360 degree: Idea of India will beat all aberrations

Many things in nature look attractive and beautiful in a holistic perspective from a distance, but a closer look changes everything. A microscopic version of beautiful objects looks quite different if not unattractive. The human face in its entirety is sometimes remarkably beautiful but a close-up of any part, such as the ear, nose or eye gives a completely different impression.

So it seems is the case with us and our country. The larger picture is beautiful. But at close quarters and being better informed brings regrettably the darker side of our social character. For someone who loves India and revels in every moment of life in the country, written a book, At Home in India, and who is under hawk-like gaze of the media, how do I publicly accept unsavoury dimensions of our national like?

On the other hand, how does one descend into the hypocrisy of being in denial?

I am reminded of words of George Bernard Shaw, “If I have to choose between a friend and my country, I hope I have the courage to choose my friend”. But it surely must have been said about a special friendship.

Even as countries go, I believe there's a difference between just any country and India, that is Bharat. India is an experience more than an entity: the sense, vision and dream of Mohammed Iqbal, Tarana-e-Hind (Sare Jehan se achcha, Hindostan hamara), Rabindra Nath Tagore (Bharat Bhagya vidhata), Jawaharlal Nehru (At the stroke of the midnight hour India shall awake to Freedom), Lata Mangeshkar (Ai mere watan ke logon) and innumerable other great Indian minds.

Bharat Mata ki Jai has become a perplexing bone of contention in recent times just as Vande Mataram had during the Independence movement. Be that as it may, Mother India, the idea immortalised in a way by the late Sunil Dutt, most certainly cannot and must not encompass vile and violent outbursts of the kind we have seen in recent times.

Macabre sexual assaults and killing of women and children, the lynching of innocent persons on grounds of imagined insults or errant behaviour, destruction of public and private property by rioting because of inane excuses, and now gratuitous assaults on African visitors are not the manner in which Nehru imagined we would redeem the pledge made to destiny.

This is not the India we grew up to love and cherish or the land we were inspired to think of as our mother. Yet in this vast nation not all is so distasteful, there is the spirituality of Bhakti movement and Sufi culture, the ingrained “atithi devo bhava”. That is the real India, apna Hindustan.

This is but an aberration, though a disgusting one at that. What is the reason then of the dark side of India? Every modern society has problems of post-Industrial internal conflict and the fallout of modern urbanisation. Some have handled it better than others; some developed countries have to revisit their successful transition to modern societies due to emergent tensions within their immigrant communities, the extremist urban violence in parts of Europe being the latest painful example.

It is ironic that in some ways they have to deal with difficult problems that we in India (and perhaps in our neighbourhood) had, nor entirely resolved. We were in political remission from the awful cancer of Partition (of land and emotions) till the relapse hit us. For that reason we are not really at peace with ourselves and the inevitable urge for rapid economic growth and development has brought its own stress.

We have become a society at war with itself under the influence of commerce and consumerism, completely out of sync with Gandhian ethos. But the battle between good and bad, evil and virtue, self and selflessness continues.

India is not the first and the last nation to battle for its soul. Most countries go through intense experiences to be persuaded or even forced to rediscover themselves. In many cases it is war or a natural calamity that destroys more than just the physical infrastructure. Rebuilding and reconciliation follow. But that does not happen without throwing up leadership of the highest quality in all spheres of human endeavour, not merely in politics or public life.

We were lucky to have been through that process of nation building after the Independence in stark contrast with the lack of that in Pakistan, perhaps due to the sudden disappearance of their top leaders. The idea of Pakistan remains stultified even as the idea of India flourished.

But sadly recent electoral developments have pushed back that remarkable accomplishment even as we engage in a fresh bout of name changing, ghar wapsi and questioning the very idea of India.

Clearly the war cry is writ large on the wall of history: opinions and views are under stress; we are not at peace with ourselves. In such an atmosphere some people, hopefully not many, look for objects of jealousy and hate, the ‘other’.

Base human instincts take over. It can happen to the most ordered and organised of societies if race riots are anything to go by in Europe and America. Even without that public discourse akin to physical assaults becomes dominant: the mayoral election in London and the ongoing US presidential election primaries for 2016 polls.

Despite that ugly words and deeds that we have heard and seen in recent times, instinct tells us that India will overcome the pitfalls and the idea of India shall prevail.

We will once again, symbolically and sincerely celebrate our friendship with Africa and its people whose struggle has been our struggle, whose dreams have been our dreams, and whose future we see as our own future. Where each thorn has been planted, a beautiful flower will one day blossom. Late Martin Luther King’s words will ring aloud once more, “I have a dream...”

The world being pulled apart by conflict needs a renaissance inspired by Mahatma Gandhi, Sant Kabir, and all the saints and Sufi sages who made India that we cherish.