Consider the leaders of our nation. They could form a Geriatric society. The President is 81, the Prime Minister is 77, the Home Minister is 74, the Defense Minister is 71, the HR Minister is 67 and there are many more old bandicoots. Each of these people in their twilight years should be enjoying a retired life than being involved in active politics. And active is just a term with no true meaning. Unless Advani's rabble rousing, going out on rath yatras and Murali Manohar Joshi's bid to "Indianise, spiritualise and nationalise" school and college curricula in the country can be called active politics.

A country is defined by its leaders. And leaders today are defined by the media. The media is partial to people who can give sound bytes and make good copy. And the media likes dynamic people. Our honorable Prime Minister has been clearly been outclassed by Musharraf in the international arena. Vajpayee, the elected head of the world's largest democracy, is way behind a self-crowned President of a nation, which till a couple of months ago was teetering on the brink of being declared a rogue state. Musharraf is not any cleverer than Vajpayee. He just happens to be younger and comes across as a dynamic and 'with-it' person. Compare Vajpayee's ponderous manner of speaking and laboured gait with Musharraf's 'in-your-face' comments and military bearing. Or for that matter Tony Blair's Carpe Diem attitude.

I strongly advocate that the citizens of India must force a rule where politicians too must retire. The nation is not here to subsidise or offer free healthcare to a select few. His excellency, the President, has been in and out of hospitals these past few months, Vajpayee is most famous for his knee operations and Yashwant Sinha had his kidneys fixed in the US some months ago. And God forbid one of them leaves for the happy hunting grounds while in office. Then we the citizens have to contend with traffic jams while the funeral cortege is taken through the city's busiest thoroughfares during peak hours.

I'm not discriminating against age. All corporate and government offices employees are retired at an average age of 58. Why then, is it different for people who hold political office? Running a country is or rather should be as professional a task as running a large multi-national. People are in the workforce for a period of years when the human body and mind are considered to be in their prime. After which people bow out of the workforce and enjoy the fruits of their labour. Considering our politicians have a fruit or two more than the average citizen, they should be retiring to enjoy them in double quick time.