bring them together if you care for them

If you care for the people, you must bring them together and not divide them. - Jayaprakash Narayan

Every party played bluff game and claimed that they support Telangana resolution if it is introduced in assembly to gain support from Telangana people. All parties have been gambling with people's lives. After seeing now anger from Andhra and Rayalaseema people, they took u-turns in their policies.

Every one has slight inclinations towards his own caste, region, religion, country, skin color, ethnicity and race. With the wisdom passed on from great people like Gandhi to next generations and natural compassion towards fellow human beings regardless of race, those inclinations get buried and people live peacefully. Selfish leaders throughout the history instigate and try to bring out those emotions out for their gains. If they succeed, wisdom and compassion will be lost and wars and agitations result. Think of world wars, relegious rifts like Babri Masjid, reservations or kaveri river fights. All of them happened because of this. When emotions are high, every one will be forced to side with one side or other side for self sustaining.

Lok Satta has more support in Telangana compared to other two regions. It is easy for the party to support and join bandwagon. Party has been cornered many times. Lok Satta told all the time same thing. It believes in decentralization of civic powers among people and getting district governments but not in creating new power centers. It believes in changing the rules of political game and not just players or table in this bluff game.

JP is not a dictator

Lok Satta party president Dr. Jayaprakash Narayan took total responsibility for GHMC election results and failed campaign plans. He called all executive members and contestants and told that he would be outside so that they could speak freely for what went wrong. However all party members voiced that they would talk freely about what went wrong in campaign before him.

I campaigned for Lok Satta party during general elections 2009. Those days reminded me my college days in several ways. First, it was full of friend ship, selflessness and energy from all volunteers around me. Each and every volunteer used to give the best what they could give. Second, we had lot of hopes and also uncertainty about the future just like we had in final year of college. However there was one difference between me and most of the volunteers.

Most people adore JP. Some treat him like Indian Obama. Some treat him like Modern Gandhi. Some simply treat him as their last hope. I was new to party. Some people want to shake hands with him at least once and some people want to take a picture with him. I remember some youth come to him and donate some money. I used to engage them while they were waiting for him. To my surprise, few of them confided in me that they were not voting for Lok satta because of their caste (Young kids rarely hide something) and their anti vote policy this time but would donate some money and also really wished Lok Satta succeed (kind of irony)!

When a journalist asked a bunch of us about what made us volunteer for Lok Satta, all but me told JP motivated them. I told that I liked principles of the party. For me, JP could stay or go or manifesto can change in future, but two fundamentals of the party (no dynasty based politics and decentralization) are what brought me to Lok Satta which keep party alive and what nation needs. I co-ordinated several Lok Satta events. I campaigned not only in Hyderabad but also in many places in the state. Total amount of time I talked to him was less than 15 minutes and that was spread over four or five incidents. My respect towards him grew many folds throughout the campaign. I was watching him all along and he also noticed me and appreciated the help I was doing. I was even worried about his health and safety but I never worshiped him. My respect increased little bit more today. He was never hungry after power. He is hungry for a better nation.

Can not change - Can not Criticise

If you have no will to change, you can not criticize as well.

a. People of Hyderabad did not have will to change their life and did not vote today and so they also lost right to criticize the government for not solving their problems. We have enough problems like water contamination, occupying lakes and public lands, traffic and pollution, no plans for disease control or crisis control, urban poverty, bastis and goons to vote.

b. Some leaders are not only leaving but blaming JP for taking unilateral decisions. With my little volunteer experience during elections, I saw the two sides of this story a little bit six moths ago.

Many of these leaders were elected when party has fewer members. They failed to expand party and reach out to more people and add new members to party. They were not able to gather few tens of volunteers and so could not even organize events. They had good intentions but no leadership skills. They had to use JP's image and involvement for every thing. When youth come forward like organizing public meets or membership campaigns and even after JP agrees, few of them reject the ideas by reminding their experiences from failed events. They were also afraid of failure. When JP started, he talked to even ten or twenty people in libraries and street corners. JP has lot of patience and confidence and they lack it. Just because they were not able to gather 100 people ten months ago, it does not mean things are same all the time with every one at every place. Despite Lok Satta enjoys majority in Hyderabad, party had to look for volunteers and candidates. This itself is failure and they should step down as moral responsibility and give room to fresh water. This is what some seniors did, but few leaders do not realize it and look for their failures elsewhere.

