Time turner...to the past and back!

Wednesday, June 23, 2004

Today was the day when I thought I'd be a worthy citizen of India!! I went to get my name enrolled in the voting list. This is where you can play 'passing the parcel' for hours!! The first trip was to the local post office. 2 aunties were chatting in there about latest happenings in the life of Jassi. Angry at being interrupted they directed me to another counter. Here the man was slower than the action replays they show for cricket. Anyways I managed to get my form.

Next back home I rushed to get the form filled and collect the required documents. Surprise!! Surprise!! I'm still 2 years old on our ration card. Mom & Dad's election cards show their pics like someone on India's Most Wanted! Anyways I manage to get everything ready and its off to the municipal school to submit the form.

Ohh Oh!! I have landed in a class full of students singing 'Hum ko man ki shakti de na!!' Where the hell do I give this form?? Its been an hr since I'm in this school trying to find where to submit this. Atlast a Good Samaritan to the rescue!! I meet a man who directs me to the right class to submit my form.

And after all this running around the form-taker tells me 'Tumchya ghari aale aaste na naav ghayla' - We would have come to your house to take your name!! As if he's talking about Pizza Hut's home delivery. Talk about door-to-door service! And a look at the post office and the form submission office makes me wonder ... what happened to paperless offices? and is india shinning with shelves of dusty files??

So till my name really comes in the voting list...its a long wait...will keep you all posted.

An entry from my old blog. The day I first registered myself for voting! The day holds a lot of significance for me ofcourse but today I'll also mark it as the day my disillusionment with India's political system began. The black dot that all voters get on their forefinger was what I'd eagerly waited to get since I started studying civics. Today it doesn't hold that much significance!

This post is not to discredit our politicians (they are past that level!) . Rather I posted it only after I realised the power of blogs to influence netizens. It was only recently that i discovered that you can still vote with an option equivalent to "none of the above" in multiple choice tests.

Since I'm averse to plagiarism (except when it applies to assignments and projects...hehe) I'll jus post a link to a detailed article explaining Section 49-O. Do use it if you think none of the candidates in an election you vote are worthy of your vote!!

Article explaining Section 49-O

Do disregard the comments on the link since the information about the right of not voting is accurate to the best of my knowledge!