WARNING:

 

This article may contain matters which could cause grief to some persons, communities or countries. This article is definitely intended to spot at them. If it hurts them, so should it. After all, its intention is to bond everyone together. I have tried to make this article interactive to the readers with sudden twists in its thinking at various junctures, before they could get into one type of conclusion. Readers are requested to read the article completely to get the clear picture of the thought behind it, before showing any disputes against it. I have never compromised to anything at any stage; every aspect in the article is important to me and everything is direct from my heart. I am ready to take on arguments against any matter in the article. If severe debate occurs anywhere due to this article, please bring it to my notice. Please take this article with right spirits.

 

 

INDIA AND INDIANS

 

 

Be prepared to take on the initial Outburst…

 

“INDIA” – It needs a foreigner to give a name to such a great country. A historically rich nation doesn’t know how to preserve its history. Why is the word secularism booming across this country only, when each of the other countries has only one dominant religion practiced in them? I disagree if people give example of countries like USA. Is USA truly cosmopolitan? Which other religion other than Christianity is followed widely in USA? (May be there could be some temples and mosques here and there) Even the Non-Christian people living there are following Christian (or Modern?) culture in some way. Which language other than English has true-official status in USA? People going to such places have to definitely alter their lifestyles (not just economically) and blindly accept some of their principles. It is wrong if some people think that USA is a blend of all cultures and is a modern culture. Actually it is under the control of an anonymous old hand. People migrating there might just be happy with the economic support that it provides. So, is there any other country like India where we could see almost everything existent through out this world, giving a satisfaction of true-life colors?

 

The GREAT HINDU DYNASTIES could not defend the attack of foreigners. Did they follow AHIMSA (non-violence) then itself, I don’t know. So, “we create Himsa among ourselves when we need to live peacefully” and “follow Ahimsa when someone attacks us or when we want freedom”, is it not coward-ness? People from every part of the world invaded us (Here the word “us” implies to only the people deserving to be called so). When every one were going out of their limits and attacking other places, we struggled to at least defend ourselves.

 

Most of our history books contain stuffs like how the Mughals attacked us, how the British people ruled us. But the original Hindu tradition is forgot, lost and treated as just beautiful epics in the story books or considered as fantasy elements, it’s realistic values are seldom recognized. When we go to other countries, they want us to change our lifestyles. (They give the name “MODERNISM” to it). If Hindus try inter-religion marriage, they need to convert to other religions. Even today religion conversion racket is going on in India.

 

            I am not telling Hinduism is a great religion. First of all, the definition of “HINDU” itself is ambiguous. Hindus know how to create ethnic divisions, sub-ethnic divisions, castes, sub-castes, sub-sub-castes, etc., but never understand the main portrait of Hinduism. Other religions also have categories under them, but they get united and make noise when foreign-religions attack them, whereas Hindus make noise within themselves and become numb when foreign-religions attack them.

 

Oops… Am I becoming too religious??? Relax…

 

Religion is not only confined to myth of belief in God, but also it reflects on the social life of a community in a nation. It can bring about evenness among the people.

 

I think the fellow Muslims, Christians and NRIs might be deciding to stop reading the article.

Hang on, hang on… Sooner, I hope you will all be along my side.

 

You would probably not find any better person who respects Islam as much as I do. We never let you people (Muslims) to go away from us NOW, even if you wish. How can you miss out on the responsibility of rebuilding Future-India? All you need is to get some simple things corrected like, “Never support Pakistanis when Indians play cricket against them”, “Never bark when our PM visits Israel”, “Never interfere (Individually or as a Union) when our Government discusses at top level about the terrorist activities in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq etc. You have to accept them as better diplomats and allow them to take their own decisions” and so on. If you want to be considered as Indians you ought to follow these strictly. You have to just forget about Foreign-Muslims, let them do whatever they want – it’s their problems, your job is to just worry about Indians. Of course, if anybody in any part of the world is in trouble, you can show concern, but don’t fill up religious colors to it. You will forever be TRUE-INDIANS if you understand these feelings and people like me will definitely visit your mosques at times (if we are allowed) and seek Allah’s grace.

