Looking at the Mirror

         We, human beings are very fond of looking at mirrors.  It gives us pleasure and pride.  We, i.e. most of us, look at our faces in the mirror and feel that we are beautiful and great. This self esteem, if not self glory, is essential for continuing with our lives.

          However good we may feel looking at our images in the mirror, this itself is not guarantee that others who look at our faces will also feel the same or modify their opinion to suit our perception of our beauty, both physical and inner.

          In India there is a tendency to feel great when some foreigners praise us for our culture, history, dress, eating habits etc.  Yes, we should feel good if others appreciating us. But that itself does not mean that only we are great or that we are the greatest.  We should feel comfortable to appreciate all kinds of life and all kinds of opinion about our life. 

          We come across many comments that there are so many Americans or Europeans who have chosen to follow Hinduism or Indian life-styles and they know that our civilization is great and only many Indians do not realize this. ON this ground alone we condemn many Indians that it is a shame that they do not appreciate our own culture. This is also a kind of chauvinism.  Those who hold the opinion that because some people of foreign origin respect and follow Hinduism, we Indians also should respect and follow Hinduism. 

          There can be another perspective.  There are many countries where Buddhism is followed by Millions. Some of these are Japan, China, Tibet, Korea, Burma etc.  Their hold Buddha in high esteem and consider the places connected with Buddhism as Holy.  Any person from India reminds them of Buddha.  They sometimes express respect for Buddha by bowing to Indians they come across only for the fact that we belong to the land of Buddha. 

          If the logic and reason of expecting Indians to follow and respect Hinduism simple because many foreigners follow Hinduism is correct,  it would also be correct to expect that simply because millions of Buddhists around the world follow Buddhism, Indians should also respect and follow Buddhism in India. This argument about foreigners following Hinduism and Indians not following Buddhism is illiberal.  Every citizen of the world is free to follow any religion of his choice and we all belong to a meta-religion called Humankind. 

          There is also another kind of argument.  This goes like this:- Millions of Indians follow a religion which originated in Arab countries.  They are loyal to the culture of Arab countries.  They are not loyal to the country in which they live (i.e. India).  They should accept and live like second class citizens.  This logic is also flawed, if not on the grounds of rights of man, but only on the grounds of pragmatism.  Remember, there are hundreds of thousands of Indian Hindus who live in countries where the majority of the citizens follow a different religion.  (In fact, if we taken the population of the world, Hindus may be a minority). If other citizens of the countries in which Indian Hindus live also insist that Indian Hindus are betraying their National Culture by following Hinduism, would it be acceptable to particularly those preaching cultural nationalism in India ?

          Recently one Arab country has announced that it would permit construction of a Hindu Temple in its territory.  This in itself is good.  This has been facilitated by the efforts of Hindus living in that country, Govt. of India and even the Prime Minister of India.  This negates the concept of cultural nationalism.  There should not be any hesitation in accepting this.  We cannot live in isolation in this world, particularly want to be a global economic power.  IT comes its own cultural responsibilities or the goal of global economic power cannot be realized with the kind of tribal sentiments of religious identity.

Paradise on Earth

All religions promise paradise after death in reward for good conduct on earth. Since no dead man has ever recorded anything on the life in hell or paradise after he had died, there is no first hand description available for verifying the authenticity of this religious belief.

          But this imaginary place of extreme comfort, full of pleasures of life as conceived in terms of earthly life, cannot only be left to the imagination of each believer who may be innocent to the extent of not accepting anything that is not observed.  IN view of the need for defining paradise more clearly without creating the need for others’ questioning important and educated people have described paradise for the benefit of gullible and innocent.  But those who describe heaven after death are invariably endowed with the fortune of enjoying paradise on earth with all the luxuries of life. The religious heads who hold in their possession huge estates and innumerable properties worth of hundreds if not thousands of crores of rupees, the preachers from humble origins who aspire to build a paradise on earth in the name of others but for enjoying it themselves and those of their ardent supports who want to share their good fortune, have all described in detail the scenes in hell and heaven. 

