The growing divide in our country and the way forward.

In the recent times one would see that there is a sharp divide that is emerging in our country. The one between the Majority and the Minorities. Be it the Muslims, Christians or the Dalits and Adivasis, who indeed are Hindus. There have been incidents of mob lynching, which has led to the death of people. While most of these seem to have the newly emerged “Cow Vigilantism” some of them have no such connections. These have been for random reasons ranging from watching a Navratri event to keeping a Horse.

Some of the rapes and atrocities reported of late also need to be seen in connection to this, as those seem to come more out of hate to some community/communities than a heinous attempt to quench sexual desire.

The underlying factor to these incidents is the hate. The hate towards a religion, cast, sect or a class. Our love towards self, family, community, state, language, culture etc., was indeed love towards one or all of these until recent times; but now the amount of love is judged by the hate, that we have towards the someone or something else. So, if I had to be a good Hindu, then I need to hate all other religions. This is a dangerous situation. Our young minds are being trained to hate. They hate or rather are made to hate other religions first and then the backward classes. The reason could be anything, starting from ISIS to Reservation or sometimes some unscrupulous concepts like “Love Jihad”.

We should learn to question any such illogical theorems thrown at us. Why should I hate Muslims, should perhaps be questioned by thinking about 10 random friends or acquaintances that we have from that community, and thinking of what harm have they done to us. Most often than not, they would have helped us with something than troubling us. Still we hate them, because we are conditioned to do so, by people, party, ideology or leaders whom we like to follow.  

The political fraternity, irrespective of the party name or the ideology they represent have reasons to divide us based on our Religion, Cast, Colour, Beliefs, Language etc., as for them, we are a Vote Bank and nothing more. It is for us to realise this. We should refuse to be treated as commodities.

Why does this happen? are we not intelligent?

Well, I feel this happens because we, as a country have (with exceptions though) become too lazy to think. We have chosen to outsource our thinking to Politicians, Parties, Ideologies, Gurus, Babas or God-men/God-Women. It is easy; follow one of them and believe what they say is sole truth. We are selling our intellect to these elements. They decide what we think, what our stand on an issue is, what is the extent of our nationality to what we eat, what we wear, when do we sleep, when do we wake up etc. At times, they even decide whether we need to watch a movie or not, yes! they act as a super-sensor board.

There is a growing “Binary”. There are self-appointed Judges and Juries who decide on How true a Hindu/Muslim/Christian (or any region for that matter) we are, they decide the level of our nationality; based on how much do we support their view. People fear these labels. They are mentally forced to follow all views of their Gurus, Leaders, Baba’s or Parties as they fear unless they do that; they may be labelled an outcast or an anti-national.

What do we do then?

Ours is a young nation. 65% of our population is below the age of 35. These people are being misled into hatred. Hatred, that will suit different political parties. We need to rise above this and use our intellect to our advantage. We need to acquire knowledge to empower our own intellect, rather than pledging it with someone, who only wants to drive us to his advantage.

The power of our youth needs to be directed well, and if that is done well we will rise as a global power. The time and energy that we waste in finding faults with our friends, neighbors and acquaintances, just because they follow a different religion or ideology, if spent positively; can make us a Superpower! Instead of echoing the voices of our “Intellectual Masters” if we find our own chord, then we will do a world of good to ourselves, our families, our society and thereby our country.

Kathua & Unnao - Revealing true colors of "New India"

Until recently the definition of Gut-wrenching Standards were the rape threats and "sadachar" sermons to the female folks over twitter by the Nationalist Citizen of "New India" who are followed by the who's who of the country. A few months back, this changed to third-rate comments being made on the murder of Gauri Lankesh. She was being called names even after her muder. These were floating in Social Media with the picture of her Corpse!

The murder of the innocent, 8 year old girl in Kathua sends a chill down the spine. Kathua was always a beautiful memory for me, from time as far as 22 years down the memory lane, which is linked to my stay at the foot of the mighty Himalayas as part of an inter-collegiate camp. But the name for-ever would now be a disturbing, disgusting and devastating mark in my mind.

