“Terrible! Terrible!” shouted a senior official of the government, “We can’t implement any projects without people complaining!The bullet trainis in a controversy because commuters want to first make the existing railways safe!We can’t build metros in the cities, because people say buildings are shaking!”

“And sir, in Mumbai, they don’t want the metro to run under a Fire temple because it will upset the magnetic waves!Another line has activists fighting against trees being cut!””

“Trees, people, temples! All are conspiring against us! Even roads can’t be widened because there are crosses or temples which can’t be shifted! People are coming up with all sorts of reasons and at this rate we will not have anything ready by 2019!”

“Is that an auspicious year sir?” asked his junior.

“That’s election year dammit, and if we can’t show bullet trains and metros, we are doomed!”

“Maybe we should think different sir!” said his junior.

“How different?” asked the senior government official, “People want to travel, we have nothing to offer them! Not even river transport!”

“Let them stay at home sir!” said his junior.

“Stay at home?” asked his senior, “You want the whole country to stay at home?”

“Yes sir, if they stay at home they will not want new means of going from place to place!”

“But why should they stay at home dammit?”

“Because it’s unsafe outside!” exclaimed his junior with a smile, “It is so unsafe, people will be afraid to come out!”

The senior government official looked at his junior closely, and wondered whether he had misjudged the young man till now, there was something clever in his argument. “So what you are saying,” he said slowly, “Is to create such tension outside that people won’t venture out and won’t see we’ve not made any progress?”

His junior nodded brightly, “We encourage murders, rapes, stone throwing and all sorts of violence outside. We make it unsafe for women, have gangs threaten them, strip them for love jihaad and some flimsy reason like that, kill journalists, and sir soon doors will be locked and boarded with everybody safe and immobile inside!”

The senior officialnodded smugly, “You know something, that’s exactly the situation in the country now, there’s anger, rage, communal tension and fear! Give me the phone please!”

The junior officer handed the phone to his senior obediently, then heard him telling all departments to stop work. “And to win the elections,” continued the junior, “We could have hourly‘mannkibaats’by the PM to keep people glued to new promises, which anyway they will never venture out to see if implemented or not!”

His senior shook his head in wonder, patted his junior on the shoulder and decided to transfer the young fellow to a remote area, as is done in our country, before the junior had aspirations of taking his place..!

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.