Vanakkam! This is to inform everyone at boloji.com that I am moving to Tamil Nadu! I am packing my bags as I bid a hurried farewell to London. If you are wondering why I am deserting Colonial London for Colloquial Chennai, let me just say that the temptation to relocate was just impossible to resist.

It is election time again in Tamil Nadu and it is raining freebies! Gone are the days when election promises were limited to roads, water, electricity, education, health and development. And elections no longer stand for free blankets and liquor. No no no. We may not have realized this but Jayalalithaa & Karunanidhi Inc. would like us to believe India has progressed much beyond those days of being a underdeveloped, third world country.

The AIADMK heavyweight J. Jayalalithaa has promised free bicycles to students. Wow finally my own set of wheels! And she has promised to maintain the price of rice at Rs.3.50/- a kilo. That's rice for only '0.04 a kilo! Further she has promised to create 500,000 IT sector jobs. And the clincher is the promise of a corruption free, honest and transparent administration in Tamil Nadu. Now that would be a really good change from the present government.

But wait a minute. Isn't Chief Minister Jayalalithaa heading the present government? So why has she saved the "corruption free, honest and transparent administration" for her next term in office. Well, who cares? She knows what the voters want and she has priorities marked out: transportation, food and employment. Honesty and transparency doesn't seem to be very high on wish-lists nowadays.

The opposing DMK has promised to slash the price of good quality rice even further to Rs.2/- a kilo. I am not going to bother to even convert that. But here is the clincher - to fulfill the recreational needs of women in state, the four times Tamil Nadu Chief Minster M. Karunanidhi, is giving away a free color television to every household! Wow, this is even better than Christmas. To top it all, he is offering a maternity allowance to pregnant women for the first six months of pregnancy! Now who would think of incentivizing pregnancies in the world's second most populous country? But then who would think of free televisions? Was it Marie Antoinette, who said if you can't give them electricity, give them televisions. Or have I got my history wrong?

On a second thought, incentivizing children isn't a bad idea at all. By encouraging the voters to have more children, the DMK supremo is only ensuring that his political base grows. The more people on the electoral rolls, the merrier it is for our politicians.

This isn't all. There is more. The DMK has further promised to fill up the 300,000 vacancies in government departments and provide free computer training to youth in rural areas, besides reducing educational fees. Hey I can study in Tamil Nadu, get free training and a job with the government! What more can a student hope for. Pocket money? That's taken care of too - unemployment allowance of Rs. 150-Rs 300 for unemployed youth. Karunanidhi Sir has thought of everything. I safely predict that if the DMK comes to power, Tamil Nadu will become the most sought after destination for students globally.

Whom do I favor? Well it is tough to choose between a bicycle and a television. With both leaders falling over each other in a bid to play Santa Claus, I just can't wait to get my hands on the goodies.

With this letter I eagerly urge you to consider moving to the land of opportunities, television and bicycles: Tamil Nadu.

Yours sincerely,
Usha