A Rape in itself is beyond humanity, here it was a gang-rape; of that of a girl, at whose age anyone could only be seen as only a daughter or a young sister, by the perpetrators. What shocks anyone is that it was an act planned and executed to teach a lesson to her parents and the members of their group, for having entered an Hindu area. It was multiple rapes, under sedation, and then a cruel murder!!

If we thought this was an act which was of the highest level of abhor, what followed; made us drop our heads in shame. a Hindu Ekta Manch was formed to protect the Criminals. The Police, some of whom were part of the Crime made a sham of the investigation and then it took the crime-branch weeks to come up with an FIR which was a telling piece of professional work under great political and religious pressure. Some members of the Bar Association in fact, stopped the Crime Branch team from filing the FIR, which was later reprimanded by the Supreme Court.

What was nauseating was intellectuals, young minds and politicians defending the crime mostly by "whataboutry". One who loves his mother, wife, daughter, sister or a female friend can never do that; but I saw many, who other-wise take pride in having all these females around them, happily defending the act. It was a disgrace to the country; when the tricolor was used in marches and protests supporting the criminals and lot of women were seen in such congregations. I fail to understand the motherhood in them, when it looks for religion to come into being!!  Yes! we have manged to bring the public mentality to such a new LOW!!!

The Unnao incident was no different, a rape on a minor escaped FIR post 10 months, just because the accused was an elected representative of the self-proclaimed nationalist party. Her visit to the chief minister of the State, helped her get a promise, but not to be followed by any action. Of course, that is true of many other promises made by the lot. She had the help of her father, a poor man who was obviously fighting for the basic rights of his daughter. (None of us will realise this until we can see our daughter in these young girls). Instead of helping him, he was beaten up brutally and then arrested to be beaten more. The doctors laughing at his helpless state, was the saddest sight for me in the near past. He was certified fit to be sent back to jail, where he lost his life. May be he lost his hope prior to his life, and we the people of the country failed him. Yes! it was our folly which got the current dispensation in power. The girl had to attempt suicide in front of the Chief Minister's residence and there had to be huge public outrage for media to look into this and all the focus forced the people in power to act.

Where are we going as a nation? Aren't we walking backwards? It took us 70 years to stand up and be counted, but are we not loosing our stature as a result of the incompetence in handling such incidents? How can people in power support, protect and patronize such criminals?

It is high time that we realize, the danger around us! Yes! this can happen to our mother, wife, sister, daughter or a female friend why female, it can happen even to a boy and we may still be looking at our friends looking for our religion, caste, color, creed, language or political affiliation before making up their mind to stand up for us! Yes that is the time that we live in. To-day I am ashamed to be living in a country, where Criminals get support just because of their religion or affiliation to an ideology, something that is unseen, unheard of or unimaginable for a sane mind.

It is time for a change! else we may loose the Unique characteristic of our democracy - Unity in Diversity.

It is time that our sons are told to look at the opposite sex as equals and not as a tool of enjoyment. Yes, we are still at an age where the girl is told to be careful as the boys in our society are not taught to be within their limits. Our girls are told to be aware of bad touch, because the boys are never told not to touch a girl with bad intentions. Girls are told to be careful with their choice of cloths as we cannot educate the boys that a girl is much beyond what she wears or how she looks. Our girls are told to come back home early, not to be alone outside, or not to venture out like a free bird, as we cannot educate our boys that a girl doing so is not inviting anyone to invade her privacy. Yes it is the mothers and fathers who raise these boys who are responsible, it is the teachers, it is the society of which we all are integral parts.

Nothing is going to change until we bring in the change, yes first within our family. Before being sorry for any girl; we need to look at our home, as each family has a role in making India a safe place for females of all ages from 1 month to 100 years, else they will continue to be vulnerable!