I was on the way from Delhi to my village,on one Friday evening, in the month of June 2007. Day was too hot to get out of the home during the day, hence I preferred evening 5 O'clock to take ride on my Pulsar 150cc.I have been always crazy for its riding and 130 KM distance from Delhi to village was a matter of two and half hour fun for me. However, on that evening riding was not for fun but for another cause, which was exciting me of my importance, responsibility, maturity and above all citizenship right. Yeah...on next day morning I was suppose to use my maiden citizenship right by casting a vote in Gram Panchayat Election . Thanks to Indian democracy and system of electing our representative by way of voting process, so that, it gives millions of people a moment of pride of being citizen of it, at least once in five year. Otherwise most of the time, we are treated as poor, helpless, mango people, made for extortion, zero value of no importance etc. My chest widen by inch when I felt importance of my voting right, for which, I got a special invitation from 2 different contestants to come to village on each ones expenditure. Best of my memory, one of them has never exchanged any word of good or bad wishes with me in the last 25 years of my life.Though, second one was my neighbor, who has been in usual touch and pretended to be my well wisher always.
Mudilia is just 130 Km away from Delhi's Nizamuddin Bus Stand but inconvenience of connectivity to main roads and towns widens the gap and Delhi seems far away from. However, presently, Yamuna Express way has linked it to Noida and has reduced the distance to 60 Km only. Including one more small village, i.e Khanpur (~200 voters), which is the part of the same Gram Panchayat, there would be total ~1500 voters in 2007. The stories of Gram Panchayat elections have always been very interesting and funny in my village, but this time I got an opportunity to watch it closely and to withdrew some interesting facts. Actually, Mudilia is again divided in two small villages i.e Mudilia (Badi) and Mudilia (Chhoti). Luckily, I was born in Mudilia Badi and was always full of vanity of belonging. However, there was nothing big in Mudilia Badi except big by population (~800 voters), or suffice to say that it was smaller economically, literally and culturally, which I realized later on.
Elections are contested there by keeping larger view in mind of Kunba, where voters are allured firstly on the basis of village and then Kunba. Since the time of independence, I never heard of any Pradhan was elected from Khanpur village, because of its cult of being smaller by population. Hence, it is oblivious to understand that most of the time Pradhani crown went to Mudilia (Badi). This time game was between three players Ranveer Singh and Ashok from Mudilia (Badi) and Chander from Mudilia (Chhoti).
There are 3 Kunba's in each Mudilia (Badi and Chhoti). In Mudilia Badi largest one Kunba known as Sataua, second large is Bhakhar and third one is Tihaua. Certain number of migrants also have adjusted themselves as part of either one of these Kunba, depending on their ancestor's belongings to any of these. Ranveer Singh is a migrant (know as pie in local language) but belongs to Bhakhar and his father (Chhatter Singh) enjoyed Pradhani's Crown for almost 15 years. Best trick worked in his favor was disputed land issue between Chhela (Ashok's father who was from Satua's Kunaba) and Radha (from Tihua's Kunaba), where Chatter Singh always and strongly supported Chhela and helped him in legal proceedings due to his contacts with government Babus and Police officers, as a result most of the votes from Satua's Kunaba was in his favor. On the other hand, he was successful in gathering most of votes of his own Kunba i.e Bhakar. Additionally, his heroic image, well known personality and most importantly closeness with bureaucrats helped him to garner the votes of poor and schedule caste group, which is known as deciding factor in wining the elections. The illiteracy and ignorance of law and order are big fears for most of these people, who are always afraid of any issue which is associated with Police and Judiciary etc. Hence, multiple factors worked in his favor or may be it was his political trick to keep alive land dispute for longer period, which benefited him in three consecutive wins in Gram Panchayat elections.
Though in 2007, things were different , Chhatter Singh died in the year 2002 and land dispute issue was almost in favor of Chhela after ~30 years of legal and physical fights. Ashok (son of Chhela), who returned to the village after retirement from Indian Army, took aggressive stance in local politics and elected Gram Panchat Head (Pradhan) two consecutive times before 2007. In his first election (1997) he cheated Ranveer by promising him favor for BDC elections, which were held simultaneously. He kept Ranveer in the dark up to the last day of elections and favored Prempal (another guy from his own Kunaba). This incident disappointed very much to Ranveer Singh and friendship and closeness of two families turned into bitterness and separated each-other. Ashok betrayed Ranveer, whom father was legal adviser and supporter of Ashok's father in land dispute case and helped him in winning the case ultimately.Though, Chhela (Ashok's father) was very much disappointed from this event and he consent his guilt some where in his inner self and was seen rarely in public meetings due to his betrayal image. On the other side, Ashok was having different view, according to him, Chhattar Singh had cheated his father on financial front for almost thirty years of his life and had taken double amount, what was actually bribed for Government Babus, Lawyers, Police Officers and other legal issues.Transfer of power and ideas in between generations had never been a smooth process in Indian history, either it has hearten ancestors or disappointed predecessors to survive in old cage. Many times this disappointment leads to frustrations and finally to revolts.
This time Ranveer Singh was preparing to head on directly with Ashok and was willful to take revenge of 1,997 defeat and betrayal. Due to anti- incumbency factor Khanpur villager's were likely to vote against Ashok, but at the same time they never favored any contestant from Mudilia Chhoti. Hence, Ranveer was appropriate and only option for them to choose. Also, they had been supporter of Chhatter Singh in his tenure. Anti-incumbency factor in Khanpur, (which can work only in that village due to neutrality ) , certain sycophants of Chhatter Singh were ready to favor his son and to go against their own Kunba's candidate i.e. Ashok, illusion of getting healthy voting sharing of schedule cast and support by his own Kunba i.e Bhakhar were four main factors to keep Ranveer alive in the race.
