No place for poor class in Naya Pakistan

[Dillinger]

You're right being nice to them shouldn't be contingent on their political views & I'm sure @notorious_eagle didn't mean it in that context !

But yaraaa sometimes they say some of the most hilarious, though extremely depressing things ! I remember I was talking to a domestic helper of ours the day after the elections & inquiring for whom did she vote & she said she went to the polling booth to vote for PML N but then along the way & I narrate 'I saw Bibi Shaheed's photograph staring at me & I couldn't continue keeping an eye contact with her because the way she looked at me said that she was hurt that we had forgotten her sacrifices & I nearly broke down in tears.....so I went to the polling booth & voted for PPP because I couldn't betray Bibi & the sacrifices she made for us' - You can well imagine what my reaction was !

Ah the sacrifice of penance and for absolving our sins...we should just make a martyr out of you and then have @Hyperion run to the polls with it..the young butt... articulate and intelligent..the cream of the youth of Pakistan..who gave his life for the quom...how could anyone not vote for the man who shall carry this young shaheed's vision forward.

 

[Armstrong]

You are correct in that they are gullible and not very deep in their thinking, but that is due to illiteracy and ignorance. I think we should all work to create schools everywhere so that lesser number of illiterates do not influence the election results years down the road.

In logon ko parhaana chahiye nah key mazaak urana chaihye.

Only when we have a an educated population can we elect people on the basis of thier views and results and not on the basis of baradari or ancestry.

Yaraaa but in the meantime do we just let ourselves & our country be held hostage to the ills of illiteracy, ignorance & gullibility or is there a need to re-think the system ? Perhaps a qualified democracy as opposed to universal suffrage with education being the touch-stone that the 'qualified' part is linked to ? Perhaps having some votes worth more than others as per a system of weightage whereby the electoral power is skewed in favor of those most education !

Perhaps Iqbal was correct in his cynicism when he remarked 'Jamhoriyat woh tarz-e-hakoomat hai jiss mein aadmi ko ginaa karteiii hain, tolaa nahin karteii - Eng - Democracy is that system of governance in which people are counted not weighed' !

 

[Argus Panoptes]

Yaraaa but in the meantime do we just let ourselves & our country be held hostage to the ills of illiteracy, ignorance & gullibility or is there a need to re-think the system ? Perhaps a qualified democracy as opposed to universal suffrage with education being the touch-stone that the 'qualified' part is linked to ? Perhaps having some votes worth more than others as per a system of weightage whereby the electoral power is skewed in favor of those most education !

Perhaps Iqbal was correct in his cynicism when he remarked 'Jamhoriyat woh tarz-e-hakoomat hai jiss mein aadmi ko ginaa karteiii hain, tolaa nahin karteii - Eng - Democracy is that system of governance in which people are counted not weighed' !

There are no shortcuts to eliminating the effects of illiteracy or ignorance, Sir, including limiting voting rights to a select few as you say. None. If we start now with education, may be we can have a proper election 20 0r 30 years from now.

 

[Armstrong]

There are no shortcuts to eliminating the effects of illiteracy or ignorance, Sir, including limiting voting rights to a select few as you say. None. If we start now with education, may be we can have a proper election 20 0r 30 years from now.

Sir - I wasn't Knighted by the Queen !

Khair jokes aside - Yaraa I'm not talking about any shortcuts, I'm talking about an interim measure to increase the quality of the electoral process & thereby the political executive till a time comes that we've got vast majorities of our population who are educated !

We must start right now....that is a given but from now till the 20-30 years from now time period - Do we remain hostage to this or do we re-think the system ?

 

[FaujHistorian]

Iqbal was correct in his cynicism when he remarked 'Jamhoriyat woh tarz-e-hakoomat hai jiss mein aadmi ko ginaa karteiii hain, tolaa nahin karteii - Eng - Democracy is that system of governance in which people are counted not weighed' !

Good point.

I think Iqbal was so right.

He was most likely talking about politicians like Altaf mota.


See his weight (of too much English-style butter chicken) means that he can bamboozle his way through 18 seats in Karachi.

On what basis?

His ph@t @rse is heavier than millions of voters who get nothing but Bhattah Khori and still forced to vote for him again and again.

Highest literacy rate in the whole country is in my community of Urdu-speaking.

