sIn Now To Objectively Look at a progrEssively Rising nAtion - Creating issuEs

My grandmother is an ardent Congress supporter.  Her father had made his children promise that their families and they will always support Congress.  Her forceful personality ensured her pushing the adoration for Congress down her children's throat.  Though they did not have much have much regard for Congress, they did not bother to protest.  Soon the family grew and people from other families came into her small and secure family as in-laws. Unfortunately for my grandmother these newer entrants to the family did not have similar upbringing or political orientation.  My father’s political thoughts were formed during a period when many of the states started seeing the rise of political alternatives to the Congress.  These younger parties were spewing ideas that seemed progressive and inclusive compared to the Congress. The party had lost its sheen.  From my father's generation's point of view, Congress died with Gandhi and the cremation rituals were complete by the time the Nehru era ended.  My father's political thoughts were shaped on two concepts, namely, "Indira Congress is not India Congress" and "If you see a snake and a congress man, don't kill the snake first.  The snake attacks you only if you disturb it".  I grew up seeing these two generation and ideas in conflict.

This conflict has an effect on my political beliefs.  Obviously, I was closer to my father's thought process.  My grandmother’s view comes from the independence era which saw Kumari Kamala dancing to the tune “Mahaan Gandhi Mahaan”.  Gandhi, Nehru and Congress motivated the young blood fighting and ultimately building a new nation.  In those days, the Congress seemed revolutionary like the Communist and Dravidian parties in the sixties and AAP in 21^st century.  The country becoming independent was probably one of the most important events of her life.  Thus, she felt indebted to the Congress for life.  But with time the party changed from Indian National Congress (INC) to “Nehruvian Congress” and finally to “Indira Congress”.  She did not understand these changes.  During this time a number of disillusioned Congress leaders left the party and formed newer parties.  These leaders took away a good part of the soul of INC to the newer parties thus making the party poor of principles.  But all this was lost of my grandmother and she blindly followed her father’s words when she supported the Congress.  Though I did not have all these thoughts in my younger days, I ended up disliking the Congress in my teens.  

My political opinions are never too strong.  I believe this comes from the fact that current affairs and politics do not interest me much.  The cartoon section of newspapers captured (and continues to capture) my attention more than any other page.  So I had no idea about my political leanings.  Though I did not like the Congress I was not sure which party I supported.  I had some liking to communism but the fall of communism in the late 80's and a few pages of Ayn Rand killed that liking for ever.  I am sure how but by the time I reached the votable age, BJP seemed an attractive option.  It probably was due to the messy vacuum created by V.P.Singh (whose reincarnation, I believe, Kejriwal is).  Their leadership team also seemed attractive.  That is till Advani climbed atop the Babri issue and caused a lot of confusion and bloodshed in the country. But Deve Gowda's sleepy tenure and Gujral’s prequel to Manmohan Singh tenure removed the Babri-cal thoughts from my head.  

At the turn of the century I was very happy to see the BJP Government at centre.  A few goods emerged from the five years of BJP rule.  Only the five years of Narasimha Rao Government left a similar impression in my mind.  Unfortunately, the BJP rule lasted five years only and the Congress was back in power.  The few days after election were worrying with the prospect of living in shame under a person of foreign origin.  To out relief the brilliant Manmohan Singh was chosen the prime minister.  Five years went by and the Congress Government did not seem to perform badly – the Manmohan magic had not lost its sheen.  Around this time, Congress' own Prince Charles started flexing his muscles.  For a few days, I was misled by the idea of joining the Congress to build a new India.  At around this time, events took a disastrous turn and the Congress Government spiralled into corruption, chaos, a speechless PM, allegations of the family looting the country, the prodigal son-in-law, the mumbling–bumbling future icon of the party and many other nonsense that I cannot remember now.

Sometime in the middle of Congress' disastrous second term, the name Narendra Modi emerged.  That Gujarat man can never make it is what many of thought.  The Gujarat riots and related accusations against him left a lot of impression on us.  But with time people started talking about him and the development he ushered in Gujarat.  His followers attracted the sceptics through the videos of his speeches.  What he said made sense and he was a powerful speaker whose words seemed very convincing.  I was soon under his sway and was desperate to see him become the PM of the country.  Apparently many others in the country thought so too and soon we had a powerful leader at the centre.  He did not have the necessity to look towards people with dubious intentions before he opened his mouth.   But the bed of roses was not thorn free.  There were doubters and agitators inside and outside of the party.  The old guards under Advani’s able leadership were sulking.  Modi and BJP's RSS associations made the so called minorities nervous (Why "so called"?  How can a secular democracy have majority and minority?).  The wilting of the roses made the thorns prominent.

