Professionals Party of India

Private sector employees, Public sector employees, Government employees, Bureaucrats, Judges - all have a retirement age. Individuals running their own businesses hand over the baton to the next generation at some point in time.

But what are our Parliamentarians doing? Once they get elected to Parliament they find ways not to retire. The below chart shows the trend and current representation in Parliament.

L Sabha ————-Age groups—————–
25-40 41-55 56-70 71-90 Total
XIV 63 231 201 38 533
XIII 78 264 164 33 539
XII 68 259 169 28 524
XI 65 239 171 30 505
X 82 233 163 19 497
IX 72 250 172 14 508
VIII 96 224 184 20 524
VII 114 229 152 15 510
VI 88 257 140 16 501
V 90 269 117 12 488
IV 109 238 119 12 478
III 98 221 137 8 464
II 151 211 107 4 473
I 112 235 86 1 434
(source: Times of India)

Is this truly representative of the youth of India, given that half of India was born after 1983? The above table is definitely not encouraging. The 1st LS had 112 MPs in the age group 25-40 and the 14th LS has just 63 MPs in the same age group. On the other hand, the 1st LS had just 1MP in the age group 71-90 and the 14th LS has 38 MPs in the same age group.

Interestingly, these are the same MPs who decide the retirement age of an average Indian and a well qualified professional Indian heading a prestigious Institute.

We are not against senior or very senior Parliamentarian’s active role in India’s politics. No doubt, they definitely bring alot of experience to the table. They can play an active role as an advisor to the party they belong. But,

Why do they try to retain power with themselves for eternity?
Will they willingly vacate their seats for the next generation?

It is high time the current national political parties wake up and take a quick stock or the Honourable Election Commission of India stipulate some guideline or the Law ministry thinks and takes a progressive decision.

And for the current Parliamentarians - will there be a political will to do this?

If this is possible in the Corporate world, why not for Parliament?  Over the last 60 years we have seen steady degeneration in our political governance and lot of mediocrity is accepted. Why can’t there be a performance appraisal for those who govern our country? PPI strongly recommends this and will come out with a half yearly performance appraisal system for MPs representing PPI. This will be available to the citizens of the constituency they are voted from.