INDIA AT CROSSROADS ?
What A Traumatic Idea Of New India !
Too much touching and moving a spectacle indeed of a learned jurist and erstwhile President of Supreme Court Bar Association of India Dushyant Dave virtually in tears and shattered in an interview by Mr.Karan Thapar on The Wire recently finding a particular minority community madly targetted to be suppressed and oppressed by those who want to destabilise the nation by dint of bitter division on communal lines feeling deeply perturbed over the stark reality why the civil society remains a deaf,dumb and blind spectator to these brutalities unleashed in form of lynching, police highhandedness and bulldozer justice?
In violent clashes some days ago,five persons lost their lives falling a prey to bullets over Shahi Jama Masjid Sambhal’s Survey move by the Archaeological Survey of India following the court orders throwing to winds with impunity the Places of Worship Act (Special Provisions) Act,1991.Dave very aptly raised his eyebrows and fingers over former Chief Justice of India Dr.DY Chandrachud’s “great disservice” to the constitution and the nation while reacting to his observation about the ascertaining of the character of the Gyanvapi Mosque in May, 2022 regretting the other judges on the bench too should have dissented to the opening of a pandora box of finding and discovering temples under mosques like Idgah Mathura and Ajmer Sharif and Shahi Jama Masjid in Sambhal Uttar Pradesh so on and so forth paving way for routine communal clashes in the nation in the times to come.
Dr.Chandrachud did pose this question how will he be remembered after completing his innings remaining at the top of the Apex Court,ironically Dave has very instantly responded tagging him respectfully of “intellectual dishonesty” while hailing the Places of Worship Act in his verdict on Ayodhya Lord Rama Temple Title Suit on the one hand but taking a turn and twist on the other hand while adjudicating Gyanvapi Mosque Case.
Human lives in the idea of new India these days have no value and meaning at all.These are being very inhumanly and insensitively sacrificed at the altar of the lust as well as insatiable quest for power for pretty long a period. Obviously 40 CRPF security men because of then Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh’s taking the movement of their convoy by road very casually and lightly were blown to bits in a suicide bomb assailant’s attack in Pulwama region of Jammu Kashmir on February 14, 2019 and after that countless army men sacrificing their lives on regular intervals because of across the border terrorism and the spectre of insurgency.
Startlingly, very dreadful incidents of killings of innocent people on one or the other pretext are the order of the day on an awe inspiring and scaring a premise of safeguarding and strengthening the majority Hindu community of India and cow protection.Hence the killings of the persons of a particular minority community are quite disturbing and horrifying a phenomena but as cases of mistaken identity Hindus too are becoming a victim of this menace, as a 12 class student youth Aryan Mishra in Faridabad region was shot dead thus mistaken as a cow smuggler and another Ram Gopal Mishra a young trespasser fell to the bullets as he dared to remove the flag and religious symbol of a particular minority community person damaging the railing of the house during a religious procession in Bahraich prompted to display frenzied and adventurous instincts of Hinduism.
Very queer to find the chieftains in India issuing sheer Utopian statements sans due application of mind and taking into the account the stark realities prevailing on the ground just to hog the limelight in headlines.On first day of December RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat exhorted couples to have at least three kids to express his deep concerns of India’s declining population growth, sounding a note of caution- if total fertility rate of a society falls below 2.1% it faces the risk of extinction while addressing Kathale Kul(Clan) meet at Nagpur.He relegated into the oblivion the truth that youth of the nation because of attitudinal changes and career consciousness is not at all interested in the bondage of marriage. Those nourishing ambitious dreams of hi fi professional jumps do not take relation of marriage seriously.Then those who are in the queue to secure a worthwhile career to be self-reliant after attaining academic abilities are frustrated enough, not to find a job matching their academic qualifications so that they are gleefully adjusted in their life.This search for a secure and regular job exhausts them to the extent not allowing them to think of matrimonial alliances waiting endlessly to settle in their lives first and then ultimately to ponder over any other priority.
