It was four years ago, on an evening at the dinner table, my architect daughter announced “I am quitting my job”. I aborted my attempt to shove the piece of chapatti with a scoop of rajma into my mouth to ask “why”? On arrival from Baroda with a degree in architecture, she had homed on to this oldest and biggest architecture firm in Bangalore and managed to get in there after several levels of interviews. My surprise was obvious. She replied “there is a lot of politics in the office”. I realised having heard that phrase before on various occasions. The conversation ended abruptly. I had to believe my daughter knew what she was doing.
‘Politics’ has become a word which has been used and misused rightly and wrongly, so much so that even by choice we are unable to keep it away from our daily travails. The great Greek thinker Aristotle who has been credited with initiating this word in Greek, which was later adopted by the English language, would surely be sitting up in his grave. For it was he who nilly willy defined Politics (from Greek πολιτικός, "of, for, or relating to citizens"), as a process by which groups of people make collective decisions for a larger group or society.
Though the term is traditionally used in relation to running Government or state affairs, over passage of time the word has been used in all places where decisions are taken on behalf of a group by those in power (as Aristotle had defined) – but in the process it has attained an implied shade of gray. When it is said that there is a ‘lot of politics’ in decisions on promotions the implicit message conveyed is one of foul play. We exhort our peers to keep politics out of some matters and at times warn them against playing politics! Playing is not the same as practicing politics as the latter ostensibly conveys clean politics, whatever that means. Concerned authorities may also indulge in politics to get things done through the back door. Is politics, in this century, taken on a meaning of ‘self serving’ or ‘vested interests’? He who talks a lot and conveys very little, we say, is fit to be a politician because such a person is thought to harbour a hidden agenda. In this the twenty-first century a politician is a professional, who deftly practices his trade for gains, where heredity is a primary qualification to become one. But then in one sense of politics, is each one of us a ‘politician’ of sort?
Mahatma Gandhi says “Those who say religion has nothing to do with politics do not know what religion is.” With politics intricately wedded to religion with greed (for money, power) always lurking in the shadows, is the whole drama continually unfolding on the National scene a case of ‘Pati, Patni aur Woh’? A combination of even any two of the trio has potential to produce dangerous sparks or fire works as the case may be.
Ha! All too confusing this and dangerous too, just as in the case of exposed PPW situation.
What say ye?
