Why can’t Indian politicians retire if work gets tiring ?

The Union Minister for Food, Civil Supplies and Agriculture,
Sharad Pawar, who also doubled as President of the Board of Control for Cricket
in India (BCCI) and has now become President of the International Cricket
Council (ICC), has reportedly pleaded with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh that
his ministerial burdens be reduced so that he can devote more of his time to his
cricketing responsibilities. The Prime Minister should request Mr. Pawar to
choose between Government and cricket. Mr. Pawar will not be any less popular in
his home state of Maharashtra, or any less respected as an elder statesman or
any less influential in Indian politics if he ceased to be a Union Minister.
Indeed, his popularity may shoot up if he prefers to give up his ministerial
perks and devotes the rest of his life to promoting cricket in India and around
the world. He could make cricket an Olympian sport ! He could get a bigger
audience for Indian Premier League matches compared to World Cup soccer. There
are so many new frontiers to be crossed and Mr. Pawar could become a global
mentor for cricket. Why should he seek to keep his Cabinet berth if he does not
have the time and energy for it ? Mr. Pawar says he needs more hands in his
ministry. There are already too many ministers in India and most junior
ministers complain that they have no work. Indeed, even senior ministers
complain these days of not having much work ! Mr. Pawar has been widely
criticised for keeping one foot in cricket and one eye on Maharashtra even as he
had his other foot in the Union Government and the other eye on the top job in
Delhi. No one can grudge a politician such political ambition. But when a
minister says he wants less work in Government to be able to devote more time to
cricket, then one must ask whether it is not time to force a choice on him. With
just nine members in the Parliament, and some of them willing to return to the
parent Congress party, Mr. Pawar demands too much generosity from the Prime
Minister, who, in fact, has been among his limited circle of well-wishers in the
Congress party. Rather than push the Prime Minister into being even more
generous, Mr. Pawar should think of retiring from Government, asking someone
younger, perhaps his daughter, to take his place. When Mr. Pawar took charge of
agriculture in 2004, the Prime Minister asked him to repeat in the rest of India
the developmental miracle he had wrought in his home constituency of Baramati.
Regretfully, he has failed on that score and Indian agriculture has suffered due
to neglect. The so-called Second Green Revolution is yet to take off, and food
price inflation has hurt. Perhaps a change of hands at the Food and Agriculture
Ministry can help.