A breath of fresh air

Even as I write this, the markets are getting ready to open up trading again.For the first time in Indian history the Trading had to be stopped because the Stock Market had hit the upper Circuit breaker,or quite simply put the growth had crossed the acceptable levels for a single day-over 1300 pts.

Now most of this doesn't really mean a lot to me but I  can see where the market is getting it's optimism from.For the first time in a long time we have something close to a decisive mandate, the possibility of a government actually being able to govern rather than constantly having to please its 'allies'. What the Congress has done to deserve such trust , I do not presume to know, but they have been handed the responsibility and now there is the hope that they will at least have a decent shot at being able to shoulder it.

While I'm not particularly pro-Congress or pro-BJP or pro any party for that matter ,it's quite easy to see primary reason for the sweep in this election.It stems from the fact that the Congress has a very clean and able leadership (although in the lower echelons it suffers from the same ailments all political party's suffer from).Right from eggheads like P Chidambaram,Montek Singh Aluwalia to astute politicians like Pranab Mukherjee.But perhaps the principal reason is our PM.The  sincerity and honesty associated with Dr Manmohan Singh coupled with his clean, down to earth image is a far cry from the controversial background of his primary challenger L.K Advani.And the less said about people like Mayawati the better,they don't even exist on the same page.

Here I must admit that it makes me feel better somehow to have a man like Manmohan Sigh at the helm with a young albeit untested Rahul Gandhi waiting in the wings.It's a far more heartening turn of events rather that say L.K Advani-the man who single handedly brought religion into mainstream politics and whom I hold resposnible for the Babri Masjid Demolition-as PM and Naredra Modi-the man who did nothing while Gujrat burned for 3 days and 3 nights even added fuel to the fire and who even today swears by hardline Hindutva which I cannot stomach-waiting to take over.

Perhaps my optimism is misplaced and 5 yrs from now we'll know for sure.....but even then if I were given a chance to change this mandate, I wouldn't -I sincerely believe this is the best possible outcome this election could have thrown up and that we have a lot to look forward to in the coming 5 years.