India of my dreams!

Growing up I always used to wonder what it will be like to have a nation without any regional, religious and political biases. Would it be difficult for us as Indian's to ever make a society minus all these? Can we ever live in a society which is not hypocritical in nature and more discriminate of its people than the US? Then, I used to think to myself, yes it is possible and it is doable, and, I, as an individual will make a difference.

 

15 years hence, my views stand corrected! The reasons for this change are the recent terror attacks that 'my' country has faced. These attacks have questioned the very essence that our country stands for "freedom"; our freedom to live & to fight back. These attacks have proved one thing to me – "we are not safe in our own homes".

 

I have had the privilege of spending some time out of India and upon my return a number of my friends and colleagues questioned my decision of returning to my country and suggested that I had made a mistake by coming back. According to them, countries apart fromIndia are better, as they offer a better "way of life", of course with "monetary benefits". However, what they do not realize is that if you are working abroad, you are earning your living in their currency, so how are things any better? Moreover, the cost of living in almost all developed nations is far higher than that of India. Anyways, my argument to them at that time was that, "there is no better place in the world than your own home". Quite philosophical, but true, yet I stand corrected again!

 

Off late, there has been enough and more debate on the state of our STATE, it's internal and external security and a lot of questions have erupted out of this debate; one of them being that the state of our politicians couldn't get sadder. As much as I agree with the sentiments of my fellow citizens, I am compelled to ask a question to all of them, including myself – Do we have an option but to elect the illiterate, criminal and old filth that has plagued our political system? Will I want to enter politics myself to clean up the mess and provide a fresh perspective to this line of profession? In my various discussions with a number of people coming from different walks of life, of late, the answer to the 2^nd question has been a long drawn silence of thought and to the former one, has been a prompt, non thought of response basically stating that these guys should be put in front of a firing squad and shot dead or that this country should be cleaned of these parasites. Well quite interesting thoughts, however quite unpractical and illogical, if exercised, would force me to come back to the 2^nd question or better still raise a new one – Are we ready for Marshal Law?

 

It is quite understandable that we are angry and agitated postNovember 26, 2008 with the way our politicians have behaved and their actions or should I say the lack of any! What I do not understand is that, are they the only ones to blame? Truly, what have you or I done in the past 60 odd years of our Independence to make it otherwise? Are we not to be blamed as citizens of this great nation or is it just for the politicians to face our wrath? Will we ever stop this blame game and look at solving a deep routed problem of religious bias and territorial enmity that we have within the state? Will we ever look at, if we have done our bit? It pains me to say that "I am an Indian" and frankly I am ashamed to say that as an Indian, I really cannot think of one thing that I could proudly say I would have done for this great nation. I do not have any answers to any of the questions that I would have raised above or the many billion that the million other citizens would have raised till date and I am ashamed of myself.

 

We are talking about concrete action to be taken against Pakistanand I couldn't agree more on this, but something like 'carpet bombing' a neighboring state and killing innocent lives is not the answer to our problems! Post 26-11, people said that when 9-11 happened in the US, the US waged a war against Iraq, Afghanistan, and the Al-Queda. A fact, but then the resultant affect was seen by the Bush administration. In fact, I was watching We the Peopleon NDTV post 26-11 and someone said that when 9-11 happened in theUS, they responded back with an attack on Iraq & Afghanistan and Barkha (Dutt) said yes they did, but it backfired for the Bush admin. The point that should have been made on this should have been that, it backfired 'cause Bush used 9-11 as a reason to attack Iraq (a must longed dream of his father!) and the terrorists were in Afghanistan & Pakistan, so why did innocent people (both US & Iraq) lose their lives over Iraq? But then that's another debate for another time! Right now what we should learn from the US is that they suffered in 9-11, and so did a number of other nationalities and they decided on sending a clear cut message to the world. A message of – Do not mess around with 'US'! What is stopping us from sending a similar message? Why are we getting so scared? Who are we scared off? Why are we so dependent on the US to bail us out or help us in this time? Are we so weak that we need someone else to speak on our behalf? – "Not the India I had dreamt off"

The Plastic Debate

What I find extremely constipating about this country is that we as Indian’s just cannot deal with certain rules and regulations; and especially not those which are meant for our own benefit. Take the ‘ban on use of plastic bags’ for instance. It is a known fact (although I have been aware of it from my school days!) that our environment is in a complete mess and thanks to the screw up of some developed nations (read USA), the whole world has to get together and rattle their (almost non-existent) brains in trying to sort out this mess.

