No Ink on My Finger

 

Since I got registered as a voter nearly a decade ago, I have been dutifully getting my fingers inked during every election. I have voted in two Lok Sabha, one assembly, and a couple of BBMP elections. 

Bengaluru has been notorious for voter apathy and every election it comes under fire for low percentages. While rest of Karnataka districts post 65-75 percent polling, Bengaluru huffs and puffs to cross the 50 percent mark and settles for a sub-55 percentage point.

Political pundits attack Bengalureans for not taking voting seriously and instead treating the day as a holiday to scoot off to nearby resorts or shopping malls. They pontificate - there is no point in cribbing afterwards for potholes, broken footpaths, traffic gridlocks, and flooding during rains. 

For me, the nearby school has remained the polling station during all the elections, and I have been casting my vote without much ado. Mostly I come across thin crowds outside polling booths and the process gets over in 15-20 minutes.

But this time, when I went to cast my vote for the assembly election, I was in for a rude shock. When I and my wife produced the electoral identity cards, the volunteers seated outside the polling booth began checking in their paper voters’ list. 

They managed to find my wife’s name and I was hoping mine must be next to it as used to be the case usually. But no such luck for me this time. They entered my ID code into their mobile phones and began checking. After some anxious moments, they too gave up saying the name has been ‘deleted’. 

I was nonplussed and could not process the information. My card changed many more hands among the volunteers and all of them keyed the number on their mobile phones, but the results were negative. They told me they have been witnessing quite a few similar cases and noted down my voter ID number.

As my wife proceeded to cast her vote I told the polling officer about my predicament. They too checked and I had a faint hope that as they are government officials their searches may be more advanced and they might stumble upon my name. But no happy ending. 

Being a long-time voter, I was complacent enough to think there was no need to check my name in the voters’ list in advance. 

A day later, I read in newspapers that after the alleged voter data theft by an NGO Chilume, the election commission had added and deleted many names, and officials said people should have been more alert.

Though I am not much of a fan of posting an inked finger selfie on social media, the inkless index finger does give me a sense of being left out.

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Covid Conversations - 2021

From cautious optimism in January to a slide towards worry and despair.

Jan 15

Person A: Hi. What's up, man. How is work? And how is the Covid-19 situation in your area?

Person B: Yeah work is going on. Now it is nearly 10 months after we got down to working from home and I heard we may be called to attend office by April. I haven't heard of any cases in our building lately. There may be some in the area, but you never get to know these days, as buildings no longer get sealed.

Person A: Yes, nowadays it is much more discreet. Earlier the street used to get blocked and sometimes we also used to have ambulances coming with blaring sirens.

Person B: The number of people wearing masks is also coming down.

Person A: And many of them wear wrongly with their nostrils exposed. Some even wear it on their chin!

Person B: It is as ridiculous as bikers placing helmets on their elbows while riding.

Person A: A friend was telling me he went on a road trip last weekend. And people in villages were not wearing masks - at the most, some had covered mouths with handkerchiefs. In fact, when they stopped at a wayside tea stall, he and his companions were looked at rather suspiciously. They probably see every masked city dweller as a corona carrier.

Person B: Overall it looks like despite many lapses we got off the hook rather lightly. The number of deaths is much lower than say Brazil or USA.

Person A: Maybe because we get a battery of vaccines after birth. Hardly anyone goes through chickenpox-free adolescence and diseases like malaria and dengue are permanent fixtures.

Person B: Let us hope the worst is over.

Person A: In many countries, the second wave is going on, but I guess we may be spared since during the first wave itself we had so many cases and our population might have acquired herd immunity.

Person B: Don't know how reliable is this premise about herd immunity. Scientists seem to be divided about it.

February 15

Person A: Malls and bazaars near my house are open with crowds close to pre-Covid levels, and even some hotels and restaurants are reopening. Some others I guess have closed for good with promoters running out of money.

Person B: But cases in states like Maharashtra and Kerala seem to be on the rise. I feel it is too early to let your guard down.

Person A: They have even announced dates for assembly elections. I hope we are not sleepwalking into a new disaster.

Person B: Our company has sent a mail saying that offices may reopen in a limited way from June onwards. We may be called up in batches and have to attend the office three days a week. Will have to wear masks, maintain social distancing and other protocols.

Person A: This may come as some relief to those cafeteria guzzlers. I remember some of my colleagues tucking in enormous amounts of food during lunchtime, and guzzle soft drinks from the pantry all through the day. I wonder how they may be managing, holed up at home.

Person B: This pandemic has taught companies that en masse remote working is possible and they can save a whole lot of money. In the pre-coronavirus days, our manager had a very dim view towards work from home and rarely used to give his approval.

Person A: WFH is at best a privilege and possible only for white-collar professionals like us. Not for those working in the healthcare sector, police department, armed forces, power station, oil refineries, and others. Even the much sought-after e-commerce services need personnel for door delivery. So a whole lot of people are still out there braving the virus.

March 15

Person A: Last week I got my parents vaccinated. I took them to a hospital nearby. It was quite hassle-free, not much waiting to get the jab. After the vaccination, they were told to wait for 30 minutes. The next dose is after four weeks.

Person B: After taking the vaccine did your parents experience and fever or discomfort?

Person A: My father experienced chills after dinner and took a fever tablet. Mother did not experience any fever. But both complained of arm pain, which lasted for a few days.

Person B: I too plan to take mine. Somewhat wary of going to hospitals these days.

