Youth and Politics

The recent death of Prof. Harbhajan Sabharwal in Ujjain, in a scuffle with ABVP students, has once again brought focus on the student politics and quite expectedly has the entire media up in arms against the ‘goondaraj’ prevalent in colleges and universities in the name of ‘student politics’.

Rashmi has a hard-hitting article on this where she mentions the lack of any ‘career-path’ in Indian politics for the youth of the country, due to which it has become a refuge of the scoundrels while the genuine ones stay away. There should, of course, be an entry point for the young blood to enter the politics, as she suggests. The problem is, ‘student politics’ is the only practical entry point for the common youth, as of today.

The youth by their very nature, have a lot of energy and they all have a desire to gain some recognition and influence in society. The vested interests know quite well how to tap such tendencies for their own benefit. The Congress shelters ASUI while BJP has its own student wing in ABVP. These student wings, in turn, act like a ready army of ‘volunteers’ during the election time, apart from preparing a pool from where they pick the next leaders.

But, where is the ‘student’ in this ‘student politics’? Aren’t these political parties, exploiting colleges and universities for their own political agenda? What happens to those parents’ who send their wards to these colleges with their hard-earned money? What about the teachers who have to live every day in fear of their own students? These are pertinent questions, which have been thoroughly ignored by our governments, to suit their own convenience.

Where are the good 'fellas’?

Most of us keep wondering why we always hear about the bad boys in politics. Are there no genuine politicians? Has youth left the country politics to its fate? The answer is that the youth today is going through a phase of ‘disengagement’. We have become a country of ‘spectators’ and politics, as such, has become a ‘spectator sport’ serving as a good source of our daily entertainment. But, at the same time, there is a genuine interest in most of us to help the country in our own way possible. This opens up a host of channels for community service and volunteering. That’s where we can find our real leaders and genuine community workers.

Some of the research done in USA, paints a similar attitude of disenchantment with the politics among youth. But, they have moved on to community service in a big way. They even have a national program for Community service called Americorps Here is a comment in one such research study:

"The Institute of Politics found that college students are engaged in their community, even if they are not involved in political activities. Nearly 66 percent volunteered recently in their community and more than 40 percent volunteered at least a few times per month, while fewer than 10 percent volunteered on a political campaign. Moreover, 85 percent of students believed volunteerism is an effective form of public service to solve problems on both local and national level (Institute of Politics 2002)."

Freechild.org lists out a few examples of Youth-led social activism.

Society on the Move?

Lets look at some of the recent developments, which are examples of our national consciousness which, thankfully, seems to be alive and kicking.

Arvind Kejriwal: the man, who launched ‘Parivartan’ to help the poor in Delhi using ‘Right to Information’ and held the government accountable towards its duties, has deservedly got the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Emergent Leadership

Last year, a School of Government was set up in Pune to award Masters Diploma in Government Programme, on the lines of John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

There are many other movements going on in our country, which unfortunately go unnoticed. The least that we can do now, is to be aware of our civic duties and encourage other people who are trying to bring in changes in our society. The rest should follow on its own.