Independents in Indian Politics

At the outset, every Independent Candidate deserves an applaud and complements for their courage, determination and the willingness to come forward for public service and offer themselves as an option to the electorate at large. It surely needs certain amount of strength – physical, mental & financial, family-support, to fight against the System by contesting elections as an Independent Candidate.

With due respect to every single Independent Candidate, and there are 4000-odd such individuals from the last elections; in my honest opinion, given the current System and the Indian Political scene, they are nothing more than “wasted cannon” in the political-war on poor-governance, inefficient and corrupt System.

Independents are also known by various other names and characteristics – King Makers, Fence Sitters, Cat on the Wall, Proxy-Candidates etc. A very large number of Independents are known to have hidden agenda that directly or indirectly links them to such a category. Then there are some who “just do it” for the sheer kick of it, some do it for local-publicity & social status and some purely to enjoy their Candidature as a Constitutional right - they are willing and can afford to burn an indecent amount of money on this luxury.

Then there are the serious ones, those with exceptional track record, good educational qualifications, who have proved their credentials and excellence in society by way of public-service or business or social-work. They are the leaders in the true sense of the word. These are the fine individuals & leaders who actually belong to, what we at FTI call, the “White-Forces”. They contest as an Independent since they do not want to identify and relate themselves to any existing political party. But they are so very few and far away from each other. They are scattered across India, without a link, a common identity, a common policy guideline & objectives. Each one of them run their own individual political manifesto, individual agenda and an individual plan to fight against the System. They are not given due consideration and importance by the electorate at large. They do not get as much media attention as they deserve. They do not get the desired space and exposure in the relevant public debates & forum. As a result, they are lost in the crowd & the noise - lost as an individual and as a voice. They lose their hard earned precious resources and achieve nothing more than a personal satisfaction – I did my bit.

Even if the voter is well aware of their candidature and their election-symbol; and knows that they are truly deserving candidates; the voter also knows the fact that ALONE, they can do very little to actually help resolve the current issues and problems, at national or even at local constituency levels.

This is the crude reality and this needs to be seriously addressed if these fine leaders (the white forces) really mean serious business and truly believe that India needs to be fixed. If they need to fight the Black-Forces democratically, they first need to assemble and organize themselves as White-Force. The very fact that these individuals are not aligned to any existing political party is a clear indication that they will find common meeting grounds. This may call for some serious “give and take” too – but then India is much bigger a cause than an Individual - they would need to shed their personal egos – they would need to shed their “celebrity” or any other such tags, if they have one attached; they would need to interact and mix with each other, work shoulder to shoulder at equal levels, on a common national platform / forum. They belong to the White-Forces should be reason enough for this congregation. Everything else would be secondary.

Of course, when true leaders join together, there are bound to be some differences in their opinion and thoughts and ideas. But true leaders also agree to disagree and work together as a team for a common long term Vision & Mission. There will be time to settle the differences among the White-Forces internally, by extensive mutual debates and discussions on Policy, Systems and Governance. For now, the growing strength of Black-Forces is a much bigger threat to the nation than personal differences.

A true leader works for the long-term Vision, the Goal, the Mission; which in this case happens to be common to all the Independent White-Force: Fix India. There could be no better Cause for these fine individuals to join together and build a strong and vibrant White-Force to take charge of India. Considering that even 10% of the total Independents fall under this category of White-Forces, we are looking at 400-odd fine Leaders spread all over India, who could contest and lead their respective constituencies under one single banner and platform at a national level.

Freedom Team of India is one such platform that invites Leaders to come together and join the White-Force. It is not a political party, not just yet. Political party at the national level will be formed only when FTI will have at least 500 leaders on board and will agree in principle on a certain political ideology and policy framework. Until then, India has to suffer at the hands of the corrupt and the inefficient Black Forces.