Koi bhi desh perfect nahin hota, usey perfect banana padta hai

There is a joke,

A person was trying to pull out a mirror in the train boggie by removing the screws. When asked, “Bhaiya aisa kyun kar rahe ho”.

He answered, “Yahan par likha hai, bhartiya rail aapki sampatti hai, kripaya iski raksha sawayam karein, isse pehle ke koi aur isey le jaaye, main isey apne ghar le jaakar iski raksha karoonga”.

Slightly away from the topic but the issue is that the way we are brought up in this country, we don’t care for the rules esp. when it comes to the public life.

• For most of us Helmet is a burden and there could be endless opposition fuelled controversies when the government tries and make helmet compulsory. People keep a factory helmet in place of a usual vehicle hanging on there two wheeler and use it as soon as they see a pandu hawaldaar. Don’t we understand that it’s not pandu who will die if there is an accident that happens? People can make all sorts of excuses for not wearing helments, “Yaar, sar par thoda bhari bhari lagta hai”, “Yaar ajeeb saa lagta hai”, “Yaar, ladkiyaan chehra hee nahin dekh paati hain”. Abey sale maar jayega tab kitna halka ho jayega, udta rehna phir.
• Similarly in smaller cities people don’t even care for breaking traffic signals. They are pretty sure of getting a clean chit by bribing our dear pandu. But don’t they understand it’s again its not pandu whose life they are putting in danger. Its there own.

[Problem is we tend to argue over everything and don’t even believe the Government of India. Rules are for breaking]

• Keeping our surroundings clean is something which we don’t seem to give a damn. We only care for our home. The sense of community belonging to our area is lagging somewhere. We don’t seem to understand that germs born outside our chamakte damakte ghar can also make us ill. Most of us wouldn’t have forgotten the example of Surat plague. But things can change drastically and dramatically if able leadership with proper freedom to operate comes to take charge of the things. The way surat has changed itself, has been recognized even by UN. Surat actually came to its senses because the amount of loss to its diamond trade because of that incidence was too heavy to forget.[ It’s a more tradition related problem, needs deeper changes into our mindset]

• If you are in Singapore and forget to flush a public toilet, you are going to loose enough money to remember that incidence for all your life. But here, public mein halka hone mein kisi ko sharam tak nahin aati hai. It has never been a part of our social code of conduct to stop someone from spitting in public. [Problem could be lack of public toilets + lack of civic sense]

So where is the problem? And what is the solution?

To be very frank, I don’t intend to do anything about changing this society and solving the problems that the country and its people face. I am just reminded of the dialogues from the movie Rang De Basanti. The dialogues in the dhaba of DJ’s mom.

1^st guy: Arey yaar choodo yeh desh bhakti kee baatein, bhaut boring lagti hai.

Su Mckinley: Boring !! in logon ne tumhare desh kee azaadi ke liye jaan dee thi (While aamir khan is intently watching her, still not able to digest her fulent hindi)

Karan : Kaise azaadi Su

Madhavan: ek min karan, main manta hoon is deshbhakti ko, azzadi ko. Mujhe vishwas hai is desh par, deshbhakti par etc.

Blah ..blah…..mujhe naaz hai is desh par.

Karan: Naaz hai, kis cheez par, population par?

1^st guy: nahin berozgari par

Karan: corruption par etc.

Madhavan: Come on guys, koi bhi desh perfect nahin hota, usey perfect banana padta hai.

Karan: Chal yaar tay hua (=its decided), tu desh ko perfect banata raha, main jis din degree mili kat loonga America. Mera kuch nahin hone wala is koodedaan mein.

Yups!! This is me. And I don’t find my peers different although they may be posing so. Most of us are so saddened by the current socio political environment and if there was some deshbhakti or rashtraprem left in few, that has also died a miserable death.

Yaar why should I waste my energies to rectify the problems those persist even after so many have tried for so long. Some people may blame me to be an escapist, coward who runs away from the responsibility.

Kya farak padta hai yaar. I don’t give a damn !!. What matters to me are my surroundings. What maaters to me is what I am, How my family is, What my future is, How would I be and what would I be 15 years from now. If some people say that this country has done a lot for you by providing quality education to you for so long and spend a lot on you during your IIT stay. I have a very simple answer, “Sorry Boss, Wrong Choice now it can’t be helped”.

I don’t like people who try and pose to be hero’s. A few days ago a friend of mine told me that if we look at 1987 batch of IIT Bombay, its really very difficult to find people living in India. Most of them have settled in Canada or USA. Why should I be any different. So those heros who reciting the song of desh bhakti will also end up like me in the west. Most of the actually, not all. They may be singing different tunes, but I don’t like to pose, truth is brutal but accepting that is the best way to live life.

Hence I don’t have any solution to the problems this country suffers with, especially the mindset problems mentioned earlier.

I may arouse a few passionate souls. I respect there deshbhakti, passion for the country, endurance, zeal and zest to work for the country, but I know there are only a few of those around and I am not one of them.

Not a lot of people do great things, and passion is vehicle to greatness. As yet I seem not to that vehicle. So best of luck to those choosing the difficult path.

I sincerely hope that the generations to come don’t suffer from the same pessimism that I do, would love this country with all there hearts and work to make this a better place to be in. I also hope that my thinking changes and i change things around.

ak