Indian Politics: A theatre of the absurd
Whatever is panning out in the political context currently is nothing new. In the 1967 Haryana Assembly elections, Gaya Lal won as an independent candidate. Within nine hours of win, he party-hopped thrice- Congress to United Front and back to Congress. During a press conference, witty Rao Birender Singh said the famous line "Aya Ram ab Gay Ram hai'- a label that now sticks to all such turncoats. Never outdone in political antics, Bhajan Lal, having been sworn in as Janta Dal CM in Haryana in 1979, manipulated the loyalty of his entire cabinet to take a fresh oath as the Congress CM. Thus began an era of brazen political opportunism that continues to date. Mercifully, party-switching is not an India-specific phenomenon. It happens worldwide; in New Zealand, they call it Waka-jumping. After Bengal, UP is now witnessing presumptuous mass migration of the people's representatives ...