           

There definitely should be something really good with the principles of Christianity; otherwise it would probably not have encouraged so many of our people to get converted to that religion. After all, we Indians are always ready to accept good deeds from any religion and encourage every religion, that’s our CULTURE (not religion).

 

Forget religions, Take a swing back…

 

Do we know what we have with us??? We have the best culture, best languages, best climate (we have the best weather variations from hot to cold), best skin colors (don’t get fooled by western colors – treat them as some skin disease and respond strongly to their complexion-sledging), best food (not like dry breads or half-cooked meat).

 

Do we find anybody wearing Sari or Dhoti in Pakistan or USA? But we find here all sorts of things right from Salvars, Burkas… to low-waist jeans. Saris are soon becoming Ethnic day’s dress-code. Why should we blindly follow others’ principles mistaking those to modernism? I know today’s people would argue that they feel comfortable with such dresses. These people should be sent to the farms or village-kitchens to check out what dress is comfortable? But will they ever go there? (Or at least will they change the situations of people in villages?) I can prove scientifically that traditional Indian dresses not only cover the humps and dumps of the body, but also helps to give proper shape to the body, proper air-ventilation and good look. Clothes in any other part of the world would give poor ventilation causing health hazards and may damage the body-figure (May be it could suit their climates. But don’t we need to be ourselves?). In the only land where WOMEN ARE WORSHIPPED AS GODDESS, it is difficult to tolerate their acts today. At least when they cross certain age, they should show some maturity.

 

Certainly it is difficult to expect dramatic changes now, as it may just be a little too late (Undressed is also fashion today!)

 

Hey… Who is this Old man?  This should perhaps be your expression now, isn’t it?

 

Achchaa… If the beautiful KUDIS want to wear dangerously low - jeans or transparent tops, they are welcome! I too will wear nice Yankee T-shirt and loose Bermudas and will enjoy the free-sights offered, under dark-tint goggles. Come on BABES, who bothers? After all my body too has tasted salt and pepper.

 

Now let’s talk something serious…

 

The top three huge turnover-fields in our country are: POLITICS, CINEMA and CRICKET. Also these three fields can hold the nation’s reputation, culture and passion together. But there is an ambiguity here. No parents would encourage their kids to jump into these fields, as they think it would interfere with their studies, make them uncivilized or bring bad fame to their families. But when eventually somebody excels in these fields on their own interest, they receive full applause and become Superstars. Do people know the actual ethics behind these professions other than money-making or image-building?

 

Our middle-class people believe that there are only two valid professions, if some one is good in studies: Medicine and Engineering. If anybody tries to get into any other field, they are considered as big zeroes (May be some higher class families would encourage other profession, but is it enough?). Due to this reason, there is an uneven distribution of talent in the various fields. There should be no inferiority and superiority egos among the various fields, as each field has its own distinction. The brilliant talents become Doctors and Engineers and shift to foreign countries or MNCs and serve them. The average talents are happy as long as their individual life is settled somewhere, somehow. The below-average talents feel like the sky is falling on their heads. And the poor talents are roaming on the streets, least bothered about the society. So, who is going to think about our culture, our society and our problems?

 

We are borrowing so many western philosophies as I mentioned so far, but do we accept all their principles? Do we see people in Western countries mortifying some of the important professions such as Farming, Security, Marketing, etc., etc., but here they are all considered as degraded professions. For e.g., Truck driving is such a responsible job. The driver has to be alert all the time and should be properly educated to know the lane-disciplines. But in India, most truck drivers are drunkards and illiterates. This profession actually requires absolute prohibition of liquor. Check out how many road accidents are caused by them. Should we not be a little more serious about such things? Why not some trained connoisseurs jumps into such a profession and bring about some attentiveness (Just check out the profiles of some truck drivers in Australia, New Zealand). It’s high time that BIG PEOPLE think about such things rather than just looking at giving something to charities. There needs to be an absolute uniformity in the society. If good talents jump into every profession, automatically the competition and healthy atmosphere builds up, it causes alertness among the poor talents and brings the best out of them too. But the great Indians never want to follow these steps of the western people. I absolutely adore the work-culture and time-sense in Western countries.

