An Interesting take by Vir Sanghvi on the Pakistani politician’s affinity for Plastic Surgery versus the seeming indifference of the Indian Politician to any kind of vanity.
One answer seems to be that while Indian democracy, for all its faults, emerges from the grassroots and deals with issues of substance, Pakistan’s spasmodic attempts at democracy are dominated by a tiny elite of wealthy feudal barons who have systematically robbed their country blind. The plastic surgery has nothing to do with the voters. It has to do with the vanity of a ruling elite, eager to splash out money on London residences and new heads of hair. In a shallow democracy, appearance is everything and the superficial takes precedence over the substantial.
Indian politics might not be as feudal as Pakistani, but its close. I think there is an oversimplification of the Indian politicians motives pertaining to the lack of care most of them put towards their appearance. The shabby clothes, the lack of a comb, the out of control ear hair, many of these seem like as much an affectation as the hair transplant. For many of India’s politicians, there is an arrogance in their humility.
