Developmental Chaos

It is generally understood that confusion and bungling is an essential part of the development process, it applies likewise to the adolescent humans as well as to a growing country. In fact it is the indication that growth is actually happening and I am pretty sure that every developed country has gone through many years of chaos. So it is justifiably explained that India which is a young country is therefore going through a phase of bedlam which cannot be avoided. This theory goes down well with most enthusiasts but I stand with those antique thinkers who differ by proclaiming the many thousand years age of this land. America can be called young because it is of a fairly recent origin but Bharatwarsh existed since much before.

People of this land knew how to live together, they knew how to do business with the world, they knew about spirituality, science and mathematics, they knew how to sing and dance, sculpture and paint, they were rich beyond imagination, they were the icons of the world. The civilization along the Indus and then the Ganga rivers were the toast of the world, they lead the world along with the Chinese people in thoughts, words and deeds. There were times of small kingdoms and  big kingdoms, there definitely must have been opulence and poverty and surely there must have been chaotic development everytime a new king arose.  Therefore though I don’t buy the argument that India is a young country but it is an undeniable fact that India is trying to stand on its feet.

We have forgotten that we were once a superpower. We have forgotten that people from other parts of the globe once walked many miles on the silk route to trade with us, to learn science and mathematics from us. Somehow over the years our best minds were lost, our education system was destroyed, not by the foreigners is we fool ourselves to believe but by us. We as a people had become vulnerable, impressionable and morally weak. We stopped believing in ourselves as a cultural entity. Another explanation could be that maybe we were too bored with our simple lives and wanting a change. The desire then became a trap and we got ensnared by the west. Either ways we forgot who we were.

Today we continue to exist in this state of forgetfulness and have ferociously adopted the western model of development which is lop-sided in the way that it measures growth on materialistic terms alone. We have adopted the western concept of individualism as our own and compete against each other for exhaustible natural resources as if it was the correct thing to do. Celebrityhood has now become a milestone everybody aspires for to such an extent that we have reduced ourselves to respect inflated egos,  to cherish the rich and powerful and crush the weak and poor as if it were the right thing to do. As a people we have mutilated our own morals that we firmly believe corruption is inevitable. In every walk of life we face, accept and adapt to corruption without realizing how it is destroying the basic fabric of us as a nation. We fool everybody by calling our country democratic because we hardly know and prize freedom. If another East India Company were to come along, some of us would willingly sell our grandmother for a few more dollars and sterling pounds. I wish to be corrected in case I am wrong in my opinion. I wish I am wrong.

In the process of trying to stand on our own legs we are creating chaos in every sphere. Our parliamentary leaders do not have the strength of character to make and pass  a strong Lokpal bill. They all know that such a Lokpal will make their lives miserable and none of them want that to happen. One of them said that the Lokpal will become more powerful that the Prime Minister. I understand that to be an honest admission of the fact that most of the parliamentarians are undeserving and up to no good, so if not the Prime Minister then the Lokpal would have to discipline them. Another path breaking legislation required in this country is the women reservation bill. Whatever is the population ratio between male and female, the same should be the share of seats in parliament at the center and state. I firmly believe that better laws will be made and better will be the governance. That is exactly what the people want and our politicians do not want. With such spineless people managing the country what can we expect other than chaos. It is said that we get the government that we deserve. That’s right. I think that if we abandoned the western model of development and learn to share what we have, if we value inner development of the person and respect character more than appearance, if we can trust our own lives to give us all that we need and not crave for all that we greed, if we understand and remember who we were, there would be less chaos and more development.  

Today we have our government doing more charity than development. Give a man a fish and he will be hungry again but teach him how to fish and he won’t remain hungry ever. However with 100 days assured employment and heavily subsidized food grain being made available to the poor, we are slowly killing their willingness to work more and try to improve the future of their children. Agricultural  subsidies are being given to manufacturers who inflate costs and pocket the benefits. People have become dependent on electricity for all major and minor needs, so the government encourages the setting up of thermal power plants on one hand and prohibits mining so as to save the forests on the other hand. Government permits the acquisition of agricultural land to set up housing townships and factories but prohibits the cutting of forests to replenish agricultural land. Petrol prices are delinked from government control so that people pay heavily for what they consume but car manufacturers are not discouraged. Food grains rot in government godowns due to lack of hygiene and proper infrastructure but government cannot permit private participation fearing hoarding and price speculation. We need iron ore to be retained inside the country for our internal consumption but government permits exports for trade parity and foreign exchange. The roads of every small town and village has witnessed an explosion of cars and two wheelers but the size and quality of the road remains unchanged, public transport is conspicuous by its scarcity and parking space has struck like a foreign comet. The list of chaos is unending.

However all is not lost. We are bending over backwards to acquire and replicate the western glitter but fortunately we have not been successful. We have miserably failed to eradicate poverty and neither have we tremendously improved the living conditions. For this we blame our ever growing population but the truth is that we have not been steadfastly honest and determinably sincere in the pursuit of western ideals. Somehow on the path we have not been able to extinguish our unique identity, our conscience has not permitted us to run roughshod over the need to address every individual’s needs albeit it is a kind of shadow of the real thing. We still want to value the mind over matter, we still seek to take every opinion along, and we still retain traces of collectivism in our blood. It is time that we accepted the truth about ourselves that we cannot think and behave like the westerners. I don’t imply that the western governments do not take their people along in their policies, rather everybody in that part of the world has a common inclination towards material wealth. We however are a different people, we are not apes and we need to be ourselves. We have to turn towards the value systems enshrined in our history. Let us bring forth the lessons from the Bhagwat Gita back into our lives.