When will We be Truly Free?

Sunil Garodia, TIR, 15 August 2014: This Independence Day, let us pause and think – are we really independent? On 15th August, 1947 India was freed from foreign rule, but did it become liberated? Are we not still captives of constricted mentality that makes us be everything but an Indian?

Where is the Indian identity? It is limited to our passport, a document without which we are not recognized as one in the community of nations. Otherwise, we are Bengalis, Tamilians, Marathis, Nagas, Punjabis and every other regional identity we can claim root to. We are scheduled castes, tribes, other backward class or general. We are male, female or, now, the third gender. We speak different languages, subscribe to different ideologies, wake up with the name of a different God on our lips and are sent off to the afterworld in differing ways.

Yet, there are several things for which we display a common streak. Across India, people yearn for a male child. They kill the girl child in the womb. They molest or rape women. They riot, and even kill, in the name of God. They use shortcuts. They pay bribes to get work done. They accept bribes to do work. They protest against books, paintings, plays and textbooks that ostensibly hurt their sensibilities. They write books, make paintings, stage plays or prescribe textbooks that hurt sensibilities. They hold governments to ransom. They are obsessed with the mobile phone, especially the ‘missed call.’ They shirk their duty. They change loyalties when they sniff the scent of power. They are adept at passing the buck.

So which India do we believe in after 67 years of self rule? The much touted ‘university in diversity’ brand of India or the other, more potent, ‘crooked brothers-in-arm’ variety described in the previous paragraph. India and Indians have to rethink their nationhood. With more than 70 percent population that is of the post independence generation, the old dogmas and attitudes do not carry weight now. For many of this generation, freedom fighters are something in the history books – and history is a subject they would have hated most if it was not ‘muggable’ (their word, not mine – meaning that which can be learned by rote) and hence, highly scoring. It is surprising how many youngsters today have no positive feelings even for Mahatma Gandhi, the father of the nation. One is sure not many youngsters in college respect history or care a hoot about it. So, the time has come to redefine freedom for a majority of Indians.

For this generation, freedom should mean freedom from corruption. It should mean freedom from nepotism, regionalism, bigotry, intolerance of all kinds, lack of respect for each other and lack of equal opportunity. It should, in essence, mean freedom from constricted or retrograde thinking and all kinds of mental blocks.  Our freedom fighters and our renowned social reformers of yore had subscribed to all these views forcefully. But a majority of this generation has no time to learn from them.

Hence, their idea of India has to come from within. No authority or textbook can drill a preconceived idea of what nationhood means in their minds. Is India about growing up in West Bengal, going for higher studies to Karnataka and finding work in Maharashtra? Is it about discovering that the old and misconceived notions their parents and grandparents held about the ‘southies’ or the ‘marathis’ are all wrong and they are equal to them in all respects?  At the same time, is it about making these ‘southies’ and ‘marathis’ realize that Bengalis are not only about arguments, rossogollas and sleepy songs? Is it about discovering that young people from all over India share the same interests – maybe a Tagore for you is a Kalki for another and an Uttam Kumar for you is a Rajnikant for him? Or is it about discovering that even in Mumbai or Pune, the common people behave or act in the same way and they have the same concerns about old age, inflation, housing, water, bad roads or power cuts as they did back home in Kolkata?

Rather like Gautam Buddha, it will only be after they move out of their sheltered palace (home state, in their case) that they will realize how similar Indians are all over the country, despite their different languages, cultures, mores, traditions and thinking. Only when they will interact with people from all over in daily life will the misconceptions go. For, when they go as tourists, they interact with a class of people out to fleece them, as all tourists are fleeced all across the country. Hence those impressions are again misconceptions. Only by living and working with them will they get to know the real people.

A revolutionary idea to transform India would be to make it compulsory for officers who qualify through state Public Service Commissions to serve for at least two years of their tenure on deputation in different states – one year each in each state. To get over the language barrier, the scheme should be introduced for duties in cosmopolitan cities to start with, but can later be extended to the countryside after the officers learn the basics of any vernacular language other than their mother tongue. Another idea would be to make military service compulsory for one year for all able bodies Indians from age 18 to 19, giving them college credits for the same. As the military is considered to be a microcosm of India, a youngster will get to know Indians best there. But again, these would be considered impositions by the majority and resisted forcefully in the manner in which anything that wants to make Indians out of ‘Indians’ is.

That brings us to the original question. When will we be truly free?