Why can’t leaders in India be as cool as Obama?

Today there is a lot of mistrust between residents in India and the politicians (irrespective of the political party). There is a war on social media. I would like to emphasize that I am totally against anti-national content floating around, I doubt any sane person will support bad content.

I have heard TV anchors telling the political party representatives on the nightly screaming shows – “We just don’t get to interview the Prime Minister, Sonia Gandhi or Rahul Gandhi. We don’t know what are their views”. And if these important people do give an interview we viewers will go deaf all day on hearing “EXCLUSIVE interview of blah blah ONLY on our channel, FIRST to bring the interview on YOUR channel”. After all TRPs are very important (irrespective of how accurate or inaccurate they are!).

Twitter was and is one of the best ways our politicians can get close to the general public. But very few of politicians in India have chosen to use this medium, even if they are on Twitter the messages are awfully boring. Reading those “best wishes for festival”, “Good morning”, “Happy new year” are such irrelevant tweets from politicians (or anybody for that matter).  There are a handful politicians who are communicating with citizens thru their tweets (I am not affiliated to any political party) – Ajay Maken, Milind Deora, Narendra Modi,  Omar Abdullah, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Subramanian Swamy, Sushma Swaraj.

Politicians in US have a funny bone

But are any of the politicians in India cool with the citizens? I doubt it. It is election year in the US. The recent speech of Obama set a new Twitter record – 52,000+ tweets per minute, Clinton’s speech got great reviews (and criticism). Most of my friends in US tell me politicians in the US are ruining the country.

What we need to appreciate about the politicians in US though is they are cool with the ordinary people. They have a great sense of humor, just not afraid to share a joke, shake their leg with their citizens. In fact they even invite comedians to the White House. Why can’t our politicians be cool? Just came across this tweet which shows Obama being lifted (with the permission of secret service) by a restaurant owner!

Can we ever think of bumping into a politician in India in a common ‘restaurant’? Doubt it. Anyway ordinary people are not on the high priority list for most politicians. There are few good ones though..still searching.

Can you ever imagine any politician or their spouses in India dancing with “ordinary” citizens like the Obamas? See this and this video from the Obamas visit to India in Nov 2010.

• Cartoon row: Is freedom of speech in India under attack?
• Restaurant Owner Slammed On Yelp For Supporting Obama
• Can’t imagine a leader in India playing with a ball