Patricia Mukhim
Someone has right said, “Being late does not make you an important or special person. Whoever you are doesn’t reserve you the right to be late.”
We used to be a society that did not know the meaning of class and the VIP culture. Thanks to a misreading of the Indian Constitution, today every elected representative or any head of any institution feels he/she has the right to take the citizens for granted. I am saying this from the context of a citizen who attends sundry meetings and has to wait for a VIP to arrive at every meeting before things get going. In recent times one has been to several such gathering /functions where the VIPs were late, not by a few minutes by over an hour. The wait for the chief guest at the recently held seminar organized by the ICSSR to launch the ASEAN Study Centre at the Convention Centre, NEHU ran to over 90 minutes while we all sat fiddling our thumbs as if we had nothing better to do. The VIP who was the chief guest did not consider it important to apologise and neither did the organizers consider it their duty to explain the delay. It’s taken for granted that the VIP has the right to be late and lesser mortals have the right to wait.
This week there were two functions where in each of them the Chief Guest as usual turned up late. One was the inaugural function of the North East AgroBusiness Trade (NEAT) organized by the North East Community Resource Management Project (NERCORMP) an NEC-IFAD collaboration and the other was the Get Together for Harmony organized by the Central Puja Committee. The chief guests for both functions turned up late as usual. For the first function a number of students were invited to fill up the Soso Tham auditorium and they were seated there since 12.30 pm. Being a captive audience and school children they could hardly protest. Out of deference for the organizers some of us arrived five minutes before the scheduled time of 1 pm. At 1.30 pm the compere announced that the chief guest had arrived. But instead of coming to the hall since he was already late, the VIP went to the stalls to see the goods exhibited. I guess the organizers from NERCORMP were too beholden to the VIP to even tell him that there were people waiting in the hall and that he was already late by 30 minutes. Seeing this utter disregard for punctuality some of us decided to leave the venue. That was one way to protest this nauseas VIP culture.
At the CPC get together too one tried to arrive by 3.40 pm since the programme was scheduled to start at 3.45 pm. And when a VIP is expected at any function the common person is always warned to be seated at least 10 minutes before the Honorable arrives. So people were seated well before time (at least most people who respect themselves and respect time were seated by 3.30 -340. The invitation said the function would start at 3.45 pm. It finally started at 4.15 pm. This is a travesty of discipline and respect for other peoples’ time. We have arrived at a point in history when time is at a premium and people are busy. No one is just sitting around waiting for an invitation to a function unless one is a social butterfly. So to take the audience for granted and to expect them to stand and welcome a late-arriving VIP is to me a mockery of everything I have learnt in school and at home.
People who are invited as VIPs to a function must understand that it is the Chair they are currently occupying which is being respected here and not their personal bearings. So if they arrive late at any function they are discrediting the positions they hold and perhaps prove, inadvertently that they are not worthy of the positions they hold. A VIP can never claim that he/she was held up in a traffic jam since the roads are cleared and sanitized for that worthy to travel on. Hence being late is not an excuse. But perhaps there is a degree of chauvinism that is operating at some psychological level that this is a tribal state and the tribal audience should jolly well wait to be given a lecture by those whom the Gods have blessed to be born elsewhere other than a in a casteless society. This, to my mind plays a big role in the manner in which VIPs take their responsibilities.
But there are VIPs and VIPs. Some are too well groomed and genteel to make their audience wait. This whole culture of informing a VIP that the hall is not yet full and hence he should not be making appearance is something very Indian too and the rigmarole must have emanated from some ego-driven individual sitting in Government House at some point in time. If a VIP is told that a function is starting at 4 PM and the audience is asked to be seated by 3.50 PM then the VIP should be in the hall at 4 PM whether or not the hall is full. The programme should start with the audience already seated. Those who lack self respect and enter late to a function should also be shown their place. This kowtowing to VIPs and cool acceptance of late comers has become Meghalaya’s bane. No wonder we are unable to progress. How can a state with an elite that’s lacking in punctuality and a citizenry that disrespects discipline ever make progress?
We waste so much time waiting for VIPs to arrive at sundry functions that if we were to count those minutes they would run into hundreds of precious hours. I can’t recall any meeting I have attended in recent times which has started on time. We are late for appointments. At meetings we beat around the bush because we are unprepared and never really get to the point. We give long-winded speeches because of the sense of self-importance and because we love to hear our own voices.
In this respect the Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi does not tolerate filibustering. He wants people to come to the point. We experienced this when as a group at the National Security Advisory Board (NSAB) we had to make a presentation on a potential security doctrine for India. Our chairperson was a seasoned diplomat but even he suffered the jitters before making this presentation knowing that Mr Modi has time neither for bureaucratese or pleonasts (someone who uses more words than necessary). Indeed many of us speak a lot without saying anything much. In other words there is no substance in what we speak, whether this is in a church or a formal function. The sub-text of our speech is empty rhetoric. It becomes a colossal waste of collective time if we multiply the number of people in the audience by the time taken in each function we attend.
So what do we do then? Continue with “business as usual” and molly-cuddle our VIPs just because they are VIPs and never let their consciences prick them when they keep hundreds of people waiting? If a VIP does not understand that he is wasting everyone’s time by arriving late at a function then does he deserve to hold that dignified position? I wonder who has the courage to break the protocol by starting a function on time and calling a young person from the audience to be the chief guest. But I guess we will never get there because we are too beholden to the VIP for favours of all kinds! So long live VIPism and long live Patronage Democracy!