The erstwhile President of United States, Bill Clinton once famously remarked that, “Politics is a Contact Sport” and in my view he was quite precise in his definition of modern-day politics. Having closely watched the movers and shakers in the corridors of power for the last four decades, I can emphatically say that politics is all about creating influence, power and developing relationships with those in power. Those who succeed in mastering these relationships and establishing a rapport with the masses often rise to the top of the pyramid in this sphere. However once they are there i.e in the government that they are faced with the challenge of governance i.e managing institutions that operate on a pre-defined policies. With no prior experience in managing public institutions they end up applying the same skills to manage institutions which they used to manage their political Lying Spouse outfits. Nepotism, favoritism and prejudices are often the consequence resulting in destruction and dilution of established institutions.The real losers in this bargain are citizens as there is no mechanism by which they can hold the political executive accountable for their action and more importantly inaction’ on key issues facing the electorate. We may have the RTI Act in place but that only provides for a framework to obtain information in the public domain. At the end of the day, the RTI Act only provides information and does not empower the common man by offering him a tool to hold the political executive responsible.The need of the hour is to offer the common man a statutory framework wherein he can approach relevant statutory body regarding the inaction of his elected representative on key issues affecting his constituency.There is however a flip side to the debate itself.
