In West Bengal, a journalist accosted a bunch of Trinamool goons who wouldn’t allow a queue of women voters to cast their votes. This video-journalist got everything on camera. Somebody wrote a caption ‘This is what happens when any party stays long in power!’ Does that also apply to the party in power in Uttar Pradesh? We do not know, but the ‘Ali-Bajrangbali’ in play in Yogi’s state is as egregious as what was on display in West Bengal.

First-phase turnouts compared to those in 2014 are down. Baramulla in the Kashmir Valley saw 39% turnout. Jammu notched nearly 60%. Nowhere in the entire country did turnout strike mid-60s, forget 70. Why and for what? Is lower turnout good tidings for the BJP? Or, is it curtains coming down on the Narendra Modi show? The Modi biopic that has run into EC trouble.

First-time voters will notice the EC is coming into honest play at last. It issued notice to Mayawati for her calls to Muslims to vote en bloc against BJP candidates. It did the same to Yogi Adityanath for his ‘Green Virus’ and ‘Ali-Bajrangbali’ termination of Muslim voters. Why do Muslims always become targets of a political slugfest? Are they themselves to blame? First time voters will wonder.

They‘ll also have noticed that the BJP is rattled by ‘Chowkidar Chor Hai’. So much so, Modi was compelled to coin ‘Mein Bhi Chowkidar’. This, after he invented and discarded ‘Modi Hai Toh Mumkin Hai’and ‘Gharme Ghuske Marenge.’ Rafale and ‘Chowkidar Chor Hai’ are refusing to fly out of Modi’s hair. Every time he thinks they’re gone, they come back from out of the sunlit sky, to swoop down on him in an arc-light of growing Rafale suspicions.

The BJP is rattled enough to take Rahul Gandhi to court, alleging that he’s committing contempt of the Supreme Court every time he shouts ‘Chowkidar Chor Hai’ and asks crowds at Congress rallies to shout the same. BJP leader and outgoing New Delhi MP Meenakshi Lekhi has filed the case in the apex court. There is conflict of interest because she might have to fight the fallout of the potent slogan if she contests again.

And it’s a slogan that badgers all BJP contestants in GE 2019 including Modi and Amit Shah – ‘Chowkidar Chor Hai’. Every BJP leader in a show of solidarity and sycophancy went ahead and changed twitter handles to ‘Chowkidar…’ Now all those BJP who is ‘Chowkidar’ is open to ‘Chowkidar Chor Hai’ attacks – collateral damage/victims. They are too close to the event horizon and at risk of being gobbled up and consigned to the black hole.

Looking at all these, first-time voters might lose their zeal to join the electoral process. They might not have realized how dirty a game politics is and nothing is sacrosanct to politicians and political parties, the masters of our universe! Those they’ll be, ironically, voting to elect. At the rate of political mischief played, first-time voters will need an Event Horizon Telescope each to look through the political gimmicks played on them.

In the larger Universe-thing, human beings do not count, such are the vast horizons. And if Narendra Modi gloats that his five-year rule has placed India among the ranking powers on the globe, he should ask why the Event Horizon Telescope team did not hold a press conference in New Delhi? To release the mug-shot of the super-massive black hole with a maw so wide it could eat millions of Milky Ways and still remain ravenously hungry. (IPA Service)