Didn’t we have our 63rd Republic Day yesterday? Didn’t we again rejoice it like Kenya cricket team after beating Pakistan in the World cup? Didn’t we get our chest impelling hard after seeing our lion hearts strutting through the Janpath, harder than what we used to have after seeing a mini skirt clad girl in a mall? Didn’t our drunkard politicians caught licking their lips feverishly at the very mention of the state’s name when Goa’s Tableaus passed through the Salami Manch? And last but not the least, didn’t we get pissed off after seeing our brave hearts saluting a lady so disgracing to be the chief of our armed forces; more so when she supplanted a true son of the soil like A.P.J.Abdul Kalam?
Now that we succeeded in hoodwinking ourselves once again with that deceitful sense of patriotism; (a blog of mine on last year’s Republic Day getting the maximum hit yesterday) won’t it be only appropriate that we should pause for a moment and introspect if we really need to celebrate so rapaciously after deceiving ourselves once again and that too for 63 years on the trot?
I am not going the route where many dispute it to be not the real Republic Day but otherwise since a certain gentleman named Jawaharlal Nehru efficaciously managed to sell his snake oil to the nation a good sixty three years back. That’s a controversy best be left unobstructed as it might just amount as an insult of our constitution (even if it is snake oil) and I don’t ineludibly fancy to be at the wrath of downright worthless and hopeless creatures like Kapil Sibal.
That said, the paramount question still need to be asked today – have we really achieved what we should have in the sixty three years of our official egalitarianism? A figure of a third of us going to bed famished every day and the basic human necessities are far away from a major section of our populace for sure makes the likely answer to be a big NO. Has the constitution, the realization of which we celebrate through this majestic parade, has served the nation as it was envisaged to? Not either. The false notion of ‘Equality To All’ that we are told our constitution vouches from page one to page last is least being seen orchestrated which speaks volume of the misnomer between what was promised and what is delivered. Those who beg to differ on this point be advised to scavenge through the history and figure out, how many politicians till date are taken to task by our law for their nefarious acts and match it against the many of those who are languishing in jail for stealing a kilo of rice, because seeing their kids starving was too backbreaking to tolerate. Where the hell is the equality here? Kalmadi after looting the nation with both his hands and legs was allowed to move free where a poor revenue stamp seller packed behind bars for two years for selling the same as he doesn’t had the adequate authorization to do so.
And Boy, what about the first preamble of our constitution where it starts with ‘We The People’? Where the hell are these people whom the constitution was dedicated to? We don’t see them anywhere anymore. Do we? What that we instead see is the lot least on the radar of our politicians (our constitution thrust them upon us), politics, democracy or even governance are the same people which our constitution coined as supreme and owner of the state. People’s voices were never accounted on Jan Lokpal as it went against a certain Rahul Gandhi’s so called game changer ideas and the dirty tricks department worked overtime to show the middle finger to the wishes of the same people who perhaps made them win their elections. The same people are vehemently termed as antinational and unpatriotic if they persist with their uncomfortable questions. And what we hear if we still persist with our demand for answers? Ornamental nonsense like ‘Elected and Electable’ from clowns like Manish Tiwari who any given day could be a huge casualty for human thought process. Where the hell is ‘We The People’ and when they were last taken seriously, if it is not election time?
Leave aside the constitution and the unimplemented proselytization laced in it. Look at the day-to-day manifestation and subversion of democracy that is more rampant than the number of rapes in Delhi. People devote a fortune and fight for donkey’s years for justice and what they get in their hands at the end of the day? Criminals like Vikas Yadav and Manu Sharma have their temporary parole applications hopping the queue with showering of some non-required out-of-turn courtesies to let them have their time for merrymaking, only to be apprehended again when media houses play images of their strong affinity towards honoring all the pubs in the city. Petty politicians were seen slapping one and all if their demands are not addressed at the earliest. Be it the Bank Manager who refuses to approve a false loan or that honest election official who refuses to budge and sticks to the rule book. All were manhandled by our pathetic political class well in front of the cameras and yet been taken to task for such act of hooliganism. Honest people like Satyendra Dube and Sanmughan Manjunath lose their lives on daily basis for showing respect to the very constitution and we are long from punishing the scoundrels of the crime yet.