On the other side, Mudilia Chhoti also has three Kunbas i.e Tihaua, (largest by population), Pachaua (second large) and Sataua (smallest) with total ~ 500 voters. Chander belongs to Pachaua group and he was never wishful to fight election but due to his integrity and kindness image, he was pushed into the battle ground by certain pseudo intellectuals of village.Their ostensible purpose was favorism of him but actually they all were lobbying against Ashok, who was suppose to make hat trick of winning three consecutive elections in a row. Among the lobbyist, two lead people were from Mudilia Baddi, my father Bijendra Singh and his close aide Bhudeva (allies Rao Saab). My father was having strong grip in his own Kunba i.e Bhakhar and has always been in opposition of Ashok's family since the time of land dispute between him (Ashok) and Radha, despite that his relations were normal with Chhatter Singh due to neighborhood. On the other side Rao Saab was a migrant, though he was part of Sataua's Kunba but never ever favored Ashok's family. His strength was his own large family of almost 100 voters and his shrewd political tricks. For implementing these tricks he always used credibility of my father's face value.
Now it was a triangle fight between three contestants and outcome was to be very exciting. Ashok was overconfident of striking hat trick. Ranveer was also confident but quite nervous due to partition of votes in the same village while Chander was solo contestant from his own village. My father and Rao Saab were supporting Ranveer ostensibly but were well aware of the fact that he was hardly to be a winning horse. At the same time it was necessary to keep him in race till the final moment to assure Ashok's defeat. Because, he was to divert certain votes of Sataua's Kunba, who were along with him due to his father's face value, certain votes of Khanpur, who were along with him due to anti-incumbency but were not willing to vote for Chander due to unusual relation with his village and obliviously most of votes of his own Kunba i.e Bhakar.
In my view, this was the entire theme of political game where shrewdness worked and was required. The goal of Ranveer Singh, my father and Rao Saab was same, defeat of Ashok. But, three were having different game plans. Ranveer was willing to defeat him along with greed for power, while my father and Rao Saab were plotting the plan to bring his (Ashok's) arrogance down on the ground. For which these both were willing Ranveer Singh to remain in the fight till last moment, which was likely to divide certain votes of Sataua's (Ashok's Kunba) Khanpur's and Bhaker's in favor of him, who were supposed to go back to Ashok in absence of Ranveer's candidature. Though, second game plan of the situation would had been shared with Ranveer, which was serving his ostensible purpose also of defeating Ashok but biggest risk to that was Ranveer's swinging nature and his likely dilution with Ashok. Greediness has never been a good idea for constructive works. However, certain close allies of Ranveer informed him of dual political trick of Rao Saab of internally supporting Chander and ostensibly being with him. This was the right time where Rao Saab en-cashed my father's face value, who was known for his morals, integrity and commitments. As a result, Ranveer was entrapped in pseudo-confidence. This entire situation for my father was like of Yudhister, when he was asked by Dronacharya in Kurushetra for confirmation of Aswasthama's death. My father's integrity, face value and Rao Saab's shrewdness kept Ranveer alive in the race almost for twenty days and till the last moment, who was blind with greed and could not sense their motive.
As it was expected, voters of Satua's, Bhakher, Khanpur and schedule castes were divided between Ranveer and Ashok. Tihaua's votes, though small in count , who were real foes of Ashok and Ranveer was also never favorite for them due to his father's open support to Chhela in land dispute case, went in favor of Chander. Along with that, Rao Saab and my family's members also caste their voting rights for Chander except two individual votes of Rao Saab and my father, who were liable and committed to vote in favor of Ranveer only. Though it was heard that certain votes from Mudilia Chhoti were caste against Chander and in favor of Ashok, but those were very few in numbers to make any difference. I was very much confused till the last moment of deciding my vote at polling booth. In my view, this was betrayal to go against Ranveer but I was having faith and confidence in my father's view of never being wrong, which compelled me to vote in favor of Chander. That was probably the last time when my arguments bowed down against my father's mount peaking personality. Though he did not insist me to vote for Chander but I could not collect courage to go against his cause. Ultimately I end up by stamping my maiden voting right against my will and in favor of my father's cause.
Though, most of people, including of opposition party, were almost sure for Chander's win but I was predicting it to be very close fight. Finally, hard work and shrewd tricks of Rao Saab's paid his way and after ten days of election I heard news of Chander's victory by the margin of 11 votes only, inline with my guess. Later on Ranveer also realized that perhaps it was hard to win for him in this situation but his candidature helped in assuring Ashok's defeat, which was a satisfactory note for him. He usually calls himself BAZIGAR (Har ke jeetne wale ko Bazigar kahte hain). He never complained of my father & Rao Saab's stance on that situation, infect he started admiring them for their political vision. My father is no more in this world but Ranveer still has very usual relations with my family & with Rao Saab's also. He can be seen in long discussions with Rao Saab randomly. Perhaps he still have political ambitions in his life and might be learning certain tricks from Rao Saab. On my next trip to my village, when I went to meet Rao Saab on his house he had been rewarded with the new name "Chankaya of Mudilia's politics". Though Rao Saab is not exposed to corporate level but leadership qualities not have any walls. Surely I am keen to imbibe some of his tricks and want to nurture them to give giant shape in corporate world. I strongly believe that most of big ideas are born inside 10x10 laboratory.