Since they were not performing, JP started relying on some volunteer co-ordinators and business people who were sacrificing their time. Train journeys, public meetings, call center, executive membership plans, tv advertisements, candidate selection and many such things are all done by volunteers. Volunteers actually feel that they are doing favour to those leaders by giving them time to work in their constituencies and mostly do not realize that they are hurting some feelings.

When party selected some young candidates, few old leaders did not cooperate. On the other hand when some senior leaders were given chance when a young volunteer is expecting seat, youth campaigned hard. During this process, JP nominated some members based on their performance. It is true that JP could have motivated these dispassionate leaders and those leaders have few valid reasons to be unhappy. However they went so far in criticizing JP in media. It is not because of lack of democracy, but they are using that for their need to be critical. JP is always approachable and they had ego all along to talk to JP or people working. When a person reaches his anger level, he looses his mind and finds fault with every thing with others and not a single fault with them. Expelled leaders lost their consciousness and are comparing Lok Satta with poision and spreading venom among members and giving feast to traditional parties. Take what they say with a pinch of salt!

Think one second. If there is no chance for second leaders, how did Katari grow? since he has leadership skills and volunteer support. If they can not lead dedicated youth coming to volunteer on their own, how can they lead others. They have no will to change themselves and realize ground realities and they have no right to criticize. Every one is special and has his own talent. Every one can not be leader and should realize what their best skills are. That is what volunteers do. What are they saying? If they were given seats or given importance, then party is good or otherwise it is not.

Best way to avoid criticism is doing nothing. However Lok Satta has a lot to do and so has to face lot of criticism along the way. Creating something takes lot of effort and demonizing takes only few people and few hours. Let us learn from experiences and go ahead towards our goal!

Need more information or want to know some expriences, contact me!

పద ముందు నువ్వు పద!

పద ముందు నువ్వు పద!
నీ వెంటే ఈ దేశం నడవదా!
పద ఆగకుండా పద!
నీతోనే అభివృద్ధి కదలదా!
నీ సమస్య నీకన్నా ఎవరికీ తెలుసంట!
ప్రభుత్వాలైనా అధికారలైనా
నిర్ణయాలు నిన్నడిగి తీసుకోవాలి!
నీ సంపద నీ ఎదురుగ ఖర్చు చెయ్యాలి!
కావాలంటే అలాంటి ఆ వ్యవస్థ
పద ముందు నువ్వు పద!

What did Dr. Jayaprkash Narayn do in last six months

It is easy to criticize and compare Lok satta party with traditional parties. It won only one seat in assembly and the demand is immense. It does not have approval or budget allocation power. It has been just six months. The problems were ages old and solving any of them need power, money and time. However work accomplished by Dr. Jayaprakash Narayan in the last six months is commendable.

Inside Andrha Pradesh assembly:

1. Proposed the bill to amend anti corruption bill to include elected members under civil servants.
2. Advanced all party resolution to elect deputy speaker from opposition.
3. Opposed amendment to Andhra Pradesh societies act claiming it is against right to form the unions in the constitution.
4. Opposed the bill allocating special quota for Christians in Dalit reservations and proposed to increase Christian reservations.
5. Opposed populist schemes in 2009 Budget.

See some of the loksatta publications for more details

Bills in early planning:

1. Alternative proposal to women reservations bill to give better and fair representation to women.
2. Voting rights to non resident Indians.

Accomplished in Kukatpally:

1. Completed the under-rail bridge in Safdarnagar, which was on hold for long time.
2. Organized free medical clinics in the constituency to diagnose eye and thyroid problems among people to provide better medical facilities. Organized a free medical camp in Balanagar colony with the help of expert doctors and distributed free medicines.
3. 20 bore wells in the water deprived areas of the Constituency.
4. Complete the Flood pipeline between Vacant Nagar and Braga Singh Nagar.
5. Booster pump installed in Satyanarayana Colony to improve the Potable water supply.
6. Street lighting between Vacant Nagar/Satyanarayana Colony and highway.
7. Booster pumps installed in Parvat Nagar and Moti Nagar areas to eliminate water scarcity.
8. Tour the Constituency every Saturday to get a first hand look at people’s problems in constituency. Meet the people face-to-face at IMAX Gardens, Road No. 4 to listen to people problems
9. Took around 100 samples of drinking water and showed to water board authorties.