Look how competent our democracy and our constitution is when it comes to protecting itself. A joker with his team and bosses sitting across the border not only planed to attack the very emblem of our republic but managed to execute it and we were left to fend for answers and a decade down the line look more confused than a toddler in a topless bar. We lost few of our brave-men in the process but their deaths are yet to be accounted for. If the attack was not a shame good enough, look how we have acted against the perpetrators. The mastermind of the vendetta is still enjoying our hospitality in Tihar while we run around like headless chickens and throw some never heard ‘First-Come, First-Serve’ tantrums. This is how strong our foundation blocks are, which are in all probability even weaker than the CWG stadia. Appeasement for votebank takes center stage even in matters involving national security and national pride and we end up becoming a laughing stock all over the world. Where is our justice system with that never executed statement ‘Justice delayed is justice denied’?
The examples are many. But yet we celebrate our foundation day so colorfully which would even scare the daylight out of the Rio Carnival organizers. What are we celebrating and for which credible reasons? For going exactly tangent to what we are dictated to follow by our constitution perhaps.
On a lighter note; can’t we have a Tableaus passing the parade with people like Karuna, Lalu, Mulayam, Achutanandan, Deve Gowda, N.D.Tiwari, Kalmadi, Madhu Koda, A.Raja, Pashwan, Mayawati, Digvijay Sing on it or are these guys reserved to go straight to the museum? And dear Election Commissioner, can we for once demand for a more realistic Tableaus next time showing electoral candidates offering free liquor to the voters while the ruffians surrounding them instead?
Good one ! Agree to each and every point...it was like you have pinned down what was there on my mind (most of it)...Loved it :)
I guess that the thoughts you have made sense, even if the language in which they are expressed reads like an English dictionary, and makes for somewhat difficult reading. However, more to the point, I think that instead of blaming our politicians for everything, have we stopped to think what, We the People, have done to get our nation where it has got. The politicians in office aren't extra-terrestrial creatures - they are Indians like the rest of us. And the traits they display - avarice, disregard for the law, an insatiable hunger for money - are the traits of our nation. Bloomberg ran an article which said the country loses about 14 lakh crores (yes, that is 14 followed by 12 zeroes) to tax evasion, through, for example, selling and buying houses "in black". Before we set right our politicians, we need to set right our national ethos. The patriotism we demand of our politicians needs to be practiced by us, the people. If we continue to rob the nation blind, it would be disingenuous to suggest that it is only the politicians who are to blame.
@Anonymous. Agree to your reassertion of the line ‘Charity Begins At Home’. Agree it is ‘We The People’ who should set some tough examples to begin with, before going ahead imputing one-and-all for the wretched condition that we are in. No two ways about that.
But this piece of mine is not necessarily aimed at politician bashing but the mess that we are fenced with. This piece is more to do with the way we celebrate our Republic Day without any considerable achievement on that till date; and for certain our political class contributed handsomely on the achievement of non-achieving. An average Indian is by default law abiding and genuine (Barring a handful who clog up that 14 followed by 12 zero tax loss). More off, it is the constitution which shoved up something called politicians through our throats (not the other way), without installing required checks and balances to control a freehand that most of our politicians seems to enjoy at present. I was arguing on the missing implementation of the golden lines of democracy “People shouldn’t be fearful of their government rather the government should be fearful of its people”. I was more referring to the unaccountability of our power circle and the complete non-action against someone if he is remotely associated with our political circle. My point was, as we are developing as a nation, it is time our constitution be revisited and adequate changes be implemented to mitigate any kind of shortcoming that we are bearing since 1950. I was just objecting to the liberty of ‘Having your Samosha and eating it too’.
Ohh, yes. It happens at times when I try to vomit a Webster (or Oxford if you like that) when I am a little happy and today was one of those days when I was over the moon, seeing an imminent whitewash of Men In Blue in the racist land . Kindly be generous in bearing this as a one-off case.
Thanks anyway for visiting my blog and taking the pain to scribe your views. Look forward for more such interaction with you in future. You may argue ‘What is there in the name’, but I still would have loved to have your name than just an Anonymous.
Even though I couldn't understand 40% of it, I still could manage to grasp the gist. Celebrating our Independence Day makes sense, but couldn't quite comprehend the semantics of celebrating R-Day.
By they way, the last paragraph was a sixer. I am still laughing reminding myself the lines.