09 March,2009 12:41 PM IST | | IANS
"You are from the media? I am a candidate for the Mau Ghosai seat in Uttar Pradesh. When will he come?" asked Rajendra Singh as he walked listlessly on the campus of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) headquarters here, joining the many aspirants for party tickets who have begun to trickle in from every nook and cranny of the country.
He was waiting for a few hours now for Arun Jaitley, BJP general secretary and chief campaign manager for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.
Asked if had already been given a ticket, he grinned, straightened his starched white khadi kurta and said: "That's why I am here, but well that's not the reason I am talking to you."
But you just said you are a candidate? He said in Hindi: "Now, I have something more important to say, whether I get a ticket or not, but you are behaving like a typical media-wallah."
"Can you drive if you don't have a licence?" he asked. And added: "The government is spending so much money on getting people to vote; there are so many advertisements, so many campaigns. I have a simple solution where you will not need to spend a single penny."
Asked what the solution was, Singh quipped: "Don't interrupt. So you cannot drive if you don't have a licence. Why? Because it is illegal. The solution is if you don't vote, the government will freeze your licence."
He continued: "Similarly, there can be a mechanism by which you will be denied certain privileges if you don't vote. This is how things are done in this country. TV ads will not make him vote, coercion will.
"Do you agree or not?" he was curious to know. When replied to in the affirmative, Singh beamed: "Well, well, well. So, do carry this in your media. I was not casually chatting with you, I am serious."
