Editorial: Don’t Lose Priorities to Politicking

Make enough noise, float enough conspiracy theories, and the continuing experience of the country shows that priorities can be easily displaced and disoriented by rabble rousing. In Sikkim, all it takes for priorities to get warped is the whiff of politicking, the closer they are to an election year the stronger is the debilitation and the fiercer the potential confrontation, the more befuddling the passion with which political twigs are swung around. The public domain is increasingly discussing the launch of a new political party or the impact new political alignments will have on the politics of things in Sikkim. Accepted, in a representative democracy, the arrival and potential of new and established parties and personalities occupies a significant place in private and public discussions; and while not suggesting that politics should take a backseat, it is important that it does not sweep away everything else that is also important to the people. Social issues need to be kept in perspective, and as mentioned, a political blip should not be allowed to divert whatever little attention these challenges are receiving. The disorientation of priorities mentioned earlier is with regard to an even more dangerous trend that energetic politicking brings to Sikkim – the coloring of social challenges, even ‘ills’ if you will please, with a political brush. ‘Politics’ in Sikkim, when it gets frenetic as the countdown for another Assembly election begins, has a track-record of slapping blinkers on the public domain [or at least the leaders who hog public space] and everything becomes of dire importance. Caste considerations and communal exigencies suddenly return to press release communications and posturing becomes more aggressive. What are essentially social challenges become political Frankensteins created by the ‘other’ side. This debases the debate, causing even more harm than the de-prioritisation of these issues that seasonal spikes in politicking can effect.
One speaks here of the still present, and unaddressed, reality of runaway suicides and unbridled addiction that continue to confront Sikkim. Politicians, because they represent a people and are expected to help fashion policy and executive responses to even social issues, are expected to address these challenges, which some will attest is of a scale which has incapacitated an entire generation in Sikkim. Maybe incapacitated is too strong an inference, but no one will have any quarrels with accepting that the twin-challenge of suicides and addiction has exposed an entire generation to substantial harm. The issues are not new, in fact they have been shocking with such consistency over the recent years that the society at large appears to have even become inured to fresh reports of suicides or drug busts. In the absence of any social or community representative organisations of any consequence [groups which would form the foundation for a civil society], one hopes political leaders to keep things in perspective and nudge social engagements to address these issues. There will be those who will smirk at such a hope, but since the society at large is yet to shake off its lethargy, it will have to the politicians from whom expectations can be raised. At least they are easily identifiable and addressed than, as some say the faceless masses. And make no mistake, these are continuing challenges for Sikkim. To refer to some recent incidents- the donation box at Hanuman Tok temple above Gangtok was burgled obviously by desperate needs to feed a dependence; a person was booked under the Sikkim Anti-Drugs Act after having already served time for three prior convictions in connection with contraband substances; and one need not recount the number of suicides because news of one arrives too disturbingly often. Mirror these against what politics has been releasing in the public domain. The point being made here is that politics and the allegations and counter allegations that come with it may be important cogs of the political wheel, but for the wheel to turn for the people, the priorities need to be organised with people in the mind, not individual aspirations, concerns or ambitions. The real priorities cannot be lost to politicking.