Projects under progress related to kukatpally:

1. Underground drainage in 11 colonies with an expense of Rs.4.40 Crores, which will benefit 2 Lakh people. This will eliminate polluting drinking water with sewage.
2. 300 mm Manjeera pipeline in Moosapet division.
3. New roads in phase 9 of Kukatpally Housing Board.
4. Resume the swimming pool and indoor stadium works on Kukatpally phase 6.
5. Road expansion works in Kukatpally phase 1.
6. Establishment of Citizen Help Centers to help Citizens in Government and Municipality works.
7. 56,000 water connections (10%) in Kukatpally circle are given 9MGD(5%) of water. Efforts are underway to increase the water supply to 16 MGD.

Proposed projects and pending approval:

1. Foot over Bridge at JNTU Kukatpally.
2. Cultural auditorium and commercial complex in place of Kukatpally truck park and move the Truck Park to Miyapur.
3. Sulabh complexes in densely populated places.
4. Full-fledged water supply scheme to replace the existing chaotic system.
5. sewerage plants near the existing tanks and wells.
6. Fence the existing tanks and wells to avoid land grabbing.
7. Service roads from Moosapet Yjunction to Miyapur to reduce traffic on NH 9

Party administration:

1. Administer, guide and monitor party units as the head of the Lok Sattta party.
2. Leading executive board in planning new campaigns and membership plans.
3. Member of party research wing on state and city schemes and budgets and developing solutions and manifestos.
4. Organizes weekly press conferences on current affairs like Natural gas issues, flood relief and other political bills.

Misc activities:

1. Spends three to four hours per week on TV shows to spread political awareness.
2. Visits universities, private companies as guest speaker activating youth on a monthly basis.
3. Visits Karnataka, Tamil nadu, Maharastra lok satta head quarters at least once in three months.
4. Honorary guest at many national and international conferences about democracy and government.
5. Campaigning on behalf of Lok Satta candidates during various elections like GHMC and state assembly elections.

Journey back

Everything is over by 10PM. People started leaving and we distributed lot of manuals and pamphlets. Nellore Yuvsatta leader Mahidhar provided dinner for us. Some of us wanted to take rest and some want to go to Hyderabad immediately. I conducted mini poll and most people voted to travel in night. Mr. Ratnam and Mr. Mahidhar left us at bus station. Since we did not have time and plan on how many people and who they are, we do not have tickets. My plan was to buy tickets myself and apply for reimbursement. We came to know that next bus is at 4:30 A.M. and decided to go back and sleep for some time. However both Ratnam garu and Mahidhar switched off their phones by this time and we are struck for all night :) We decided to go to Vijayawada and then go to Hyderabad. There is no room for 24 of us in a single bus and we got split and left in two buses from Nellore. We reached Vijayawada early morning and there are two alternatives for us to leave for Hyderabad. Express bus costs around 100Rs/- and luxary bus costs around 250Rs/-/. Against wishes of few people, I bought tickets in express claiming weather is cool, it is faster route and also we have to cut budget.

The bus journey was really good. We enjoyed it and we distributed pamphlets in every stop and also gave to every one in the bus. I arranged breakfast and water for every one. Two Idli Vada costed around 15Rs/-. We also had lot of sweets and snacks left from Hyderabad Journey. We reached Hyderabad around 12PM. I felt very sorry. If I go can back, I will provide more food for people.

JP's speech at Nellore

I watched several youtube videos, but I never listened to JP's speech directly. Around five thousand people attended the event. Train was two hours late, but people still stayed on. While JP was talking, people watched with great attention. This was the first time, where JP attacked other parties and their populist schemes in a public speech.

As it is already time for return train and tickets were booked, many leaders left the place. We were running three hours late. While we were listening, Devi Prasad approached us and suggested us to distribute pamphlets and manuals. Whenever we missed giving to some people in a row, they were raising or calling us. When I distributed material near a group of people, they were competing with each other to get the paper first. I wonder whether people are interested in Lok Satta or they do that for every party. I wish they show the same interest in voting for Lok Satta.