Let's reject Dynasty this time around. Let's reject corruption this time around. Let's reject all the adjectives by bloating them out of proportion. Bharat's Hindus have arrived, and arrived in style!
2014 has been called a historic mandate, an election never seen in decades, an expression of people's anguish against a government conveniently labelled inept and corrupt.
Was it a landslide, I beg not to differ. Was it an informed decision, I do beg to differ. I 'beg' because that's what the 'not on our side' have been reduced to. I 'beg' because, I see something my fellow countrymen, Hindus, Hindi-speaking public failed to notice.
60 years, we have waited for growth, I do not know, my memory at my age does not travel that back in time. But we believed in it. We realised we were born Hindu, and we need to be proud of the heritage. In a nutshell, modified our belief system as different from our parents or their parents before them.
Democracy became a majority rule and not a representative rule. Secularism attached itself to pseudo and communalism metamorphosed into Nationalism. Gore was either glorified or brushed aside, Hindutva was rationalised for growth.
Strategy was formalised to win the elections and not for a vision for the nation. I may crib and cry on the propaganda that swept the nation in a wave but why did we get into it surfing merrily. For all it didn't appear to be a democratically fought election but a wrestling arena where we the audience bayed for blood.
This was a bigger canvas and a dangerous one. Everything was fair and justice was the word of the meek.
We talk of a wave that was there, I fear it was Black death - a plague we the nation happily fell for. If the Parliament has the concept of collective responsibility, so should we.
I am a proud Hindu, and no one defines the concept for me. I am a proud Indian, and no one sets a benchmark for nationalism for me. As a majority, I have never felt the threat by a struggling minority. As a human being, I could never forgive the people who presided over pogroms. As a pro-developmentalist, I could never justify the concept of the greater common good.
In this new modified India, am I an outcast? When people around me, near & dear ones talk of going saffron, why do I feel alarmed? It is just a colour like green afterall.
2014 has been called a historic mandate, an election never seen in decades, an expression of people's anguish against a government conveniently labelled inept and corrupt.
Was it a landslide, I beg not to differ. Was it an informed decision, I do beg to differ. I 'beg' because that's what the 'not on our side' have been reduced to. I 'beg' because, I see something my fellow countrymen, Hindus, Hindi-speaking public failed to notice.
60 years, we have waited for growth, I do not know, my memory at my age does not travel that back in time. But we believed in it. We realised we were born Hindu, and we need to be proud of the heritage. In a nutshell, modified our belief system as different from our parents or their parents before them.
Democracy became a majority rule and not a representative rule. Secularism attached itself to pseudo and communalism metamorphosed into Nationalism. Gore was either glorified or brushed aside, Hindutva was rationalised for growth.
Strategy was formalised to win the elections and not for a vision for the nation. I may crib and cry on the propaganda that swept the nation in a wave but why did we get into it surfing merrily. For all it didn't appear to be a democratically fought election but a wrestling arena where we the audience bayed for blood.
This was a bigger canvas and a dangerous one. Everything was fair and justice was the word of the meek.
We talk of a wave that was there, I fear it was Black death - a plague we the nation happily fell for. If the Parliament has the concept of collective responsibility, so should we.
I am a proud Hindu, and no one defines the concept for me. I am a proud Indian, and no one sets a benchmark for nationalism for me. As a majority, I have never felt the threat by a struggling minority. As a human being, I could never forgive the people who presided over pogroms. As a pro-developmentalist, I could never justify the concept of the greater common good.
In this new modified India, am I an outcast? When people around me, near & dear ones talk of going saffron, why do I feel alarmed? It is just a colour like green afterall.
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