In UP, the electorate’s relationship with politics is different from that in other parts of the country. None of the dry and boring cynicism of the posh metro colonies can be witnessed here. It is refined, sophisticated and an astute response to the moment of reckoning every five years.

Perhaps in its tea stalls, where the tea can often taste stronger than vodka shots, its barber saloons, and paan ki dukaans, an otherwise unempowered or impoverished Indian feels important, sought after, and able to make a difference.

Radhey Shyam, his wife and three children run the Radhey Shyam tea stall that was set up in 1996. A chana seller Ravi Shanker Mishra was there on a hot afternoon and theorised all about the Congress’s strategy of “keeping India poor, but happy.”

Mishra is a regular at the tea stall when not selling chana. He also told us his big secret—that he has studied only till Class VIII and that he buys paper from the scrap dealer in kilos for making pudiyas for the chana. ‘‘But you know, I read magazines and cut out some articles. That is how I hope to help my children later.”

Amartya Sen’s Argumentative and Articulate Indian is hard at work in UP’s addas, and brewing not just theories, but in his own way, plotting for a better tomorrow. Said another quick-wit we encountered, “We don’t have power at all during the day. It just comes from 10 pm till the morning. Those in government think that by not giving us power (electricity), we would be troubled and turn into nikammas (good for nothings). But you see, all of us come out of our homes as the heat is unbearable, and end up talking to each other for hours—maybe something good will come out of just that talking.”
Empowerment here can mean at least a million different things.

... contd.