And

yet we are slaves to this mota chor bhatta khor.


sadly.

 

[Argus Panoptes]

Sir - I wasn't Knighted by the Queen !

Khair jokes aside - Yaraa I'm not talking about any shortcuts, I'm talking about an interim measure to increase the quality of the electoral process & thereby the political executive till a time comes that we've got vast majorities of our population who are educated !

We must start right now....that is a given but from now till the 20-30 years from now time period - Do we remain hostage to this or do we re-think the system ?

Interim measures in our country are nearly permanent Sir (the type we call our seniors, not the knighted ones!) so once we take away universal voting it won't be coming back any time soon. And think of all the international implications, not to mention the internal turmoil that would be created by those who benefit from the present system.

And yes, we will remain hostage to this system unless we work hard for a few decades to change it by building a proper foundation of education first. There are no shortcuts or other choices at all.

 

[Armstrong]

Interim measures in our country are nearly permanent Sir (the type we call our seniors, not the knighted ones!) so once we take away universal voting it won't be coming back any time soon. And think of all the international implications, not to mention the internal turmoil that would be created by those who benefit from the present system.

And yes, we will remain hostage to this system unless we work hard for a few decades to change it by building a proper foundation of education first. There are no shortcuts or other choices at all.

Dude, I'm 22 - Hardly the senior of a Doctorate level student !

Indeed risks are involved therein but the upside of it is that as more & more people become literate they add to the electoral net & get suffrage ! Unfortunately the current system hasn't worked for 65 years....even Iskander Mirza lamented this dichotomy of coming up with a constitution (and by extension a system of Governance) that requires significant literacy when we've got most of our population well below the literacy line !

 

[Argus Panoptes]

Dude, I'm 22 - Hardly the senior of a Doctorate level student !

Indeed risks are involved therein but the upside of it is that as more & more people become literate they add to the electoral net & get suffrage ! Unfortunately the current system hasn't worked for 65 years....even Iskander Mirza lamented this dichotomy of coming up with a constitution (and by extension a system of Governance) that requires significant literacy when we've got most of our population well below the literacy line !

Sirjee, A General outranks a Brigadier, not to mention an extra year of longevity here.

The current system has worked very well for those who control it! Why change?

 

[FaujHistorian]

Interesting.

Just read this one on the other thread.

Thanks for sharing.

Many of us in Pakistan have this elitist and ivory tower syndrome that the poor wretched "untouchables" should stand in a separate line so they won't soil our suits and 30,000 rupees ladies shalwar kameez.


However it will be travesty to believe that such awful behavior existed in all or in majority of poling stations that served millions of Pakistanis in this sacred moment of elections.

So I strongly disagree with the OP.


But I kid you not when I say that in Pakistan elite DO feel that the poor wretched masses cannot figure out their mouths from their @rses. So why to trust their vote?

Some of this elitist attitude is amply reflected in this forum, when the posters cry cry cry that PTI lost because poor wretched poooople could be bought by a Qeema-naan. If it was that easy, Imran khan had no shortage of money to supply butter-naan, biryani, and qeema naan.

This is just a shameful disgusting excuse that NL won just because!!!!


The reality is that all this mass of humanity Pakistan (minus the blind robots in my Urdu community) is much closer to the ground, and thus weigh their options based on practical reasoning.


I feel that PTI lost because it didn't have time to connect to the masses, and convince them that in the hour of their lowly needs, a PTI jiala will be there to address such needs.

In Pakistani culture, personal contact counts. And Noon League was able to pick the candidates who had the personal contacts. One of the required tests for such candidates was to see if they know how many villages and small towns are in their area, and if they know who are the key people in that village or small town.



PTI on the other hand was flying high in the twitter land, with young and energetic candidates, who perhaps needed another 6 months or may be a year's worth of work to go around and shake hands and "kiss the babies".


"Reach out and touch the common man" is the basic requirement. And PTI will surely have that in the next elections hopefully in 2018-2019.

So all those PTI jiyalas, quit crying and weeping like little kids, grow up, and wait for the next elections.


peace

 

[SEAL]

PTI sucks big time.

As Mushtaq Minhas said jis ko 17 years main politics nahi aye aos ko agy be nahi aani".

Mush said before elections about IK: IK na pehle kabhi kamyaab hua na ab hoga".