Punjab Outlook

Across party lines and ideologies, one thing unites all political leaders—an unshakable belief that the public needs constant guidance. According to them, inflation is not inflation, unemployment is not unemployment, and corruption is merely a “misunderstood administrative innovation.” When prices rise, leaders don’t fix markets; they fix definitions. When roads break, it’s not bad construction—it’s “temporary inconvenience for long-term development.” The public listens quietly, wondering how a pothole can be rebranded as a vision document.

Political speeches now resemble motivational seminars. Leaders raise their fingers like strict schoolteachers and lecture citizens on discipline, sacrifice, and patience. “You must tighten your belts,” they say—usually while wearing belts imported from foreign brands. “Think of the nation first,” they declare, just before boarding business-class flights to international conferences on austerity. The public nods respectfully, trying to understand why national sacrifice always starts at the bottom and ends at the podium.

Every election season turns into an exam hall where promises rain down like free notes. Leaders assure the public that jobs will appear, corruption will disappear, and development will run faster than election speeches. Once elected, however, the syllabus mysteriously changes. Suddenly, citizens are told they misunderstood the question paper. “We meant long-term,” leaders explain gently, as if correcting a slow student. Democracy, it seems, is the only system where the teacher blames the students for poor results.

Press conferences are the highlight of this comedy. Leaders answer no questions directly but deliver extended lectures instead. A simple query about healthcare transforms into a history lesson, a geography class, and sometimes a moral science lecture on how citizens should live healthier lives by not getting sick in the first place. Journalists ask about accountability; leaders respond with philosophy. The audience leaves enlightened, but uninformed.

Opposition leaders are no different. When out of power, they become passionate tutors of ethics and governance. They lecture endlessly about mistakes made by the ruling party, conveniently forgetting that they once taught the same subject using the same wrong notes. The moment power changes hands, the lecture script remains identical—only the teacher changes seats. The blackboard stays dirty, but the chalk keeps moving.

Perhaps the funniest part is how leaders assume the public has a short memory and an even shorter brain. Every failure is blamed on the past government, the weather, global forces, or occasionally the public itself for “not cooperating.” Citizens are advised to stay silent, stay patient, and stay hopeful—preferably forever. After all, questioning too much is considered indiscipline in this political classroom.

Yet, despite the lectures, the public keeps learning—just not what leaders intend. People have learned to decode speeches, translate promises, and laugh at serious faces delivering unserious explanations. The true education happens not at rallies but at tea stalls, kitchens, and social media, where citizens mark leaders strictly and without mercy.

In the end, the nation does not suffer from a lack of lectures; it suffers from a lack of listening. If political leaders spoke a little less and listened a little more, they might discover that the public is not a class of dull students but experienced teachers of real life. Until then, the lectures will continue, the bells will never ring, and democracy will remain the only classroom where attendance is compulsory but results are optional.