DEMOCRACY AND COMMUNISM
Most of the big countries in the world have democratic governments. China, among them, the biggest in population is not democratic. India, the second biggest in population takes the pride of being the biggest democracy in the world. The sudden fall of Communism in almost all the East European countries has strengthened the idea that people in the world have a greater fancy for Democracy than for a totalitarian government.
The question why people have started having contempt for Communism and have preferred democracy is simple. Communism as practiced and as is still being practiced in some countries was and is not on the pattern of Marxism. It had developed as Stalinism, the cruelest form of government. It deprived the people of their freedom of expression, speech and work. Almost every aspect of human activity was under the maximum, rather total control of the government. Everything in the nation was owned by the government and all profits went to it. The question of acquiring from the haves (the rich) and passing on to the have nots (the poor) did not arise.
It has been noticed that democracy has been a great success in some countries as in the USA, the U.K., Canada, Australia, France, Germany, Switzerland, Sweden and other prosperous countries of the west. But it has failed badly in backward countries of the continents of Asia and Africa and in Latin America. In these countries democratic set ups are rife with corruption and exploitation.
Democracy is a philosophy that has to be adopted by the people in their day to day activities. The people have to be disciplined to sustain the national life. They should be patriots so that they may look into the interests of the Nation first. For this they should be educated so that they may distinguish between the right and the wrong. The people have to maintain a standard of morality so that the nation may be saved from the hands, of rogues and ruffians. A hungry stomach cannot think about the society and the nation. The people should be prosperous – at least well fed. They should be responsible enough to digest the truth of the principle that more children we have poorer we are. It is true for the Nation too.
Everyone in democracy claims the right of freedom of expression. It means one should allow it to others too. All are right in their own way. Thus tolerance for the views of others is the backbone of the freedom of expression. The people should, besides tolerance, have a strong will to save the nation. They should reject those who enter politics for personal or partisan interests. They should rise to the occasion to stand against the appeasement of those who betray the nation. The populist leaders should be discarded.
One notices that this preparation for democracy has rather become irrelevant in India and other backward countries. Thus we have a distorted Version of democracy that is leading us towards anarchy. Let the people feel their responsibility to check this rot to establish the form of democracy that suits their country.