Lead India…a TOI initiative !!
I have been seeing a lot of advertisements about the Lead India programme initiated by Times Of India (TOI) , a leading English Daily in the Country. I am not sure what it is, but as far as I understand, it is about finding a person who can LEAD the country and bring it out of its problem !!
I say a novel initiative !!
But Again, I saw a Hoarding on a major road, saying something like this
“Love Bangalore , Vote for XY”
(I don’t remember who XY was, and again, I have no intention of advertising for him !!)
and this statement made me wonder, how loving Bangalore is only associated with Mr. XY and not the other participants. I realised that Mr. XY is from Bangalore and hence the statement, ‘LOVE BANGALORE’
Well the question I ask is
Are they trying to find the problems of our country by promoting regionalism ?? Why have they not advertised based on his merits, but rather from the city to which he belongs. Do they TOI people expect that anyone from Bangalore is a better Leader than the rest ?? Or they feel a Bangalorian can bring the Country out of any problems that the Country is facing ??
I think, if the person is worth his salt, if he really believes in solving the problems of our Country, he would know that he won’t achieve anything by promoting regionalism or any kind of bias for that matter. And if I were that person, I would request TOI to take down those hoardings !!
I think the voting should totally based on merit !! Same goes for all other TV shows that encourage the viewer to vote for them on the basis of the state they belong to !! The Media should play an active role in uniting the country rather than dismantling it further based on region, caste , language or religion. I think the Media needs to pay more attention on the kind of message they are sending !!
Merit or Regionalism …what should be the basis !!
–Update — 25th Jan 2008–
Special Thanks to my good friend Ravi Sinha, who had taken the snap at night 11:30 for me and also to Chindanoor, who took the snap in evening. Thanks Guys !!
–Update — 29th Jan 2008–
Well it seems like, the hoarding are not put up by The Times of India or The Times Group.
It is placed by ‘Friends of R K’. This is mentioned at the bottom-right corner of the hoarding.
Well for all those ‘Friends of R K’, your gesture of friendship will be the precise reason why I won’t vote for him, not that I was going to !!
Good read!
I had babbled on similar lines on my blog here -
http://superblog.crazyengineers.com/2007/12/24/lead-india-a-times-of-india-initiative/