          Afterall, these people are human beings living on earth.  Their imagination can run riot to the extent of what a human being can imagine.  The scenes of heaven are more earthly than even gods can imagine.  It is obvious that heaven for other animals (man also being an animal, albeit a social one at that) like dogs, frogs or pigs would be as different from human heaven as are their lives.

          In India, politicians of all hues have the tendency to promise heaven on earth provided they are elected to office.  They can visualize paradise in places of their power and political convenience.     For the last four many politicians, journalists and public intellectuals of doubtful integrity have invented a paradise in Gujarat.  Since they have the political authority in Central Government, they have also started imagining a heaven in India, if they continue in power. 

          Like the religious preachers who exhibit the power of gods through their powers of prayers in religious conferences, these politicians display paradise in digital medium.

          The scenes described are very dear to the ‘haves’ and those of the middle classes that aspire to  become ‘haves’.  Big malls, products of luxury imported from foreign countries, excellent fourlaned roads, beautiful buildings etc.  Invisible and hidden behind these are poverty, social backwardness, prevalence of age-old pride and prejudices and illiberal tendencies of hugging the tribal identities like caste, creed colour, religion, region and language.

The concept of reaching paradise after death has to be replaced by the plans for fulfillment of simple necessities of life for millions of people.  Equality of opportunities, society without any discrimination.  Yes it may be ideal, but it is our constitutional ideal, an a simple ideal, attainable by hard work and appropriate policy measures, unlike the unattainable luxury of paradise after death.





         

Accidental Death of a Very Famous Peacock

          They were discussing the accidental death of a very famous Peacock aal over the TV. It was in the private garden of a billionaire that the peacock died of drowning.  It was on air for at least four days.  Press had the freedom, people have the freedom to discuss anything under the sun.  Yes it was a very famous Peacock, no doubt.  The peacock had plumes that no other animal or bird had. It is beautiful, it would dance beautifully like a Bharathanatyam dance,  it would shake its waist like an Arabian belly dancer , ir caberet dancer in a bar in a Bombay suburb.  It was all about beauty.

          And then started the descent.  They talked about this peacock that is so strong that it could not have died so trivially, so cheap and so suddenly.  For death comes to the great men and women, in a grand style or else you have to make it grand.  It could not have been so bland and uninteresting.  Death could have informed the media or at least could have given a clue so that Press could have had it.  Since Press was not ready for this grand event becoming so trivial, it had to make it grand. The media, the second Gods decided so.  Death had to satisfy the reasonable questions of fair minded, truth seeking anchors

          Of course it is the very same media that did not ask why a prime Minister of a country of more than 30 crore people living below poverty level of earning 32 rupees a day belonging to a very poor family, could wear jackets of lakhs of  rupees and still represent and also work for these poor people.

          It is the same media which does not reel out statistics of millions who die of malnutrition and diseases.  The whole time business of the media is spectacle and continuous staging of spectacular events or finding them for the well fed middle class chatteratti.  Accidental death of a very famous peacock is such a spectacle and even if it is not it had to be made such a spectacle.  It can be played again and again and people have no way of expressing their views since it is a one way communication.  Only the TV Gods can talk.  This death of a peacock could be made to look like a mystery thriller of immence potential.  The reports of visceral examination, skin examination etc have to be analysed by people, not definitely qualified to even make a cursory glance of any dead body, leave alone that of a peacock.  

          This fills time.  And people are watching. They are actually lapping it up.  Greatest of doctors came over the studios and speculate about the possibilities of a mystery thriller and of course to show their faces on National Television   These are te very same doctors who not falling prey to public opinions prepare and sign autopsy reports of ordinary mortals or famous people.   They can come to the studios even if they don’t know anything about either peacock or the cause of its death.  So accommodating, for public purposes.

          Of course, no one is protesting.  Everyone is having a good time, at the expence of the dead peacock and public.  Except the people who really need attention to get some relief for their problems that are so ordinary and so common that they do not make news any more i.e. poverty, sickness access to education or lack of infrastructure ( don’t imaging Bridges or Railways, they are too big, think of Toilets.

          Four days and 24 hours still going on, the battle for the truth.  Bharath Mata ki jai, Vande Materam and so on.