Person A: Yeah man, you are right. The sight is quite unnerving, doctors, nurses moving around in PPE kits. The dangers posed by the virus and the general fear psychosis is very palpable in hospitals and nursing homes.

Person B: Healthcare workers are just a sneeze away from this deadly virus. Every day must be like going to battle against an invisible enemy. It's not just doctors and nurses; the cleaning staff, security, and the admin guys, they all are equally vulnerable.

Person A: In newspapers, we often come across some famous well-known doctors falling prey to the virus and even dying.

April 15

Person A: If we thought 2020 was bad, 2021 is turning out to be catastrophic. The dreaded second wave is spreading at an alarming speed. Almost everyone I know has some horror story to narrate. Either their family member or a close relative has been infected.

Person B: If you need hospitalization, you really had it. There are no beds or oxygen cylinders available and caregivers have to run from pillar to post to get one.

Person A: If you log on to Twitter or any other social media site, most of the entries are SOS calls for hospital beds and oxygen cylinders. People are putting up videos of mile-long queues of ambulances outside hospital gates waiting to admit the patients.

Person B: This time even well-known people like former diplomats, police officers, and TV anchors are unable to find a bed or a cylinder either for their relatives or themselves. A couple of them even breathed their last while awaiting hospital admission. If this is the condition of the privileged class, I shudder to think about the plight of ordinary people.

Person A: Cleary neither the government nor people saw it coming. Only a few states had bulked up their oxygen capacity after the first wave. Some had even wound up makeshift Covid care centres set up at stadiums and other places during the first wave.

Person B: While the Corona situation is going out of hand, there is no let-up in electioneering. Look at the crowds at election rallies and various religious events and processions. 

Person A: A fatigue seems to have set in. People are tired of following Covid safety protocols.

May 15

Person A: Our neighbour died yesterday. He was in his early forties. The guy used to wear a mask and observe all safety precautions. He has two small kids.

Person B: This is really sad. The disease is decimating families across the country. In case of infection, you can recover, but death leaves long-lasting scars. I hear even getting last rites done is now a huge challenge.

Person A: Yes. The body was taken for funeral around 10 am and they had to wait well into the evening. Only the guy's younger brother went to cremation ground wearing a PPE kit. Rest all viewed the funeral through video recording.

Person B: It's really tragic. You can't even bid a proper farewell to your near and dear ones.

Person A: Vaccines have also become scarce. Booking on CoWin site is a major challenge. I was looking for my first jab and my parents' second.

Person B: People spend hours before CoWin site and don't go beyond OTP stage. Getting a slot is akin to winning a lottery.

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Inked Minority

With a heavy heart, I have to admit that on April 18 I got reduced to a minority. I was one of those dunderheads who, overcome by a false sense of self-importance, decided to junk long weekend and trudge to the polling booth to get my fingers inked.

My constituency Bangalore Central attained the dubious distinction of recording the lowest turnout in Karnataka state so far, though the second phase is pending. But it is highly unlikely any other constituency in the state would be able to replicate this under par performance. With less than 50% voters turning up, those with inked fingers got reduced to a minority. It could even give the country's voter apathy capital South Mumbai constituency a run for its money.

When I went to cast my vote this indifference was palpable though I did not make much out of it. I reached around 9.30 am and the enthusiasm of booth party workers and their willingness to help was missing.

I remember during 2014 general election the party booths were bustling with activity and booth workers were more than eager to guide voters about their serial numbers and booth numbers, often followed by a discreet message, "Please vote for Modi". During the subsequent BBMP election and the assembly election, this enthusiasm was there, though in a more diluted form.

This indifference was also visible at the polling booth. I was shocked to see that there was no one, let alone a queue. I was able to cast my vote in a jiffy, though while coming out I did notice some 4-5 people queueing up, I guess all from the same family.

I then thought I should not read too much into deserted polling booths. Probably I was lucky enough to be there during a lull period. 

However, by evening I realised that the malaise of voter apathy was for real and far more widespread across the city, with the constituency where I voted being the epicentre.

Bangalore has been notorious for low turnouts. And painstaking efforts by NGOs and government officials and numerous ad blitz have over the years made little difference.

While the city, in general, is drawing flak for keeping off the polling booths, a lot of people who wanted to cast their votes were shocked to find that their names have been struck off the voter's list. And these were not even first-time voters but had voted during many elections in the past. They had not even shifted their residence to warrant deletion of names.

The officials claimed voters' list is updated on a yearly basis to account for voters who have shifted their residence or died and to delete duplicate and fake entries. This gets done under the National Electoral Roll Purification and Authentication Programme. 

Looks like many bona fide voters' names too got eliminated in this 'purification' process. In Karnataka, 13.8 lakh entries got deleted since May 2018, and 5.05 lakh were from Bangalore alone

Tailpiece

Now pundits are coming up with suggestions like online voting to improve this sorry state of affairs.

Putting forth my two-bit wisdom, it won't be a bad idea to provide arrangements to absentee voters to ink their fingers near the resorts they are holidaying! It will boost tourism in the bargain.

Social media will be flooded with people posing with inked fingers in front of fancy resorts. We will have city's Page 3 glitterati posting messages like 'Just inked my finger near Orange County Kabini, now off to a coracle ride.'

If political parties can ring-fence their legislators and let them have a good time at resorts (at God knows whose money) to prevent horse-trading, why can't voters exercise their franchise amid some fun and leisure! Why should netas have all the fun!

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