There is a very beautiful saying "Together we can and we will make a difference"
but after 61 years of precious and most awaited independence for which our ancestors stood against the British empire do we have really made a difference!
This question often strikes my mind but I am always unable to convince myself.
There are innumerable examples present in front of us..... so many day to-day happenings which often leads to a diversion in my idea about "have we really made a difference"???
Here I would present some examples which would examplify my thought procedures
Considering the PROS of the independent India
India, A country which is considered to be at the top of the list in case of heritage and culture, which is later proceeded by china with rich heritage and culture .... is considered to be at the top of the list later preceded by japan and china receptively. Many poets and literary people have described a lot about this country. Even foreigners like hune-stang also wrote many things about rich Indian culture and advanced teaching methodologies.
Because of its rich heritage there is a very famous saying "कोस कोस पे बदले पानी चार कोस पर वाणी"
Infact I think India is able to retain its rich culture and ethic values because of the people. They are the ones who have kept the ethics still alive even at this advance age of modernization.
India is one of the developing country which has shown drastic progress after the introduction of globalisation.
India is one the leading country in IT sectors. Indian manpower is world wide famous!
Its only in India where we experience seasonal changes in a beautiful manner!
It's only India which has given us big laureates like Amartya Sen, Bhattacharya, Kautilya and many more.
He was an Indian who worked with Einstein and invented 4th state of matter known as Bose-Einstein condensation.
Often our young scientists make us proud by winning various competitions like young scientists award and young mathematician.
It is India from where ladies like Kalpana chawla and Sunita williams have brought fame to there country because of there indispensable contribution to the field of aeronautics and engineering.
They are The Indians who invented IPL and brought a revolution in the field of cricket ;)
It's yoga, the old Indian callanetic, which has created awareness in the whole world and is also practiced widely today.
And the list goes on and on ....unendingly.
Now lets talk about the other face of the coin. Although people are familiar with this face of coin too but still I would like make some remarks!
Talking about India, A country which holds starling light position in the corruption chart!
A country which is rich in heritage but still they are in deplorable conditions (Infact its surprising to see that tourism holds one of the most important position in the revenue generation! but still no amendments are made to improve there condition)
A country where corruption is so widely present (both in a horizontal and vertical chain system that people have accepted it as a part of the society.) No work proceeds unless you keep a "hari patti" over the desk of the local babus
Day before yesterday I was reading an article written by shobha de in times of India "Mera bharat kahan" In that article she made a beautiful comparison between the miserable life of a girl who sells news papers in the street and the ONLY olympic winner of India, millionaire- Abhinav bindra (who continued shooting as a passion!)
These are the true facets of life which cannot be neglected any how!
This is not the end of the list, Next come the prevalent communalism which has nearly oops... already destroyed the peace of the beautiful kashmir valley!
Not only kashmir valley but other small areas and remote states like sikkim, aasam are also slowly and steadily joining the list!
After seeing and having a look at these innumerable examples of the two facets of the coin I am unable to draw the answer for the question "After 61 precious years of independence have we really made a difference"?
Is this the capability of India that after so many odds it is able to stand erect on the road of development OR it is the inability of India that are acting as hurdles in the road of development?
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17 comments:
A very well-versed blog!!
Yes we have really made the difference. Now, on the world forum countries listen to India. Its point of view can't be ignored anymore. Every country has problems so does India. If we look at the history of America, they were having the same problems like corruption, unemployment, racism etc and they still have but they keep check on them presently. India is facing the same thing and a day will come when we will become the most powerful country of the world. You can consider me real optimistic :o)
and yes it is really a very well written article :o)
Romans, Greeks, Egyptians and all older civilizations are in the museums, but Indian Civilization is still residing amongst her people. Hats Off to this greatest achievement.
When you say "Infact I think India is able to retain its rich culture and ethic values because of the people.", I feel that it was the women of India who were able to keep the rich culture of India intact. My salute to Indian Womenhood.
