I just finished reading an article by a leading French journalist (based in India), Francois Gautier, India’s self denial. In his article he has praised the tolerance of the Indians and he says that he has noticed a striking similarity in the Indian people, their tolerance. He has praised our nation for it’s glorious past and the ancient wisdom. But according to him (and as it is quite visible today to us too) our people (we Indians) lack a sense of pride and we tend to feel belittled when we compare our country’s present situation with the developed western nations. We have started feeling that the system here is rotten, corrupt and incompetent.
I do not disagree with the author for most of what he has written. I feel he is quite right when he says that Indians keep judging themselves by the western standards and western wisdom. The main reason, as he too points out, is our poverty. We are a poor nation (now don’t tell me that the GDP is 7.4 today), and we feel this is because of our inefficiency.
25 million Indians died in 100 years due to famine during British rule (according to British statistics. In actuality the numbers were surely much more than this). India was a prosperous nation. People here lived in peace and longed nothing but spiritual happiness of their souls. Never has India tried to expand its borders or tried to plunder other nations. But our country has seen many greedy invaders and tyrant rulers. After the battle of Buxar there was such a huge scale plunder by the Britishers that loot became an English word (language of Wordsworth and Milton today recognises this word as Goods or money obtained illegally). During this time only the industrial revolution gained its full momentum in Britain. The point is that we will have to understand and realise that if today we praise the richness of some western country then we must take this into consideration that they are well of today and that is visible to us but the millions of people who died due to famine in India and many more in other countries of Asia and Africa in past. We must feel proud of our ancient wisdom that prohibited us from torturing others and that never asked us to spread our religion forcefully. Our forefathers have believed in peace and harmony.
Today we are having many problems and the youth of today when sees the western nations he is so much blinded by their development that he concludes that this nation is rotting and its no use staying here and wasting his career(most of the IITians either leave India or aspire to leave and get settled abroad) . Today, as the author of this article has pointed out, the main reason of our miseries is the flaw in our constitution. The flaw that allows the political parties to collect funds for their election campaigns. No one can aspire to become a political leader in this country on sheer talent and desire to work for the nation. Politics needs black money, black money brings criminals in politics, crimanalization of politics takes place and then politicisation of criminals.
The biggest nation party in this biggest democracy of the world, the INC, itself is the clutches of Sonia Gandhi today, who as per the author knows nothing about India. But the Indians just ignore it and rather have accepted her by now, here comes the tolerance of Indians.
Every nation has its own problems, but no problem can be so huge that the people of that nation cannot tackle. If anything is needed then it is the self acceptance. Accept that you are an Indian and feel proud about it(and don’t just say it). Work for the betterment of the society(that’s what The Holy Baagwad Geeta say is the karma of every individual). Stop comparing our nation with the western nations and look forward to build a new India that cherishes the wisdom of our ancient gurus and sanyasis.
I found the article thought provoking and thus shared here with you. I hope with time, more and more people (especially youth) will start accepting that its their duty to build a new India .
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