Our sense of justice and fairness is being questioned every day and there are enough examples to prove it, Ayodhya movement, Babri demolition, Shah Bano case, Mandal agitation and Gujarat riots. Sometimes I feel that we need healers and peacemakers more than politicians, technocrats or economists, if we want happy faces around us.
Personally, I would like to see Saudis allowing construction of churches and mandirs in their kingdom, fundamentalists in Pakistan sending Diwali greetings to Indians, Shiv Sainiks sending Eid greetings to Pakistanis, Israelis and Arabs sharing meals and many more such things. Secular, atheists, people with a religious bent, all living together without being judgmental. All this is too complicated and wise men amongst us choose the simple answers to the questions of life.
If you are an Indian, all Pakistanis are terrorists and if you are a patriotic Pakistani, you have to believe that the whole purpose of an Indian’s existence is to finish everything Pakistani. Not logical but definitely simpler. Hafiz Sayyed represents Pakistanis and Bal Thackeray is the true representative of India. Forget about the Asma Jahangirs, Ansar Abbasis of Pakistan. Also forget that Jaswant Singh and LK Advani of the so called communal and right wing Indian Political party praised Jinnah publicly and in the process lost their jobs. If you are a Congress supporter, all the ills and even goodness which hurts Congress is RSS agenda and if you are a BJP supporter, Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi are responsible for everything which is not right in the country. Imam Bukhari the saviour of democratic institutions, simplifies everything by talking about Bharat Mata Ki Jai and Vande Mataram, whatever the topic being discussed is irrelevant. Mayawati ji talks about anti dalit and manuwadi forces, subject is irrelevant again. Even Julian Assange could not escape being called Anti dalit. Arundhati Roy is another favourite of mine, she finds a great conspiracy in everything, including Anna’s anti corruption drive.
Masses are swung from one extreme to the other in their assessments about what their country is supposed to be by our electronic media and the “analysts”. The so called saviours of faith (Saffron and green both) are allowed to spread venom. The bigger tragedy here is that we can find young college and university students in this lot, some of whom are not even living in India. They have some wonderful heroes to choose from depending on which extreme they believe in. Narendra Modi is either the infallible hero and can do no wrong or is a communal murderer who can do no right. Nitish Kumar’s word is either Gospel truth or all that he has achieved for Bihar is because of BJPs support. Rahul Gandhi is either the Avatar who is the last hope of all Indians or is all out to ruin mother India. You have to hate somebody if you are alive and show that you have a mind of your own. Thanks to the internet these fanatics actually find an audience.
All this gives rise to hopelessness, but I believe there is always something waiting around the corner. There is no logic behind this hope but some day sense will prevail. As the economic condition of the masses will improve, people will worry more about improving their socio economic conditions and vote bank politics will not work. Divisive politics in the name of caste, creed, religion will be redundant.
from Vishesh :)
from Reema :)