Most people I met were happy with our new PM.  He seemed to have the right vision for the future and articulated them well.  We expected him to indulge in bombastic and populist action. But his actions were sober and to many he seemed to take a step at a time.  He was working to bring in timeliness at the Government offices.  We heard about him terrifying his ministers with 5AM and 7 AM review meetings.   He brought out the necessity of making India clean and every family having a bank account.  These were not all talk but we saw it happening around us too.  For me, the cleanliness of Chennai central station was a big surprise.  It was longer wet and the foul.  It was not just the stations but the trains and their toilets were clean too.  But this did not extend to all places – Chennai continued to be dirty.  But I don’t think we can blame the PM for it.  The local Governments and the citizens have to take a big chunk of that responsibility.  There were instances when even the most ardent supporter of Modi was seen throwing waste on road.  Such is our attitude.  Interestingly, the PM had mentioned some place that all the talk about “Swach Bharat” is to make people think about it initially.  He does expect India to become like Singapore in a matter of months.  That surely is a well thought of plan with realistic expectation.

Soon the honeymoon period came to an end. The trouble makers started lifting their heads.  The purportedly hard core Hindus wanted to ban beef and surprisingly the whole world went up in arms.  Many people who had issues sitting on the same table as a non-vegetarian were supporting the holding of beef parties and beef eaters were now equated to freedom fighters.   The news papers and TV channels started screaming out about the sensational case of Hindu extremism – a few hard core Hindus killed a freedom loving beef eater.  Demands of apology from every Hindu right from Narendra Modi were heard.  I do not watch the cable network and so am not sure if Arnab apologized on our behalf in prime time television.  The battle shifted to the social media with people taking sides and many versions of the reality emerged.  Since then the media and social media have been trading pole-apart realities.

This barbaric Dadri killing resulted in the strong emergence of the word - "INTOLERANCE".  I think this word is primarily used to describe an allergy – “I am intolerant to pollen”, “I am intolerant to Vijay movies” and in the latest trend “I am intolerant to Hindus”. Since that last sentence is grammatically incorrect, the word extremism is added at the end.  As a result of this allergy, many intellectuals started returning awards.  Many caring citizens expressed their concern in prime time television. Soon the King-Kongs of Bollywood joined.  Shahrukh Khan cried out at the intolerance he was being subjected to.  One of my oldest friends mentioned over dinner that he was very disturbed by the growing Hindu extremism.  This happened a week before the attacks in Paris.  I was of the view that that is an instance of extremism.  I am not sure if the ISIS would quite appreciate it if we equate the Dadri killers to them.  As the word suggests, extremism requires something extreme to be done.  I am not sure if the Hindus have the capacity to indulge in extreme acts.  Maybe a sacrifice here or a stone thrown there but none of those grand “lets blast a few round of AK47s in a concert”.  Sure there are fanatical elements in Hinduism but extremism is taking it too far.  Unlike riots which are immediate and reactionary in nature, extremism leads to well thought acts of destruction as in Paris.  It is not fair to compare Alexander with Aurangazeb (I am not sure which of the two would be feel insulted with this comparison).

The Paris incident and the BJP not winning Bihar elections brought a lull to intolerance to intolerance storm.  Modi was yesterday’s hero; the press had newer one.  The ever charming Lalu, the angry old leader Nitish, the man of the messes Kejriwal, the atomic Didi and the American returned Akhilesh were the new hopes of India.  Lalu's ninth and twelfth failed sons with that hope-dope of the future were the shining stars of youthful democracy.  The media and in a few instance social media started singing praises for these shining stars of 2019.  I hope that the Mayans have missed the end of the world by few years and that the world would end by 2019.