As a step towards this initiative, members of our great (Democratically elected?) government and of course their hugely supportive members from our bureaucracy, early this month, announced the ban on the use of plastic bags in retail stores. As much as this topic was in discussion for the past few years and I do remember reading about it, the government finally managed to issue a law banning the use of plastic bags in Delhi this year. What I fail to understand is that what is the big deal with this law? Is it not passed by the government with the right intentions, although it might have been done in too much of a hurry not considering the repercussions of it? Is it not going to help in the conservation of our environment? Using a bit of commonsense, the answers to the above questions are quite clear to me, then why such a ruckus around this law?

Well, the way I see it, the problem lies with both the law maker as well as the public. Law maker’s because they have decided to implement a law without clearly planning for it. They plan on exterminating the use of plastic bags from across all retail outlets, lay a heavy penalty on the people flouting the law, but no provision of providing an alternative to these hazardous bags. The shoppers in the city go shopping, mostly do not carry their own bags to bring back the merchandise purchased, for various reasons, too cumbersome, or just plain not Cool, could be two that come to mind! The shops stop keeping plastic bags, so how do shoppers carry their purchase up to their cars or back home? Simple problem, no solution!

Alternatively, the public is to be blamed because we refuse to carry something as simple as jute or any other form of bag when we go shopping and then loose our heads at the shopkeepers for not being able to cater to something as simple as a carry bag. Well, if it was something as simple then I would love to ask the citizens of this city as to what is stopping them from carrying it with them when they leave their homes in the first place?

And just so that we are clear, I am as much a part of this junta as anyone else as even I have been stranded at various instances without a carry bag – I’m no saint!

The other day I was at Shopper’s Stop located in a plush South Delhi mall and there I saw the employees at the cash register packing the purchase of the shoppers in branded plastic bags. At an instance one of my acquaintances asked me, deliberately in front of the employee, “how come these guys are still giving plastic bags; do they not come under purview of the new law?” Well, before I could react to this question, one of the other shoppers turned around and said, “kya bhai saahab (read What Man!), these outlets belong to big and powerful people, you really think any law would be able to stop them from doing business, in our country?” At the same time I noticed the expression at the employee at the cash register and he had a sly smirk on his face. Could mean anything, but I’m not sure if benefit of doubt is something that would be appropriately applicable for him! 

I noticed a similar case at another popular outlet in Delhi, 24*7, where immediately after this law was put in place, they started charging a measly Re. 1 on the bill to give you your purchase in a plastic bag. On my enquiry the employee said, “We are not giving it to all customers, we ask our customers if they need a bag and if they say yes, we charge them Re. 1 for it.” Wow, what a brilliant idea of making money and a mockery of the law, all at once! Which moron would actually refuse paying Re. 1 and getting a plastic bag in return to carry his / her groceries?

Why, I ask? The last I heard about the laws of the land, they were supposed to be the same for everyone. Then why is it that this law is applicable to the round-the-corner kirana stores and not to the large scale shopping centers? Would love to get an answer to this, if anyone has any!

Now we hear that our great leaders are planning on introducing a new kind of plastic bag, which will be woven using old, ragged plastic. Let’s see what this new initiative and urban planning of our government gets with it!

Up Your's!

I just couldn’t stop laughing this morning after I saw the headlines in most of the English dailies of the country. As much as the news on the first page surrounded the subject of the 15^th Lok Sabha elections of this “great” democracy of ours, the pictorial representation in most of the publications was that of the celebrities casting their votes in Mumbai yesterday. Now isn’t that something that India really wants to read about; but then that calls for another entry on the working style of our media industry.

Well coming back to the topic of the 15^th Lok Sabha elections and the headlines. I was quite impressed with the graphic representation of the finger which symbolizes someone actually casting his / her vote. Interestingly, over the years it has always remained the index finger; however this year the Election Commission seems to have thought to make voting a bit of fun and have chosen the middle 

finger over the other four to symbolize this! And guess what, their response to this choice is – Mr. Shekhar Channe, joint electoral officer, said that the index finger was marked during the recent bypolls, Zila Parishad and council elections. To avoid complications, they decided on the middle finger. (Source: DNA, May 1, 2009/ Picture Courtesy: Mr. BL Soni.DNA)

How dumb do these guys think the citizens of this country are? No really, that is the lamest excuse I have heard in ages. I’m sure that’s not the real reason. Instead, someone senior in the Election Commission would have thought of sharing his views on the state of the Indian politicians but really did not have the balls (read guts!) to go up to even one of them and say it. And thought what better a way to convey this but through a large percentage of the billion population – lead by our ever willing list of celebrities - through just a symbol! Now this is just a theory, you really do not need to take it seriously.

But whoever came up with this idea, Sir / Ma’am you have my deepest regard and I applaud you for coming up with this brilliant idea. What better a way to get the Indian public into the polling booth and in a united tone say Up Yours Mr. Minister (s)!