Lost Glory of Indian Independence

It all started 60 years back when we got independence after a long so called non-violence struggle. On that day every one felt very patriotic of being Indian and celebrated Independence Day with lot of enthusiasm. 60 years down the line many things have changed including our value for independence. Lakhs of Indians lost their lives in the struggle for independence. Many sacrificed everything and fought bravely for this cause. Now how many of them are remembered? Except a few like Gandhi and Nehru family we hardly remember anyone else.

Some of them don’t know about Independence Day until they return empty handed from the bar shops. It became just another holiday, nothing else.

No of events happened in the last 60 years , but few things are worth discussing.

The purpose of reservations is completely misused mainly for political purposes. Reservation has become a weapon to further divide the society in terms of caste and religion. OBC reservation Muslim reservation and so on…….. But no body talks about caste less society or reservation for poor. Politicians are happy to provide reservations for rich in a particular community rather than to a poor person from another community.

1984 Sikhs massacre and Gujarat riots are shame for us as both were lead by our national political parties. Secularism has a different meaning here in India. If a completely Muslim party in an alliance that can be secular alliance but if it is a Hindu-devoted party, then that is a communal party and communal alliance.

Terrorism shaken the country many times but still there are no strict rules to check the terrorism. It is the people who are suffering from it not the political parties. So they are hardly bothered about it.

When the GDP is growing at over 8.5%, the poverty ratio is still over 30% and illiteracy rate in some states like Bihar is less than 50%. Our politicians swallow crores of rupees, our legal system takes more than 14 years to solve a case but we don’t react to any of these issues. But If Indian cricket team loses a match, and then they are country wide protests and so on. But we don’t give a damn about serious issues like farmers’ suicides and starvation deaths. Not only we, the news channels and news papers are so obsessed with cricket and Movies, they are not at all bothered to look beyond that. Farmers’ suicides, starvation deaths, child marriages, untouchability issues, child labour issues are not getting media’s attention as CNN-IBN,NDTV, AAJTAK are busy covering Aishwarya Rai’s marriage and Sharuk Khan’s new movie.

What about us, as the citizens of India, did we become anything better of. Probably not. We still cast our vote on the basis of caste and religion. The caste feeling is so deep that in some states people admire a particular actor if he is from that caste only. If we think only illiterates behave in such a manner, probably we are wrong. We became so selfish as We like to spend 50 rupees for a cup of coffee but we don’t give a rupee to a orphan child or aged beggar. Our argument is we should not encourage it, so what else can be done? That is not our headache.

When we have thousands of problems hanging around our neck, we talk about Indian to become a super power. Nothing can be funnier than this.

I am not saying everything is gloomy; there is a lot of hope still left in us. As a nation we hope for bright future, not only for the fortunate few, but to everyone in our country.