Hope Lives!

The ascension of Parsuram to the apex as the Chief Secretary of Madhya Pradesh has come as a sanjivani for many of us who have lost hope in the system. It is indeed a matter of immense satisfaction that the system that has a matter of routine started throwing up sycophants and nincompoops for top level assignments also at times recognizes the jewels that would otherwise have remained hidden in the omnipresent heap of coal.

Parsuram Ji has been one of my rare bosses who never bossed over but always remained a great friend, a tremendous well wisher and an unmatched guide. He is also one of those rare bureaucrats who have a heart of gold and a spine of steel. Perhaps his name that was also the name of one of the greatest sage of all times, has had an effect on his entire persona that now resembles more a polished diamond than anything else. 

Shivraj Ji  and Parsuram Ji would make a tremendous combination, a combination that is bound to put the state on the highway to progress. A progress based on and inspired by a very strong value system that both these frontliners share, is going to be an everlasting one.

That both the political and bureaucratic masters are going to leave their footprints on the sands of time is also a foregone conclusion, yet what really matters is that both of them are instrumental in rekindling hope in an otherwise hopeless scenario.

If only someone like Parsuram ji occupied the apex slot in railways, railways is bound to rebound.

The city of hope and beyond

I returned from Bhopal, the city of hope today morning.

Bhopal visits are always emotional affairs. The staff of Madhya Pradesh Tourism, the bureaucrats, the media and even the politicians and the unions, all give me a feeling that my not returning to the state for a third tenure is an unpardonable crime. I agree that I have to go back for the third and final tenure. Only God knows when.

There is something about the city that lightens up my heart and also my entire persona, immediately after alighting from the train. No doubt, it is a state managed well by Shivraj Ji, but there is more to it than merely being a state that is on the move. It is a state that accepted me, an outsider as one of their own and gave me heaps of love, respect and affection and now remembrance for all that I did in the pursuit of my own happiness.

It is also a state that allowed me to explore and then actualize my own, hitherto hidden potential. That so much could be accomplished in a three years tenure is a lesson that even I would find it difficult to forget. A commercial as well as a sarkari turnaround of a phenomenal level was achieved, thereby propelling the state to the forefront of Indian tourism in a modest time frame and in the process the state tourism corporation came to be recognized as an icon of success and change.

Railways on the other hand has evolved into an organization that neither recognizes, nor desires brilliance. The working of this feudal and highly sycophantic organization stands out as a sheer contrast to what I encountered in my previous posting. And that explains the ridiculous scenario in which we find ourselves – a commercial organization in a monopolistic situation in a sellers market racing to its doom. An organization where almost the entire senior brass, have no clue whatsoever about the purpose of their existence in the organization.

Give the men a reason for their existence, a reason that is linked to a cause and then witness the blossoming of the men and the organization they work for.

Is there hope beyond the dark clouds? I hope there is!

Insha Allah, we shall survive and then overcome.