Respected Yashwant Sinha Ji?

You will be missing the title of Your Excellency, the President not by a whisker but by a wide margin against Smt. Draupadi Murmu in today’s Presidential elections. Sir, it is not winning or losing in an election but gracefully participating in the democratic process. You did participate, but you sadly missed the grace essential for the highest office representing 140 crore Indians.

You could well have limited yourself to exemplifying your knowledge of almost everything under the sky. But, unfortunately, your speeches lose merit when they are laced mostly with scorn and criticism about the present Indian government and PM Modi and HM Amit Shah in particular. Your address urging the lawmakers to vote as per their conscience might have been feebly aimed at dividing the BJP legislators and parliamentarians. Sadly, many of your supporters seem struck by your call of conscience, resorting to voting for your opponent.

True, Draupadi Murmu did not give a press conference. A few in Lutyens’ Delhi think that we are west and imitate all that happens abroad. Why do we need press conferences? India is making history by being ready to recognize a tribal and the second lady as the President. I know the political typhoon it has created for many parties, who play to the gallery, recalling Ambedkar only where it matters and relying on the Fair and Lovely cream on the sly. If you called Murmu Ji a rubber stamp, your brother from Patna called her a statue. What is wrong with you both?

You were never going to win, but did you claim that you would recall all the ED and CBI investigations against the corrupt political leaders, most of whom have lined up during your nomination. Many have also bolted and changed their choice of candidate, as ignoring a tribal would have cost dearly in any election in India, and the stigma would have lasted long, which no party could afford.

Sir, you were a Finance Minister of the country, and there were enough opportunities for you to gracefully exit the race when the NDA nominated Draupadi Murmu. You have, instead, tried to politicize the highest office and cast aspersions not only on your electoral opponent but also on the sitting President of India. No wonder the main sponsor of your circus went public, stating that she might have reconsidered the option of sponsoring you had she known earlier that Murmu would be the candidate. Was that not enough indication for you about your political fortunes?

Your feeble cry sounded like, “elect me, and I shall undo all that is done,” it is not done, Yashwant Sinha Ji. This is not another MP post for you to lambast on social networks. You must be apolitical, which you forgot the day the BJP threw you out and in your period of the wilderness after that. You sadly do not possess the cleverness of the other two candidates, whose names preceded you and who promptly declined to join the fray, Shri Gopal Krishna Gandhi Ji and Shri Sharad Pawar Ji. Instead, you were planning to convert Raisina Hills as a kitchen for political kichadi. Thankfully, that would not happen.

Join me, sir, in cheering a tribal woman as the head of India and sculpting a new chapter in our glorious history.

Jai Hind

Sampath Kumar
Intrépide Voix