Basically it is the difference in the Attitude towards our women, which Swami Vivekanand has beautifully points out,"The Indian culture sees every woman in the image of a mother, while the western culture sees every woman in the image of a wife, a lover." This describes it all.
Have we any difference??? Yesterday, when I was returning from Almora, we boarded Kumaoun Express. It was a meter gauge train, very small and it was very difficult to sit straight when all the three berths were up. Suddenly I realized that We, as the entire Human Civilization have deifinitely come a long way in terms of Human Empowerment. Today how so many desparities we may see, but we have moved very close to the concept of Equality. Atleast we have the concept of Human Rights, to uphold the human dignity. (obviously there are many aberations, in its implementations), but think of some time back. Prisoner of Wars had no rights. They were slaves of the victors and they were equivalent to other animals. But this is not the case today.
This is the Biggest Achievement of Modern Civilization. Infact mankind has the biggest ever opportunity today, to become one of the greatest civilizations of all times.
I totally agree with you
This was the reason I wrote the second last line in my blog saying "Is this the capability of India still standing erect after so many odds or..."
but As we are progressing don't you think so our speed on the path of progress would have being increased by several folds if we would been in the top rankings of corruption, or if would have a count of 126th position in human development terms.
I do agree with the fact that it's not always possible to have all the positive traits but one could work upon lessing the negative ones!
I will then point to one point of your blog, "After '61 precious years of independence' have we really made a difference"? with 61 precious years of independence under quote. Why do we always see our history as only 61 years old??? Mind you, even by the most conservative estimates, Indian Civilization is nearly 5000 year old, with an amazing unbroken continuity. No other civilization has been able to do so.
Now why is this so??? After Independence had we seen some merit in our ancient traditions and practicises,we might have now been better. Unfortunately, people at the helm of affairs that time, were Indian by birth but Western by their thinking.
When we say we have 61 years of Independence, that means we had nothing glorious in our past and it was only after 15th August 1947, that India has emerged. What a dangerous sense of self negation???
Recently China Organized the Olympics and the theme of their Opening Ceremony was their 5000 years old culture and how had they blended their culture with modern thought???
Can we think of it happening in India???
Coming to the question of corruption. What is it exactly? I may define it as encroachment of other's rights, by few, who have got some extra powers. Now this originates from unequal distribution of power and resources. Hence to uproot corruption, the best way is equitable distribution of all powers and resources. It was on this principle that Socialism thrived. But then why it faltered and slowly all Socialist States are giving way to Capitalism???
I feel that the entire design of Universe is made on inequalities, which we phrase as diversity. See around yourself and you will see stark inequalities or diversity around yourself. Same is true for Human Society.
Now what can be a solution to it??? There are two school of thoughts. Western Philosophy, based on Herbert Sepncer's Social Darwinism Theory says "Survival of Fittest". Indian Philosophy as propounded in Geeta says "Paritranaya Saadhunaam" meaning thereby preservation of the weak".
Preservation by whom??? Obviously the society.
Now you can compare between the two fundamental premises.
It is ultimately the question of raising one's conciousness where the mighty, the powerful will preserve the weak, and the weak will respect the other.
In India there were three centres of power. The 'Raj Satta', Dharm Satta, and the Lok Satta. And there was a interlinking between them. Whenever any centre crept into corruption, the other centres corrected them.
Many social prerogatives were the responsibility of the society. Like primary education. It was imparted to all without any discrimination by the temple priest. Infact, the idea of universal primary education was given to the world by India only. In Europe education even the primary one, was limited to the aristocracy. It was some Christian Missionary who saw the system of primary education to all in India and took it back to Britain (this is very well documented in one of Dharampal ji's book, A Beautiful Tree). The then Governor General of India, William Bentick at the time of division of Bengal himself has stated that Bengal alone possessed more than 1 lakh primary schools. Now the government was not kind enough to start 1 lakh primary schools in Bengal alone!
