As things stand, there is little chance that either Congress or BJP will recover enough to be in a position to choose our next prime minister. This privilege is likely to go to someone like Mayawati, who will have no compunctions about keeping the job for herself as she has indicated in every interview she has given since becoming chief minister. And, why not?

Meanwhile, am I the only one puzzled by the absence of anyone trying to create a new national party before the next general election? A party that would stand for the reduction of the role of the state and for policies that would support the entrepreneurs who have saved India from becoming an economic basket case. High growth rates are not because the public sector is suddenly doing brilliantly but because the private sector is booming.

We need a political party that will stand for policies that allow private participation even in areas that should be the territory of the state. There has been such abysmal failure here that every political party is forced to accept quotas in jobs and education as the only way to help the underprivileged. It is a flawed idea and a dangerous one as we saw recently in Rajasthan.

The better way would be for us to adopt policies that would increase the size of the Indian cake. In education and healthcare if government cannot invest our money wisely it must allow private enterprise to enter and build the hundreds of thousands of schools, colleges and hospitals that India cannot afford any more to do without. In agriculture if all it can come up with is yet another nebulous package, of the kind the prime minister

... contd.