A dynamic,middle-aged man,best known for successfully launching Indias first low-cost airline,is looking to Mahatma Gandhi and Buddha for inspiration for his current,seemingly-whimsical venture. His endeavor: getting elected to the Lok Sabha as an Independent from the Bangalore South constituency,spending only the stipulated Rs 25 lakh. Gorur Ramaswamy Gopinath,57,founder of Air Deccan,openly admits that he can well afford to splurge on his campaign from the proceeds of his airline sale and indulge in a bit of expensive election skullduggery. If I spend a few million dollars,Im as bad as the others because my political life has started with a lie, he says. Gopinath wants to keep within the EC-dictated Rs 25 lakh. That is where Buddha and Gandhi come in. Both were motivational thinkers who kindled peoples emotions with the power of ideas,he says. If Buddha and Gandhi could succeed in stirring the masses with no money,no internet,Facebook or Twitter,no media,what am I complaining about? Like millions of educated,middle class Indians Gopinath said that he too was a passive onlooker until recently. One evening,as he sat sipping whiskey in his bungalow,fulminating inwardly about the Mumbai terrorist attacks and the assault on women in pubs,Gopinath said he was struck by Gandhis aphorism,Be the change you want to see. I decided that I had to hurl myself into politics, he said. Swapping the Gandhian loincloth for linen shirts,and Gandhis journeys in third-class compartments for rides in buses,Gopinath said he wants to trigger a movement of change against casteist,communal,corrupt politics. His low-cost campaign tactics to woo the common man have been decidedly unconventional. Gopinath,who calls himself a political entrepreneur like Gandhi,said canvassing had been taken over by a network of eager volunteers distributing,Vote you must! Vote to change your life! pamphlets. Volunteer numbers swelled from 40 to 1,000,he said. But the man who has coaxed thousands of first-time flyers inside his planes has realised that getting educated,high-tech,but apathetic voters inside voting booths is no mean task. Gopinath has ambushed people travelling by buses,eating at roadside joints,and striding alongside early morning joggers in parks. Refreshingly, the cavalcade of cars and firecrackers were missing from the campaign. He will not accept large donations,he says,showing off on his phone a pledge of Rs 2,000 from a well-known Bangalore socialite. Rivals like Ananth Kumar of the BJP have dismissed him as a non-entity. But Gopinath cannot be written off so quickly,say first-time voters like Virat Seth,a student. He may not be Gandhi,he may not even be the messiah of Indias middle classes. But nobody dismisses the fact that Gopinath represents a shift in thinking about politics in urban,middle-class India.