Water conservation by maintaining Kunds was the responsibility of the society. Garbage disposal was the prerogative of the society. The government merely acted as the facilitator. Powers were diluted at the village level.
In South there are references of the Chola Dynasty and their village committees. It was a highly democratic set up.
Unfortunately our nation builders failed to see any merit in our ancient wisdom. Only Dharampal ji did documented some techniques after independence, but his voice was listened nowhere.
Since we paid no attention to our age old wisdom, and embarked upon the developmental model based on Western Principles, I will say that it is the "capability of India that after so many odds it is able to stand erect on the road of development". One inherent trait that we Indians as a society possess is the power of assimilation. The power of giving space to other's viewpoints and ideas.
What India is witnessing today, Japan witnessed in early 1950's and China on late 1980's. So going by those parameters, it will take some 30-40 years for realizing the developed India by the modern parameter.
Obviously, the cost we will be paying will be much higher than the gains we will be deriving (by the so called conservative and backward Indian or rather 'Hindu' parameters.)
I would like to say that it has been only 61 years since India really tasted the taste of democracy!
With this statement I had no intentions to neglect the glorious past that India has!
I would like to tell you that no matter how much glorious past we have ...unless we work hard our annual GDP would not increase!
Past cannot improve the country's economic condition ...but it is the deeds which would favor it!
It is our sincere deeds and actual efforts which would lead india to the path of betterment and development!
China was initially known as the state of yellow race people, but now no one can dare to call them so
You know why?
It is because they learnt from there past, they inculcated those ethics and values from there past and then used them according to the modern era!
This is what i want to convey!
today in this midst of corruption and communalism we need to lead india from unreal to real,
we need to increase the speed of progress by several numbers!
By saying this I did not deny the glorious past of India but I do also remember the sati pratha and the kar yojna according to the cast and creed of the society!
today what we need to do is to extract the good and make it better.
As you mentioned that there were 1 lkh schools at the time when bengal was divided, wish thoes schools would have remained yet and wish those sincere efforts would have been followed in other states of the country then today we would not have such a big proportion of illiterates!
You cannot ignore the problems on the basis of your glorious past! One needs to remember that each day when finishes becomes a history/past so we should bring an erratic change in our prevailing endemic policies because once these things followed truthfully and sincerely then only we can have another glorious past which would be read by our grand and great grand children!
But there are many hurdles which need to be cleared before, some social and political barriers often act as hurdles in the path of the progress. I think people who worked in the renovation and making of kunds would be knowing it in a better way!
I don't say that there aren't any merits in our ancient wisdom, rather i insist that those policies should be revised and to be used now!
just blabbering about the glorious past won't help anyhow!
There is a very good saying in hindi : "behta paani amrit hai aur ruka hua naashkaari!"
In the same way just making ourself contented with the glorious past is not enough....one should strive harder and harder to bring india from the race of developing countries to the race of developed countries!
And on your statement the "capability of India that after so many odds it is able to stand erect on the road of development".
I would like to quote that this thing would have happened earlier if we would have been sincere towards imparting our duties.
Your interpretation is correct, nearly what I meant to say.
Now the question is who is going to do what is required and how?
Definitely past cannot improve present's situation, but it is also true that we must learn from the past. The mistakes we made, the progress we made. And work earnestly.
You say wish the Bengal Model of schooling had continued, then we would not been facing problems of illiteracy. Now here exactly lies my argument. You say blabbering about the past don't help. I agree completely. Now it was the Britishers who destroyed this Indian Schooling Model. After Independence, I feel it was a good practise of our past and should have been revived by our nation builders??? Shouldn't they??? But did it happened??? A mammoth budget is being spent on a highly centralized approach called "Sarva Siksha Abhiyaan", but so far no clue has been taken from the previous decentralized Indian Model. Who is responsible for it???
