Word: baharestan
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...Iranian constitution (which Mossadegh as a young revolutionary helped put across) requires a secret ballot. Mossadegh scrupulously ordered up all the paraphernalia: voting tents, police guards, army tanks. In fact, he ordered a double set of everything-one for Teheran's vast Sepah Square, another for Baharestan Square. Anyone voting yes could do so "secretly" in Sepah Square, but to vote no, one had to go to Baharestan. Government employees were let off work and in mobs descended on Sepah Square. So did other mobs assembled by the outlawed Tudeh Communist Party, which also would like to keep Parliament...
...Baharestan Square, things were different. The occasional voter had to run a gauntlet of signs proclaiming: "Only Traitors Vote for Non-Dissolution." Election officials dozed, read magazines, swapped stories. At day's end, to no one's surprise, the count in Teheran district stood: for the dissolution (and Mossadegh), 166,550; against, 116. Mossadegh hailed the vote, of course, as a great vindication of democracy...
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