Republic At 66
By Poonam I Kaushish
How does one feel on Republic day, today? Rather how is one supposed to feel? Patriotic? About what? Pride? Forget it. Satisfied? Far from it. Joy? Sure, it’s a holiday. That, my dear, compatriot is what 26 January boils down to. Just another chutti to do your own thing. Nothing more nothing less. Sixty six years which embody the joy and tragedy of India!.
New Delhi is under a heavy cloak of security as our leaders go through the same stereotype motions mechanically. President Mukherjee unfurls the tricolour at Rajpath, followed by a Parade displaying the country’s military might. Fighter planes streak in a befitting grand finale. People’s chest puff up with momentary national pride. Later in the afternoon, the President entertains the mighty and powerful to tea in Rahtrapati Bhavan’s resplendent Mughal Gardens. The Governors follow identical rituals in their States. Spotlighting the outward symbols of India’s unity.
So far so good. Yet sharp questions arise at home and abroad about the health of the Republic. Let’s start with terror which has become an albatross around India’s neck. Forget Pakistan’s home grown terrorist brood of Laskar e Toiba, Hizbul Mujahindeen, Jaish e Mohammad et al today we are in the cross fire of the ISIS too.
Last week over 14 IS sympathizers were arrested underscoring, the terror dance continues despite Pakistan promising to reining its non-State militants. No matter our Home Minister doesn’t tire of stating we will give them muah torj jawwab!
Equally worrisome is the fact that 15 States are Naxalitehit and there are 40 Naxalite groups active in India. Having links with Pakistan’s ISI and the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) making even the semblance of governance difficult in half the country. Worse, they are running a state within a state with a parallel revenue income. While various State Governments grapple in the dark on how to get the better of them. Alas, tribal life comes cheap.
Economically, the country is on the roll. There is international cacophony that India has arrived, with billions rolling in foreign direct investment. The stock market has never had it so good. IT-related business is booming. The demand for India “techies and neties” far outstrips the supply. Start-Up, Stand-Up India are the new buzzword. Connectivity is the latest mantra. Infrastructure and development are fashionable. Malls and high rise buildings dot the landscape and cars clog the roads. Even rural India is improving. Internet cafes and beauty parlours, branded consumables et al can be found in the villages.
Little consolation this! Look at the dark side: The widening communal divide mirrors the deep crevices in our secular image, proof that our social polity is now gripped in its cancerous tentacles. Violence has become the rhetoric of the time, killing yet another signpost of our enfeebled enforcement machinery. A new cult establishing an order of hatred and rage wherein one man’s food is another man’s poison. A succinct testimony to the ongoing maelstrom over growing intolerance. From love jihad, beef ban, anti-Pakistan cultural-sports protests to killing of rationalists, Hyderabad University has earned the ignominy of being the new hot bed of hatred following the suicide of Dalit student Rohith Vemula which has set India aflame once again resulting in a political slugfest all trying to cash in on his death. Predictably, while the Congress led-Opposition held aloft the banner of the Sangh Parivar’s growing intolerance painting Rohit’s demise due to the BJP’s antiDalit stand and accusing the Government of pursuing a “Hindutva agenda”.
There is political disquiet over Modi’s failure to curb his rabid Hindutva brigands who stand accused of Rohit’s demise. His crime? Acerbic views on Hindutva and using Telugu’s equivalent of English swear word **** to denounce it, along-with protesting against the hanging of 1992 Mumbai blasts perpetrator Yakub Memon for which he paid with his life. Should this become litmus of one’s patriotism?’ How does merely criticizing a belief or thinking tantamount to spreading “hatred”?
See how Bollywood’s Amir Khan has been replaced by Amitabh Bachhan and Priyanka Chopra in the Incredible India media campaign simply because Khan’s wife said they could consider moving to another country due to the growing intolerant climate in India. And Shah Rukh Khan cornered on what it is to be a Muslim in India, leading him to say he was a proud Indian.
Raising a moot point: Is India heading towards an era of political intolerance and Hindutva values thrust down our throats? ‘It’s my way or highway’ attitude? Is the polity afraid of the clash of ideas in our public life? Has are ruling netagan lost their ability to handle criticism? Bordering on a narcissist Hindu phobia?
Undoubtedly, far from being tolerant and turning a cheek to varying opinions it would seem that we are determined to turn most things into a bone of contention. In an era of political correctness and ethnic sensitivity, where fundamentalists march as patriots in uniform, a wry irreverence, or a tongue-in-cheek reference, becomes an act of “hatred”. Life is lived in the slim strip called the official.
This apart, another notable failure of the Government is its inability to bring down prices. Every visit I make to the market for vegetables, oil, sugar, wheat and dal-chawal, the prices have risen by a minimum of Rs 2-Rs 10. That it is the annual summer season does not cut ice; the Congress parroted the same dialogue.
Worse, the NDA has increased taxes. Service tax has gone up from 12.3% to 14%. Why? It makes accounting simpler, assert finance mandarins. Not for them the fact it has a cascading affect on family budgets. Think. A simple visit to buy soap, toothpaste, food-stuff will set you back by at least a couple of hundred bucks a month, resulting in a housewife’s budget going for a toss. Add to this rising water and electricity bills which continue to give a tough time to the common man. More. The Finance Minister has imposed luxury tax of 2% on even daily necessities like getting a haircut. Realtors are crying foul. A buyer of an Rs 25 lakhs flat will have to shell out Rs 10,500 more. This is bound to lead to a slowdown instead of propelling growth. Any wonder, Modi is perceived as pro-rich.
Sadly, beyond the financial might of overflowing tillers of Brand India, lies the squalor and the filth that is the reality of asli Bharat. The less said the better of the poor kisans. The polity’s callous and lackadaisical reaction to farmers suicide says it all. Compensation is virtually non-existent. Shamefully, in the last year alone, over 16,500 farmers have committed suicide, epitomising the country’s ennui to its farmers.
Compounding matters, with over 65% of the population working in agriculture, instead of beefing up their lives the Government’s Land Acquisition Bill has got caught in the GovernmentOpposition cross hairs of proanti farmer lobby. With none willing to take up cudgels for those who put food on our table. Simply, because kisans per se do not constitute a vote block, divided according to sub castes.
All in all, Republic Day is a time for honest soul searching. Time has come for our netas to turn a new page and invest in its citizens genuinely, people who make this nation, their education, health, jobs and in their future. Specially, as he system faces it’s greatest-ever crisis even as our people are urged to revel in the “feel-good factor” waiting for ache din to arrive. We Indians deserve a lot better. (INFA).