“Anything free this election?” a fictitious friend asks me, leaning forward with the eagerness of a man about to win a lucky draw.

“Quite a bit,” I tell him. “In fact, so much that you may soon wonder why anyone ever thought of working.”

He nods thoughtfully.

Because that is where we have reached. Elections are now distribution drives. The louder the promise, the bigger the applause.

Consider the promises linked with Vijay in Tamil Nadu. Monthly payments for women. Gold and silk sarees for brides. Free LPG cylinders. Free electricity. Collateral free loans. Unemployment allowances. Jobs in lakhs. Large education loans. Farmer incentives. Health insurance at a scale that would make even developed economies hesitate.

It reads less like a manifesto and more like a wedding invitation with gifts listed on the back.

Now let us be clear. Welfare is important. A nation must care for its vulnerable. But there is a quiet difference between helping someone stand and training them to sit or sleep.

And we are rapidly becoming experts at the latter.

What is even more fascinating is the arithmetic. Somewhere, in some office, there must be a man trying to add up the cost of gold for lakhs of marriages, free electricity for millions, monthly payments across households, loans that may never return, and insurance schemes that stretch imagination.

I suspect he has stopped trying.

Because in elections, numbers do not matter. Emotion does.

And the voter, my friend, is no longer asking, “How will you build the state?” but “What will you give me?”

But there is a deeper danger here, one we are not even discussing. When everything begins to arrive without effort, something quietly dies within us. The instinct to strive. The hunger to build. The pride of earning.

Enterprise does not survive in an atmosphere where rewards are disconnected from effort.

We begin to wait instead of work. Expect instead of create. Depend instead of dream.

And slowly, very slowly, a nation of hardworking citizens begins to turn into a nation of comfortable recipients. Sluggish not because we lack ability, but because we have been trained to rely on handouts.

It is the most elegant way to destroy initiative. No confrontation. No conflict. Just comfort.

And we accept it gladly.

Because who refuses free?

But here is the truth we carefully avoid. Nothing is free. Every cylinder, every unit of electricity, every rupee handed out comes from the same pocket it is being given to. It is your money, dressed up as generosity and returned to you with applause.

Meanwhile, debt grows quietly. Infrastructure slows. And the future is mortgaged without discussion.

But elections are not about the future anymore. They are about the next promise.

So the next time someone asks you, “Anything free this election?” you might pause and say, “Yes. The slow death of enterprise…!”

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