Why? Oh why? Why did he eat that salad?

Here he was, a typical Telugu boy. Used to eating mountains of rice with oodles of spice and ghee. Pickles, curries, powders they all had to be nice and hot. That was his constitutional requirement.

Not for him the rotis and dal and chicken tandoori. Nor could he manage with Chinese or Continental. The American stuff he hated and thought eating burgers was a wimpy thing to do. And steaks…food stuff of the barbarians.

So how did he land up trying a salad?

I guess it all began when all of them realized that they had become vegetables. Their minds had stopped working and their bodies had stored too much fat to move beyond. In a stage of vegetative coma, their entire focus was only on making the next illegal buck. And the counting was in millions.

Then one day, almost in quick succession they all realised that the day of the single curry was over. Single cuisine was a thing of the past. The need of the hour was a multi-cuisine hotch-potch. And they served it in a hurry. And in style.

Suddenly the membership of exclusive clubs began to mysteriously open up. Handshakes between brinjals and tadpoles became a common sight. Chickens sat down for community dinners with dragonflies.

But a pretence of independent thought and direction was maintained. Parties regularly fought and berated each other to keep the illusion going. And they called it a phase of constructive and co-operative politics. Agenda based or Issue based support from outside to the ruling party which was no longer a majority, but was not yet a minority either.

Then the ranks began to grumble. Friends in one dish and foes in another as an idea, didn’t seem to go down well with the masses, classes or anyone in between.

The question then was, what to do next?

The people had gotten used to choosing their vegetables independently, irrespective of the dish that was on the menu. And the hard etched battle lines had been blurred into conflict areas of dotted indecision.

It took a massacre and a monk to come up with, or rather force a solution. The massacre was conducted diligently by a man masquerading as an organic option. And the monk, who changed his style from loud Punjabi to quiet Buddhist before the country could say ‘Turban’ just nodded sagely at everything that was happening and everything that wasn’t.

Into the equation came a new concoction called the Dumb Aloo. It was rooted in the famous Banana Hai family and was strongly influenced by Italian wine and Columbian weed.

Now the people, both the electoral masses and the party peers, were thoroughly confused. Since the package of this OR that OR even that was not viable, the only option left was to try an AND.

It is rumoured that the man who eventually proposed the solution that is in vogue now was called the Big B. And it was made clear right from the start that the B neither stood for Bastard nor Bitch. Anyway, this gentleman had some culinary, even if only cinematic, experience and he put it to good use.

What happens when you chop all the vegetables, leaves, meats and even eggs into small pieces and throw them together in a large bowl. he asked himself. Add some cheese if you feel like it and call upon some cash reserves from Switzerland to serve as the ultimate dressing?

What happens is that you get a delicious salad. And depending on which party is in the ascendant position the salad gets an appropriate name. Gujju Salad, Kashmiri Salad, Andhra Salad, Amma Salad and so on.

The salad is a meal by itself and actually tastes quite good. Especially with Cayman Island Dressing or a Swiss Cheese topping. Having struck gold with this magic formula the Big B served it at all occasions around the country.

And the reaction was one of relief. Now everyone could have his cake and eat it too. Individual identities could be claimed even if collective decisions were to be the norm.

A popular chief minister who at one time had Prime Ministerial ambitions chose to bite into the salad instead of eating humble pie. And new partnerships were forged.

Territories were marked out. Shares were worked out. And the Indian public mutely went along to the farce of an election and got ready to console themselves for the next five years with the thought that they had indeed voted in the parties to power.

Why? Oh why? Why did the salad have to look like a solution? We all know what happened to Caesar…one of the few kings after whom a salad is named.