From despair to hope!

Pain and anger over the Nirbhaya incident marked the national mood in the December of 2012. Such was the pain that a nation normally used to celebrations abandoned the new year bash and such was the anger that the entire populace clamored for nothing short of death penalty for all the rapists including the juvenile. It was perhaps the first time in the history of independent India that the entire nation rose in unison against gross injustice and torture perpetuated on one individual. It was also perhaps for the first time that the middle and upper classes spilled out of the confines of their homes onto the streets, to show solidarity with a cause and anger with the incident as well as the state of the nation. Perhaps everyone felt as if  mother india herself had been defiled.

The December of 2013 in sharp contrast has been marked by a mood of despair yet anxious expectation. Despair and frustration over the abysmal standards of governance witnessed in recent times and anxious expectation over the results of the mini general elections that are indeed a pointer towards larger changes to occur in the way governance is conducted in this country. That the quality of governance and call for probity in public life and not merely anti incumbency mattered in this mini mahabharat was its main redeeming feature. For once the people of this nation voted for good governance in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chattisgarh, and for AAP in Delhi out of sheer frustration with national parties. 

I only wish that the anger, frustration and despair does not spill over to 2014 and that this year marks the beginning of good governance in this nation thirsting in vain since its tryst with destiny.

Perhaps the time for a real tryst with destiny has now arrived. Maybe we the people of India, the resilient people of India may now opt for spine in favor of resilience and for the call of conscience in favor of greed. The silent acceptance of mal-governance, corruption, high handedness and inequality may soon be a thing of the past if and only if the change that has happened especially in the capital of the nation proves to be a real change and not a hashed continuance of the status quo.

We as a nation have a problem in almost every sphere of our activities. Be it poverty, lack of housing, water, electricity or basic infrastructure, there are shortages galore, shortages that do not have a plausible reason to exist after sixty six years of self rule. Why Delhi should be internationally known more as the rape capital of India than for any other reason is what makes us hang our heads in shame. Why we are way below in the transparency index and a front runner in corruption is beyond rationale. 

Screwed or perhaps warped governance is at the root of almost every issue, yet our leaders, good and bad blabber only about further tweaking the system for marginal improvements that remain merely sinusoidal. While any bureaucracy thrives on the backwardness of the nation, the inability of the public representatives to understand why we have not reached where we should is inexplicable. That a machinery built to rule is unfit to govern is a realization that has not sunk in despite failures galore on every front. 

The day we have a leader who understands this very basic premise and then makes structural changes in the processes as well as the machinery that makes policies, takes decisions and enter into contracts, the country would be able to make up for the lost years.

IT’S A SOCIAL ROT; WE APPEAR HELPLESS

(This article was published in the PIONEER of 27/11/2013)

A decline in our moral conduct and the understanding that the law takes a long time to reach the guilty, have encouraged people to be more defiant and brazen Two recent incidents have shown the mirror to our society as people who were looked upon as role models and crusaders have bit the dust.

Who could have ever dreamt that Tarun Tajpal of Tehelka fame would stoop so, in absolute variance with all that his paper claimed to stand for. Tehelka had been identified with exposé of acts of corruption and low conduct in high places. It was in the forefront when the people of this country felt defiled by the brutal rape of Nirbhaya last December. It highlighted gender issues, yet what its poster boy had the temerity to commit, in the confines of a lift, has left us all stupefied. The trust of the people, in what they perhaps recognised as the brave voice of sanity, stands betrayed, even as the victim has been violated. The relationship of trust and mutual respect that needs to exist between superiors and subordinates in organisations, especially ‘open’ ones like media houses, has also been put to shame. 

The exposé on the Aam Aadmi Party also shocked the nation beyond belief. People, more so in the city of Delhi, felt cheated and shattered by what they saw and read about the conduct of a few of the contestants. The tide of hope that recently rose in the people has apparently ebbed on witnessing the conduct of those who defiantly rode the steed of honesty. Perhaps good governance may still emerge, yet the public euphoria that had started enveloping the city has begun waning. 

This was meant to be. Understanding human nature is easily the most complex exercise known to mankind. Its complexity is identified by the ground check that while all of us know fairly well how we would like to be treated by others, we rarely use that same yardstick when treating others. The lesser the variation between the two treatments, the greater is the man and vice versa. The fact remains that the mandarins of Tehelka and the AAP hail from the same society that we are a part of; a society that has started producing scams and displaying human conduct of the lowest variety with amazing regularity in recent times.

Incidents like these and many others that we are ashamed of and forced to witness, arise because of two reasons: First, the general degradation in our social behaviour, and second, the lack of fear of retribution spurred by the abysmally slow pace of the judicial machinery of the country. While laws are in place, the process of justice delivery is so agonisingly slow that the thought of being able to get away is emerging stronger by the day — especially among those who regard themselves as the upper echelons of the society. And why not? There are examples galore of blatant travesty of justice in the everyday life of the people of India.     

There is absolutely no doubt that our social fabric needs a thorough cleansing. The emergence of a just, fair and prosperous social system is long awaited. Yet, the moot question remains as to how shall it be achieved in this otherwise hopeless scenario.

We, the constituent of the Indian nation, have perhaps never appreciated that organisation and nation-building require the toil of generations. Such achievements definitely do not come cheap. Even the examples of many nations in the developed world and some in our neighbourhood, have failed to arouse us from the slumber that we have been in, since the nation came on its own.