There was a terrific water harvesting model prevalent in India. All human settlements never encroached the catchment areas of the rivers. But what is happening today??? A small rain turns Kolkata into a flood plain. Water Clogging in Bombay has become a perennial feature. All the urban and rural settlements are facing a huge challenge in terms of sewage and waste water disposal. Delhi's Akshardham temple and now the Commonwealth Sports village is being constructed on Yamuna's Catchment area. Have our policy makers or for that matter the citizens of India have any clue as to how our ancient civilization managed itself???
Indians after independence, blindly copied the western practise of disposing all their waste into the rivers. The rivers were dying. Europeans realized this and soon they made corrective measures and now their rivers are as clean as they used to be. But is it happening in our country??? Have we taken any clue from the westerners???
I do accept that there were many shortcomings in the ancient civilization and that the modern civilization has its own merits too and that I have written in the first comment to your blog.
My question still remains??? Who is going to do what is required and how???
When we educated Indians will come out of our 'chalta hai' attitude. When we going to ask for what is our legitimate constitutional rights from our elected representatives???
WHEN???
The questions you have raised are perfectly correct ....... this is what wanted to say that these things should have been revived even after Britishers left our country, we should have rebuilt tho9es schools at bengal, and not only there this things would had been practiced in several other places too .but it didn't!
WHY because people were too busy to engulf the money of the government and filling there pockets.
soon after independence our 1st plan released by planning commission, although there had not been any kind of planning commission at that time but what i mean to say is the first plan for the development of India was followed under the guiding light of Nehru ji with full faith and trust but this thing did not continue for so long!
If you see your questions ........once again then you would come to know the real meaning of sentence "have we really made a difference after 61 years of independace...... have we really been able to live up to the dreams which our freedom fighters thought about the free india? no doubt ....may be upto some extent we might have fulfilled them up but not completely"
and about your question : "Who is going to do what is required and how" and when? soon I am thinking to blog down some more thoughts of my mind
:)
Bilkul sahi kaha. After Independence we have to some extent been able to make a difference. What we both are arguing upon is that we could have done even more and better. Now this is a trade off, which we have to live with. Moreover I feel we should have a positive outlook and attitude towards our time in which we live in. Thats why I said that the Modern Civilization has come a long way towards equality and justice.
I had a little experience during my short trip to the hills. We hired a taxi from Kausani to Baijnath and Bageshwar. At Bageshwar, the driver dropped us at the outskirts and when we asked about why, he said Gram Panchayat Elections are going on in the area and his vehicle is scheduled for the election duty. Now sir if you see the constituencies, their terrain and approachability, then you will empathize with me.
I was really impressed by our Indian Administrative Machinery. When they have to do something, they can reach even the remotest places of the country, no matter whether electricity has reached there, whether roads are there, but elections will be there. Even USA asks for consultancy from CEC of India, on how they manage such a widespread elections.
I feel thats a big big achievement for us. It only is the lack of political will that is inhibiting us, otherwise we have a tremendous potential.
Yesterday I went to Agra to watch the movie "A Wednesday". To some extent my question of "Who is going to do what is required and when?" got answered. The Stupid Common Man.
Who can be that Stupid Common Man, will tell you some other time.
Common man is not stupid you stupid gaurav ji. Common man just don't have courage to do so as he is busy in earning breads.
@gaurav
Do you think that it "only" is the lack of political will or something else?
You know the main problem with us is we always try to blame someone for something. We never take responsibility to do the right things. I think that it is our will which is inhibiting us and I think it is not otherwise we have tremendous potential. I will write more if you don't agree with me.
@ ravi
common man really is not that stupid, he has got a tremendous potential, may be yes he is busy earning for his bread, but he ultimately is the change maker. Most of the people we see in the post Independence era, in positions of power were mere common man that time. All the leaders be it on the political front, economic front or social front, all came from among the common man. So when I say the common man with stupid in apostrophes, your second comment about our lack of will resonates with it.
so you are accepting the fact that you were wrong in framing the sentence in your 12th post in the blog stating "I feel that's a big big achievement for us. It only is the lack of political will that is inhibiting us"!
and if still you are not convinced i will write more
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