 

Now I hope some of the NRIs understand my feelings…

 

But you have some work ahead of you. We are absolutely proud of you for flying our nation’s flag high; we admire your achievements and your effort in reaching those heights. But you should educate our people about the new technologies & strategies, rather than bringing us new fashions, trends, western-cuisines, foreign language-accents, etc. You got to be dedicated & patient to understand what your role actually is. I know this will not be easy for you, but it’s your country isn’t it?

 

Language issue…

 

First of all it is disappointing that I am writing this article in English, when there are far superior languages in our country. We Indians sadly need English to communicate with each other. Hindi is a superb spoken language. But it’s never going to be a good scriptural or good grammatical language. There are too many variants in Hindi and certainly it is difficult to find its purity. Also, the Hindi speaking people should understand the essence of other Indian languages. Hindi is never going to get any support in states like Kerala and Tamil Nadu. First of all, the literacy-count of the large Hindi-speaking community in India should improve. Do you find an official status for Hindi in USA, UN or even in any literature book and manuals of international electronic equipments?

 

More than the national language concept, I would like to suggest a different idea. We have many great languages which are each worth becoming a national language. We have an average of at least 5 Crore people speaking each of our languages, which is more or less similar to that of any European language. We have to compare our India with Europe and move in their path. There has to be a proper language exchange between the states. Whatever work we do should start from the state-level, controlled strictly by one official-regional language in each state (This should include education, science, technology everything). Then at the national-level all the states can communicate at a higher level (through state-representatives) in simple English. Then at the international-level, the top authorities can handle in pure English. That’s where English should get its preference. English is the best written language and the only technically feasible language in common business, but should not be forced at state-levels.

 

One last Jhalak…

 

                Our affectionate Sardarji was once at the London Airport, totally depressed. He had swallowed his own phlegm for the 10^th consecutive time in 10 minutes and was very upset. He could not find any secret place to discard it (He never knew that he could have used a dust-bin or a wash-basin or toilet for the purpose). Now he was angry, he carried the 11^th phlegm all the way through the flight without having any drink or food through out the journey. When the flight eventually landed at the Mumbai Airport, he was immensely happy and the first thing he did was of course to spit out the molten viscous substance at random places, with full liberty. People surrounding him, including the security personnel did raise their eye-brows. But Sardarji was least bothered and screeched with cleared throat, “Yeh, tho Hindustan hai… mera gyaarahve ballebaaz tho chakka uda liya (11^th batsmen have hit a sixer)” and started singing “Meri dhesh ki dharthi…”

 

 Sardarji found this luxury in this great country. He wondered what the sophisticated facilities in UK are meant for, when it was unable to invigorate his vocal-cords with such an ease. Of course our “dharthi” can tolerate plenty of such muck and also instantaneously forgive her children’s’ peccadilloes.

 

            You can take this Jhalak (self-image) whichever way you want and decide on “WHAT OUR COUNTRY HAS GIVEN TO US? WHAT WE HAVE GIVEN TO IT? AND ALSO HOW OUR COUNTRY SHOULD BE?”

 

O.K., I can understand… enough is enough…  I will leave you soon… (Before you start spitting at me)

Thank you for tolerating this long…

 

So... What is the conclusion???  What is the actual problem???  What is the solution???

 

There is nothing to conclude here - You may probably need to read the article again to understand the main thought behind the article. Each of you - yourselves should assess deep inside your heart what the problem is and what the solution would be (And that includes even me). Let us do something to rebuild India...

 

 

Hints to understand the article better:

 

Blue colored/Regular Paragraphs: Normal contents.

Red colored/Bold Lines: Interaction with the reader.

CAPS words and lines: Words and lines with special or ambiguous meanings.

Green colored/Italic Lines: Statement that would contradict another statement elsewhere.

 

And I will leave it to you to identify exactly which statement(s) contradict which other statement(s) to bring about the sudden twists. Also please try to understand these twists.

 

I am sorry if you couldn’t identify the color or font-style distinctions on your local machine.

 

 

Love you all,

 

SOMASHEKAR T

Bangalore

 

somashekart@yahoo.com