India My India!

Every August 15,there is a sudden deluge of articles about the legacy of Mother India and our achievements post-1947.Even niche magazines like "Anna Nagar Post" come up with celebratory writeups eulogising our nation.Keeping with the trend,here is my piece of wisdom:

This year's I-day comes in the wake of bad news across the Indian heartland."Common wealth games" have become "Individual Wealth games"(Witty Vengayya Naidu).Kashmiri youth are interpreting rising unemployment as a justifiable reason for separatism.Children pelt stones at CRPF men.A national party stands by a tainted criminal involved in a fake encounter killing.Naxalites blow up trains at will.A Union minister declares war against Naxalites while another joins hands with them at Lalgarh.The PM has comfortably disappeared out of the mediaspace.A holistic solution is needed to address the above issues.The typical Indian response of forming GoMs,Joint Parliamentary Committees and convening an All-party meet can make powerful headlines in "The Hindu" but will not go beyond that.

The news that Rs.300 crores have been diverted from SC/ST funds for the CWG raises age-old questions on "Entertainment Vs Development".Conducting a flawless CWG will definitely boost India's image vis-a-vis China's Olympics success in 2008."When millions are suffering without food.." is an argument which will not sell now.These questions should have been raised way back in 2003.With 2 months to go for the Games,this public mudslinging amounts to lack of common-sense.The charges of corruption against Kalmadi and team should not be blown out of proportions.Kalmadi is,after all,a typical Indian.(Assuming that all allegations are true.No smoke without fire).The investigations can wait till October 14.The whole world is watching and we are dancing nude.India cannot become a superpower without maturity.

Kashmir has meant trouble right from 1947.One can envisage chaos everywhere.The old theories of Pakistan fuelling the separatist feelings of Kashmiris lay exposed.A Hurriyat leader asks:"First they said the guns came from Pakistan.Will they now say the stones came from pakistan too?"Boys barely out of schools are found engaged in damaging public property.The State and Central governments accentuate the troubles with their indifference to the fiasco.Repressive measures like "Armed Forces Special Powers Act" will bring more stones onto the streets.Yes,An Azad kashmir will not survive.But after 63 years of failed regimes,it is worth a try.What Gandhi instructed to Britishers("Leave India to God or even to anarchy") must apply to Kashmir too.

I initially sympathised with Naxalites.When we talk peace with Pakistanis,why to fight our own people?The support of such social activists has emboldened Naxalites extremely.They blow up buses and trains.Killing civilians is a shocking new face of Naxalites' warfare.Naxalites are a product of inequitable distribution of wealth.A more development-oriented approach by the respective state governments can help things.The respect given for mining companies(like "Vedanta") should be given to the people displaced by them.A nation's development is not possible by killing it's own people.But that still does not justify the extremist approach of the Naxalites.Arundhati Roy and PC should realise that both of them are wrong.But no one,including this blogging youngster,knows what is correct then.

This article stands in sharp contrast to what I wrote last year.But I could not help it.We need to introspect and settle issues.It is a pity that even after 63 years,survival remains our country's only major achievement.