The gifts of our democracy

Unfortunately, each year the rulers present the national budget during the hottest part of the year. The heat in June paralyses the poor masses physically as well as mentally. Add to this, the economic furnace into which the masses are flung during a budget season. If, during a budget season, you ask a common Pakistani: "What do you think about the budget?" He would ask back: "What is a budget? I am dying of hunger and thirst. Let me have some water from some drain and a piece of bread from some garbage." During our hottest days our masses are utterly out of their senses. They can be easily befooled in such circumstances. And, undoubtedly, the budget technology is invented to make fun of the masses. If the hot season is hell for the masses, it is a paradise for the rulers. The rulers give birth to the budget in their air conditioned maternity rooms. The masses keep watching the birth of the budget from their volcanic slums. What a budget proclaims is not strictly mandatory for the rulers. They can slash any part of the budget any time they fancy. And they can make new additions any time they want to make new additions. Thus actually, budget-making is a very interesting waste of time, energy and money. Logically, the budget system should be set ablaze. The rulers should have absolute powers to do with the country's financial affairs whatever suits their political interests. The period preceding the budgetary proclamation is a nerve-wrecking period for the masses. The masses can be emancipated from this horrific ordeal by abolishing the budgetary system altogether. Obviously, this suggestion would not be acceptable to any government. For every government, proclaiming a budget is a symbol of its supreme power. Normally, budget-making is a democratic requirement. We are a democracy. We must keep making budgets. Our democracy has been very generous. Apart from budget-making, it has blessed us with numerous other gifts. Our national poverty is a gift of our democracy. Our national corruption is a gift of our democracy. The current wars amongst our various institutions are all gifts of our democracy. The American drone attacks are also gifts of our democracy, etc, etc. America is a democracy. So is Pakistan. But American democracy has made America the world's supreme power, whereas Pakistan's democracy has made Pakistan one of the world's most wretched entities. America is our friend. Why don't we beg America for a photocopy of its democracy? If America favours us with a copy, we should dustbin our own democracy and start practising American democracy. If we honestly start emulating American democracy, we can easily become one of the most respectable countries of the world. Let's have an example of the functioning of the American democracy as compared with the Pakistani democracy. Under the American democracy, the President can't allot even a single particle of American dust to an American. What a slavish democracy On the contrary, under the Pakistani democracy, the rulers can allot any part of Pakistan to any Pakistani or a foreigner. What an imperial democracy Recently, an American President was about to retire. He had no residence of his own. He looked about for a rental house. Had someone told him that the Pakistani President had the power to allot any part of Pakistan to anyone, he might have applied for a residential plot in Islamabad. Can you imagine the size of the plot which Pakistan would have allotted to the houseless American President? Under Pakistani democracy, the masses are miserable. They can be relieved of their misery only by replacing their democracy with an American-brand democracy. Our salvation lies only in a genuine democracy. Unfortunately, our democracy is a fake democracy. We import a wide variety of things from the West. But we have hermetically sealed our borders against the entry of Western democracy into Pakistan. Our rulers have manufactured an indigenous democracy, which is all misery for the masses and all affluence for the rulers. n The writer is a freelance columnist.