I did not realize that I missed intolerance’s Arnold-ish “I will be back”. Coincidentally, A is for Arnold, A is for Aamir Khan and A is for that stinky place too.   Aamir Khan possibly figures in every Indians best actors list.  For a long time, he also seemed to be a perfect human being - a good and concerned citizen.  If Aamir had made that statement a few years ago, it would have made many of us reassess our thoughts.  But Aamir's personal reputation has not been the same for the past decade or so.  There were talks of affairs and a child abroad.  He separated from his long standing wife and soon got married again. I have no issues with these if I was thinking of Aamir the actor.  But these thoughts are not good enough for me to appreciate or even tolerate Aamir the social activist. Personally, I found his actions during the Narmada Bachao Andolan disappointing.  Initially it was impressive to see him sit in the dharna supporting the farmers.  He seemed genuinely concerned about the dam effects on the fate of the small farmers.  Many of us were touched and had a tear in our eyes.  A few days later, the ever vigilant media vilified today’s hero with the news that Aamir would lose some of his ancestral property as a result of the dam.  Suddenly a chink appeared in Aamir's golden armor of selflessness.  He put on the Lagaan hat and became a farmer's grandson whose genes have been tuned to understand the pain of a farmer.  Many faces emerged in the broken mirror.  It is not wrong to be selfish but to mask selfishness with selflessness is quite a cheat.  Apparently, it only takes a misstep to get to the bottom of the goodness hill regardless of how high one is.

Aamir continued his concerned citizen act with Satyamev Jayate and had the whole nation in tears.  The success of the programme and his movies made Aamir feel like a God.  He now believes he knows the ultimate truth and now can will others to utter it too.  His words seem to be the worst among all the tolerant servants of Gods.  Sadly, he does not come in and say that he finds this place intolerable to live due to all the intolerance (is that a paradox?).   He generously brings in his Hindu wife’s name and casually mentions a bedroom conversation in public.  The point to note is the Hinduness of his wife.  She finds it intolerable and that is good enough for us to realize how pathetic India is.  The country has become so dangerous that she want to move out of here.  I wonder which safe country she has in  mind when she says she wants to move.  On the day of this momentous disclosure, Russian jets were brought down by Turkey and the worry of World War III was in the air. A few days earlier, an African-American was shot 16 times by cops.  A week or so earlier, ISIS gunned down over 100 people in Paris. As a result Muslims around the world were facing many unfriendly situations.  Switzerland had banned the use of hijab in public places.  A few weeks later, a couple of Pakistani origin shot a number of innocent Americans in California.  A friend had mentioned that sometimes it is scary living in US because they are not quite sure who is going to get out a gun and start shooting.  I don’t think Mrs. and Mr. Khan are stupid enough not to know of these occurrences.  So how do they think there is a safer place than India somewhere on this messy planet?  Aamir himself was strip searched and interrogated at Chicago in 2002 as a result of his name.  The dream destination of many Indians is definitely not the comfortable place for Mrs. and Mr.Khan.

But there is something more hurtful than Khans statement!  I don’t too much about that guy’s personal beliefs and morals to take his seemingly intellectual statement seriously.  What hurts me more is the kind of support many people extend to this ridiculous statement.  While the common people on the social media have been tearing the ever selfish Khan to pieces our dear journalist and media persons continue to talk about freedom of expression and intolerance.  The statement "with great power comes great responsibility" should be remembered by all these people in power.  Aamir is a person with a lot of power and while he has the freedom to express what he wants, he should express it responsibly.  He cannot make populist statements to be a part of the intelligentsia (all of whom have decided to be journalists and media persons).  Unfortunately, we the common people of India don't have a choice but be embarrassed about being a Hindu, Muslim, forward caste, Dalit, north Indian, Madrasi and a million other things.  Some of us write, not very well, and put these words in blogs that no one reads.  Others express it much better and get noticed by many as in the case of this link.

Probably for the first time in the nation’s history, we have a PM who seems to care about the nation.  He does not have a family trying to loot the country or let the country into dynastic rule.  He has a tough task ahead of him in first attempting to change the nation's attitude.  Only then can he think of trying to achieve anything.  Not many in his party support him in the endeavor, which makes things tougher.  To complicate matters further, he cannot make enemies inside the party and at the same time has the tough task of making his party seem intelligent.  We have to support him for our country to be successful.  Instead what do we do - we indulge in absurdities, we build stories about the downfall of Narendra Modi.  We wait for him to fail.  Even if he fails, I am sure he will move on but I am not so sure about the country.  Just this morning, the news was showing how the Congress ridiculing the parliament by sloganeering in Rajya Sabha.  The reason, their beloved leaders are summoned by the court.  How dare these jokers treat their leaders like first among equals?  Can’t people file a case against these two and should they not appear before the court?  How can we let jokers with such absurd mentality come back and rule this country?  Or do we expect an odd-even prime minister for the nation?  The rest are not even worth a discussion.

When will all these tolerant intelligentsia understand we don't have a bloody choice!