Democracy is good even when people always prefer the "wrong" things?

"How steep have my countrymen fallen" lamented my father when I talked with him yesterday.

"It is a curse that cinema stars and cricketers have become gods for the youngsters, who seem to be willing to even give up their lives for these people" he added.

"When we were young, we also liked film stars and musicians.  But, our heroes were those who had sacrificed a lot to free India from the British" father went on.

I knew he wasn't exaggerating--one of his prized possessions is an autographed photo of Jawaharlal Nehru's, and he still regrets that somehow a photo of Tilak's got lost in the shuffle of life over the years.

"Do you know they perform poojai and abhishekam for Rajnikanth's posters?" he asked me.  I told him I was there in Chennai about a year ago and even watched that on TV.

The trigger for all this?  The protests over the screening of a Tamil movie, Vishwaroopam, seemed to have take over all the media airtime and print space.

"Who cares if a movie is not screened?  Everybody is behaving as if there is no other problem here in Tamil Nadu.  There is power cut, and water is in shortage, and all everybody talks about is Vishwaroopam and Kamal Hassan."

Just when I thought he was done, father continued.  "And now Ashis Nandy."

I told him that I was following the Nandy affair on the news.

"By the way, there is an opinion piece on the Nandy issue that you might want to read" father said.  I told him I would look it up, because father said it was authored by the son of a friend of his--a friendship of over 70 years now.  (I later did look up the op-ed.)

While I have never asked my father whether at this point he would even willingly give up his vote if a Chinese-style politics were imposed on India, I will not be surprised if he says yes to that because of his conviction that there is way more abuse of freedom than anything constructive.

To a large extent, this freedom is both India's blessing and its curse.  The freedom that allows people to do and say whatever they want, without worrying about the government, unlike the case in China.  The freedom that has allowed the arts to flourish, and for the movie industry to become such a significant part of life.  So significant that for fifty years now, all the chief ministers of Tamil Nadu have had serious professional movie connections.  The freedom that makes possible an ever increasing flow of thinkers and writers.

The downside is that there is very little action compared to the talk, unlike very little talk and a whole lot of action in China.  Until a few years ago, it seemed like India might be able to compete against China in the economic race, but now it increasingly feels like China has won the race.

"So, what's the update on Kudankulam?" I asked father.

"It is in the trial phase now.  Even there the media is horrible" he responded.  "In any industrial project, a trial phase is when the problems will be identified and corrected before the full production.  But, the media is overblowing the problems, when already there is so much tension over the project."

But, if people prefer movies and cricket and whatever else, while completely neglecting infinitely more urgent issues, then that vox populi rules, right?