Once this monopoly is endangered, they find fault with the very system they had given currency to with such fanfare, and shrewdly substitute it with the one of their liking which could consolidate their hold over the power structure afresh. Presidential democracy is one such gimmick the ruling combine is employing to check the steady decline of their hold over the levers of power and its impending shift to the hands of the Other Backward Castes and social justice groups in the wake of their late and tumultuous political assertion since the late 80s. Presidential democracy no doubt suits the requirements of the uppercastes more than any one else. Besides the Muslims, they are the only community to qualify in some measure for the all India presence tag. The fragmentation of majority electorate on caste, sub-caste and linguistic lines is so intense that no caste has a sizable presence in even 50 of the total 543 Lok Sabha constituencies.
Every caste is a regional one which belongs to a state or two.
Outside their respective states, these communities command little following or recognition. As a result, any one from these communities graduating to the candidature of the president in the proposed presidential form of government would be a remote possibility due to lack of his broad national acceptance. The chances of a Muslim candidate to this coveted post is ruled out at the very outset as the Muslims are the least assertive community in political terms, even though they form the largest single block with 12 per cent of population constituting more than 10 per cent of the electorate in as many as 276 Lok Sabha constituencies compared to 76 by the Brahmins. Even today the uppercaste dominated national media, which is the maker or destroyer of one s image and public perception, describes the OBC Chandrababu Naidus, the Deve Gowdas, the Laloo Yadav and the Mulayam Yadav as regional satraps catering to the parochial ambitions of their respective communities and regions, and the Hegdes, Tiwaris, Seshans, Swamys and the Vajpayees as state and national leaders. As a result, only those politicians would make a successful bid to presidency who command media-induced popularity.