to reach the half-century or century mark. Never did I disappoint him ever since and liked each of his profile picture albeit with a disclaimer comment saying ‘Liking your photo as requested by you J’

Remember those pesky chain mails? Yes, those chain mails might have died but looks like its proponents have adapted to new technology. Those ‘Forward this mail if you want to have good luck’ has now transformed into ‘Like this post if you are a patriot’. On some specific days viz: Father’s days, Mother’s day it adapts to read ‘Like if you love you mother’. The number of ‘likes’ is only the proof of such numerous superstitious zealots still doting the world.

Talking of the zealots reminds me of the heated debates that happen on these numerous FB forums. Irrespective of what the forum is about most of the discussion take the colour of religious beliefs, political inclinations or patriotic fervor. The hot flavor of current election season being the ‘BJP vs Congress’ or more specifically the ‘NaMo vs RaGa’ debate. Though there are usually a few of them arguing and counter-arguing, you can get a fair idea of which side the inclination of the silent majority likes just by observing which comments they ‘like’.

Just as in case of the multi-faceted word ‘fuck’ which can be used and noun, verb, adverb, adjective and many things more, so is the case with the ‘likes’ which can stand for a variety of things. So when I post the link to this article onto Facebook I would have a task at my hand to figure out why did the reader ‘like’ it? Well, I hope they like it J.

'NaMo'nia

Oh well. So ‘Goa’ is trending on twitter and as well on the news. And no! It’s not the usual things that generally catapult Goa in the limelight. No drugs, No rape, No government toppling and no, not even the cheap liquor, “cheaper” women or cheapest petrol.

It’s the endemic that has come visiting the Goan shore that been making the news. Should I be calling it ‘epidemic’ rather than endemic? It surely seems to fit the meaning that Merriam-Webster had to offer and I quote “affecting or tending to affect a disproportionately large number of individuals within a population, community, or region at the same time”. Furthermore it had a simple example towards its usage to makes things easier for those Grammar Nazis, which read 'Pneumonia is epidemic'.

Thankfully so it wasn’t the epidemic of Pneumonia that was affecting the Goans and the rest of Indians at this moment. But then this wasn’t any less dangerous either. It at least sounded as potent and to add to it a homophone of Pneumonia … It was called ‘NaMonia’. In a very rare spark of brilliance, some congressman can come up with this brilliant and rather very apt term to describe the euphoria as well as the paranoia towards Narendra Modi, the PM-in-the-waiting for some, the savior of the country for others and Maut kaa Saudagar for the rest.

With the BJP choosing Goa to host its National Executive meet and followed by the drama of absence of L K Advani and subsequent elevation of Narendra Modi to the seat of Chairman of the BJP election committee provided tons of fodder to the media. And needless to say it has enthused the Modi fans with more vigor to troll on the social networking sites, be it Facebook or twitter or anywhere else. Not that they were any dormant earlier, but the elevation has given them a shot in the arm.

I have no issues when people take their pick whom they want to see as their PM, but the sheer euphoria these Modi fans create bemuses me. These armchair activists seem to see no  future for our country without NaMo at helm. Agreed that he might have significantly transformed his native state of Gujrat as been allegedly reported in the media and various reports but so must be true with some other state’s CMs too. As his own senior party colleague LK Advani mentioned there are many other credit worthy performances by CMs of other states. 

Performance appraisal apart, the kind of rubbish propaganda that the NaMo fans resort to is ridiculous, especially those where they have a comparative analysis of Modi with the uncrowned prince of the congress and a strong contender for PM post, Rahul Gandhi. Agreed that the ‘Amul-baby’ by himself doesn’t have any qualification or a proven track record and my pick too would be the former over the latter, but the abusive comparison done is outright disgusting. Very often you would even find a pictoral comparison, wherein in one frame you would see Rahul giggling with some young girls vis-à-vis Modi interacting with some school kids. In another such pictoral comparison you would see Rahul wearing a skull cap and next to it the famous picture of Modi gently declining to wear one at his Sadbhaavna Yatra.  There would be other picture where it’s shown as a very old man falling at the feet of Rahul which many a times happens unannounced and very next to that pic would be Modi bending to seek blessings from an aged person. I see no rationale in the point you people might be trying to drive home. Instead it reflects pathetically on your mentality guys.

Sychophancy till now looked like a forte of the congressmen and it didn’t seem that anybody would come any closer to them when it comes to sucking up. However now looking at the Modi fans, it seems like they have taken their idol worship to newer and insane heights. Only thought that comes to my mind when I see these newgen toadies is “Sardi Khaasi Naa Malaria Hua, Yeh Gaya Yaaro Isko Namonia Hua”