Sham democracy
05 May, 2008
By DR A.H. KHAYAL
When Pakistan was established, we were granted all sorts of freedom barring one freedom. We were free to play cricket in the streets. We were free to play football in the streets. We were free to take bath in the streets. We were free to dump rubbish in the streets. We were free to use footpaths as our bedrooms. We were free to molest women in the streets. We have been enjoying all these freedoms to our heart's content.
Lately, some of our freedoms we have started enjoying more passionately. Now our thieves are stealing more passionately than ever before. Our robbers are robbing more passionately than ever before. Our women-molesters are molesting women more passionately than ever before. Let's passionately cheer ourselves for what we have been passionately doing!
When we were freed, our British masters granted us all the freedoms detailed above. But there was one particular freedom, which they cruelly denied to us. It was political freedom.
Socially we were as free as mad elephant. But politically, we were miserable slaves of our indigenous masters. Back home, our ex-masters don't have even one of the freedoms which we have been enjoying since our independence. Let alone our diverse street-freedoms, they don't have even the freedom of spitting in their streets. They have only one freedom. It is political freedom. If they feel like spiting publicly they can spit only in the government's face.
They cannot spit anywhere else because they don't have the freedom for that. They can spit only in the government's face because they have only one freedom. It is political freedom. We can't spit in the government's face because we don't have political freedom. We can spit anywhere else because we have all sorts of freedoms barring political freedom. If you want to know whether the citizens of a country have political freedom or not you should study the spitting laws of that country.
It is said that a right to vote is a guarantee of political freedom. What a crude joke! A citizen is politically free only if the basic needs of survival are either guaranteed to him by the state or they are within his own easy reach. A voter with an empty stomach is as easily gullible as a hungry baby. In most of the democracies of the world, the politicians thrive on the poverty of the masses.
There are two brands of democracy. There is a genuine democracy and a sham democracy. Under a genuine democracy, the masses enjoy genuine political freedom. But under a sham democracy, they are miserable salves of the rulers. Under a genuine democracy, the masses and the rulers have a common culture. But under a sham democracy, the masses and the rulers live in two different universes.
Britain is a genuine democracy. Consequently, he rulers and the masses have a common life-style. Just have a look at the British premier and the masses. What the premier wears is also worn by a taxi-driver. There is nothing, which the premier's bedroom has and the driver's bedroom doesn't have. There is nothing, which the premier's washroom has and the driver's washroom doesn't have. Both enjoy roughly similar dishes. The premier relaxes by taking holidays aborad. So does the driver. What a cultural brotherhood! It is this cultural equality, which confers complete political freedom on the entire nation.
Under a sham democracy, the rulers and the masses belong to two radically different worlds. The masses live in caves. The rulers live in palaces.
The rulers of a sham democracy generally hate to die in their motherland. They prefer to die in 5-star medical clinics abroad. But they hate to be buried abroad. They love their motherland for their burial. Their post-mortal love for the motherland is laudable.
According to an international agency, more than four million children annually die of starvation in various sham democracies of Africa. The reason is that most of the rulers of these democracies spend lavishly on their personal life-style. Nothing is left in the treasury for the babies but premature extinction.
Our world is flooded with democracies. Unfortunately, most of these democracies are sham democracies. The rulers of a sham democracy believe that it is the patriotic obligation of the masses to live miserably. And simultaneously it is the patriotic obligation of the rulers to live as majestically as possible.
According to a news, a young man of twenty borrowed some money from a bank for business purposes. Unfortunately, the business did not pick up. The loan could not be returned. The bank's recovery staff got to the young man's house. His mother and sister were insulted by the staff. He was too sensitive to swallow the ladies' insult. He committed suicide. Would the bank accept the dead-body as repayment of the loan? One wonders!
In the past, various Pakistani banks lent billions of rupees to various Pakistanis. The loans wee never returned. The banks did not insult the womenfolk of the borrowers. Instead, the loans were written off because the borrowers were politically highly influential. Under a sham democracy, politically influential person has a divine right to get his bank loans written off.
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