Went to the meeting of National Election watch – Tamilnadu chapter in IIT Madras. The visit on one hand rewound memories of the past.

But then here we (along with the members of janaagraha) were in the second floor of the Science & Humanities. Our presence in the meeting was more to understand the action steps in the Poll watch that is being launched by a network of NGO’s across India. The presentation and the discussion was led by Prof. Trilochan Sastry, Dean IIM Bangalore and others in the panel were Prof Arvind (Asian College of Journalism) The criminalization of politics and the statistics over the years was shared. Tamilnadu which we in the south consider to a clean state unlike Bihar and Jharkand had an alarmingly high rate as well.

I was reminded of the thoughts of Ms Deepthi of Janaagraha Bangalore about the track record of the our Parlaimentarians.

ADR – Association for Democratic Reforms, the group that is led by Prof. Trilochan Sastry has been on the roll since 2002. Their major landmark acheivement has been the legislation that makes it mandatory for Politicians contesting elections to share their Education and Financial details in a sworn affidavit. Started with a Ford Foundation grant today they are partnering with 1200 NGO’s and have come a longway.

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