The logic of politicians

Yesterday, I was watching TV and there was a political debate going on on Times Now. The host said that 10% of the seats allotted by BJP and Congress in the Lok Sabha Election 2009 were to people who had criminal cases running aganist them. Guess what the answer of Kapil Sibal was. He responded by telling the host that at least 90% of the candidates were clean candidates. His remark was made in a way that said that having 10% criminals is not that bad considering that 90% of the selected candidates were clean and that we should be thankful to the political parties.

Actually, from what I have heard of the logic used by politicians, Kapil Sibal’s response not appropriate. Let me first give you some examples of how politician’s think and then I will suggest how Kapil Sibal should have responded.

I read the following examples of the amazing logical minds of the politicians in a newspaper article. I think Kapil Sibal may get some pointers as to how to respond to questions.

Now when a politician was told that the number of women per 1000 men is declining, he commented “This is a good thing as it will solve our biggest problem, that is, increasing population. With less number of women, fewer children will be born which will ultimately result in less population. Also, fewer women would mean fewer crimes against women including rapes.”

When it was pointed out to the politician that a third of the population of the country is illiterate, he responded, “This is good news. This means that two-thirds of the population, that is 66 crore people are educated. Now which country can match such statistics.”

Lastly, when the politician was told that 40% of all households live in one room, he said, “This is excellent news because it supports the great Indian tradition of joint family. When people live in one room, the love between them is bound to increase. It is because of this that the divorce rate in our country is low.”

I think you have got the drift. So Kapil Sibal should have responded as follows, “This is excellent news. At least, 90% of the candidates have clean records. It also shows that the Indian society is a tolerant society. The political parties and the citizens of this great country are taking positive steps to rehabilitate the criminals for the good of the society as a whole. What more. Imagine we are getting the criminals off the streets and making them sit in the parliament under our supervision. This will have two benefits. One, the streets will be much safer now. Two, we can control the criminals better as we have becomes quite good at it with our experience with over the last so many years. By taking the step, the political parties are doing a great service to the nation.”

Well, if people like Kapil Sibal think it is OK for political parties to give tickets to criminals, then what can anybody say.

Avinash Narula