The polity is very miserably at its wits end to channelise and exploit upto the optimum extent the strength,energies and potential of the abundant demographic dividend readily available at the disposal of our country at present in the entire world.If this rich human resource is not handled well instantly by way of offering adequate employment and fine avenues for growth and progress in life, it will be in the long run none else’s loss but of India that is BHARAT’s.
Why cannot”We the people of India….” resolve to strive together first for creating and building an everlasting aura of affection,common brotherhood, amity, peace and harmony in every nook and corner of the nation? In turbulent, tense, dreadful and violent atmosphere,what is the fun of making such appeals to couples to have at least three kids when the ruling dispensation is all the time at daggers drawn with the opposition, healthy critics and dissenters with unilateralism,whimsical, parochial and contemptuous outlook how can we now fancy a nation where fertility of any sort can see any upward trend that too confined to just one solo party in a diversified world order? Without any sort of transparency, accountability in the system,collective wisdom and expertise what positive and constructive can be fancied?
John C. Maxwell, an American scholar musing over the leadership issue is quite relevant here to cite”A leader is one who knows the way,goes the way,and shows the way.”Are not we living in fools paradise to dream of a Developed India by 2047 bereft of either any foresight or vision to realise this utopian building castles in the air exercise?
Are not we now dwelling in an India where handful of individuals not ideas, ideologies and institutions reign supreme?For individual name and fame as well as hollow self-glorification, they can go to any extent possible to achieve their selfish ends as values, ethics and humanity have no room,significance, meaning and interest in their scheme of things.
Time is not very far off when we shall find the masses constrained to grapple with the polity evading truth,slipping into silent and self-denial mode to face the public music to take cudgels against anti-public programmes and policies of the regime of the day.
It is all the more very depressing to see those gracing top constitutional positions of the nation taking an oath of office in the name of constitution too reacting to the sensitive and burning issues concerning populace of India in a very selective,whimsical, biased and partisan manner, at times adopting a silent or evasive posture owing their sense of gratitude only to their promoters not to the constitution.
If the President and Vice-President of India can fly to foreign nations with a message of goodwill and cordiality why cannot they afford some time to visit Manipur on fire and boil for more than a year to apply balm on the deep wounds of Manipur people ? Are they waiting for the situation and things to flare up more and more? Obviously they seem to be following the footprints of their mentor Narendra Modi who too flies off and on to foreign lands but has not bothered to visit Manipur so far.Charity begins at home, does not it ?
Nobel Laureate Dr.Rabindra Nath Tagore haunts who on the eve of India’s freedom
dreamt of an independent India where the mind is without fear creating a poem entitled “Where The Mind Is Without Fear”(Gitanjali).Are we living in a free India where the mind is in reality without fear foreseen by Guru Ji Tagore?
Dushyant Dave’s wailing did symbolise and signify candidly that a dauntless India dreamt of by Dr.Tagore has now turned into a traumatic,chaotic,violent, bloody and virulent nation making people all the time panicky and stressful. That is why Dave is restless,non-plussed and sleepless because people of different hues always feel fear stricken due to a sharp polarisation on communal lines to paralyse, jolt and jeopardize the secular spirit and credentials of the nation. Dave’s soul-searching and remorseful a question why no body is rising to the occasion to be up in arms against this non-sense,venomous and blood thirsty atmosphere merits deep introspection in the best interests of India.
History often repeats itself.Dave shedding tears act will not go waste but shake us all from our deep slumber as Farmers leader Rakesh Takait’s tears too worked wonders bringing the stubborn and unyielding a regime down to its knees to withdraw three black farmers bills on November 19, 2021.
Shall we still not wake up at all taking Dave’s tears lightly before it is too late?
Contributed by : Prof PK Sharma Freelance Journalist, Associate Professor of English(Retired),
Pom Anm Nest,BARNALA(Punjab)
(Views of the authors are personal/independent of https://theglobaltalk.com opinion )