Murder of a Messiah

“Hey, Punjabi’s you people broke my heart!”

This is what Sardar Manpreet Singh Badal might be saying to himself. The man who sacrificed his well established political career and stood for fighting against the looteras of Punjab. Just fifteen months back he was finance minister of Punjab, life would have been easy for him, but if only he was like other politicians. Little unfortunate for him, it seems he is not the one, who cares much about the power and money. A simple man, he drives his own car. Though it may seem quite normal to many but not to those who are aware of Indian politician’s lifestyle. He neither has any security cover nor does he use red light. He once said: “I am in public life on my own choice and feel no threat to my life from anybody”. How many of Indian politicians you can find these days saying this thing.

When everyone was busy in hoarding money, hunting for power, establishing close contacts with Badals (fate deciders of Shiromani Akali Dal politicians), agreeing to Badals each and every statement, he was the one who stood up and said,“ Hey, they are lying to common man”. And that was his first suicide attempt in terms of a politician’s language. But, he is a man of courage, he stood against the mighty. He has guts to say a liar is a liar and that too, to Chief Minister of the State.

When Prakash Singh Badal was making false claims of debt of Punjab and debt waiver required from center government, he enlightened common man of Punjab with real situation of the so called Khazana. He said that Punjab has small tax base and it cant afford the debt of Rs.70,000 crores. He said that revenue defict of Punjab is much higher, though senior Badal was shouting other way. He also made us aware of a common fact that not all farmers of Punjab need subsidy on power.Though he was not against subsidy on power. He just wanted to rationalize the subsidies for better financial management. He said that he was a rich farmer and he didn’t need subsidy on power, it should be for the poor and needy. Can anybody please tell, what is wrong in these kind of views? They are perfectly fine, but they are not meant for a guy who is in political arena.  

He went on to form a political party, for fighting against corruption, injustice. He fought for common man. Very well aware of the political situation of Punjab and challenges ahead, he took a plunge. In the start he got decent response from various sections of society. Educated youth was well aware of his objectives; they supported him in the virtual world. Media called him, “Man of masses”.  When everything was looking rosy, here we got a shock. We lost it. Yes indeed we lost it. Not even a single seat for his party, PPP.  

Punjab lost a golden opportunity to come out of a messy situation and put an end to family politics. Instead of zero any number would have been his source of courage and dedication for the work for next five years. Unfortunately, we deprived him of even that. Yet another fight for Messiah begins; now not only he has to fight for common man, but  also for his survival in politics.

Signing off

Rohit Garg