On the seventy first anniversary of India's first liberation army, Azad Hind Fauj, I greet you. It is so sad that barring a few none of our one and quarter billion people even know this or worse still care about it. Do people even care for our country for which you sacrificed everything? I wonder.
I don't know where you are, if you are alive or dead. With all due respect, I would still say that I would rather see you dead. To be alive to see what India is going through now is a torture that I never want you to endure. At some points of time I think it is better that you went missing. I could never bear to tar your image by imaging you as a politician vying for votes or trying to please the "minority" that comprises of a vote bank. It is much better to see you as my beloved and most honored Head of the Provisional Government of India in exile. That is how I will picture you for as long as I live - the hero, the fighter and the leader, that's what you are.
When I said what India is going through, I didn't really mean the political scene. We at least have an able Prime Minister now. I'd say the best we had in the last 68 years. You would have liked his ways of thought and actions. What concerns me more is the actual people and an apathy is every sense. There is no passion in trying to do something, the only passion I see are in negative things. Students fighting against teachers, random people on the streets killing if anyone protests against bursting fire crackers, religious fights, poverty, utmost poverty, lack of education and unimaginable violence against women. I am not just worried about criminals. Criminals have existed on Earth for as long as there were humans and they will always be there. What worries me is the criminal mind set in regular people. The high school students who killed their classmates, the terrible thing in engineering colleges called ragging... that is far more dangerous than a stray criminal. These crimes are intertwined in the society.
I also see a backdated notion of going with the flow where families keep on obliging to dowries just because it has always been the norm. Why do we still have the idea of arranged marriages? Why do we expect a child to be an engineer just because his father is one? Why does a woman still feel that she should give up her career when she has a baby otherwise people will think that she is neglecting the newborn? Why would a man feel ashamed to do simple household chores? Worse still, why would a woman, an educated working woman still believe that a woman's place is in the kitchen? These make no sense to me.
People have taunted me with "why did you leave the country" when I bring up these things or talk about helping the underprivileged. I don't feel like explaining that at times you can (and I am) doing much more from outside than from living there. Patriotism runs much deeper than being merely present within a political boundary. Maybe some day people will have the passion to do something good, however small, but still an act of kindness.
You tried to liberate us from foreign rule, but there are so many things that we need to liberate us from now. I don't know who will be able to do it... we need to change the mentality of a 1.26 billion people...who will do it? Who can do it?
Yours sincerely
Sayari
I don't know where you are, if you are alive or dead. With all due respect, I would still say that I would rather see you dead. To be alive to see what India is going through now is a torture that I never want you to endure. At some points of time I think it is better that you went missing. I could never bear to tar your image by imaging you as a politician vying for votes or trying to please the "minority" that comprises of a vote bank. It is much better to see you as my beloved and most honored Head of the Provisional Government of India in exile. That is how I will picture you for as long as I live - the hero, the fighter and the leader, that's what you are.
When I said what India is going through, I didn't really mean the political scene. We at least have an able Prime Minister now. I'd say the best we had in the last 68 years. You would have liked his ways of thought and actions. What concerns me more is the actual people and an apathy is every sense. There is no passion in trying to do something, the only passion I see are in negative things. Students fighting against teachers, random people on the streets killing if anyone protests against bursting fire crackers, religious fights, poverty, utmost poverty, lack of education and unimaginable violence against women. I am not just worried about criminals. Criminals have existed on Earth for as long as there were humans and they will always be there. What worries me is the criminal mind set in regular people. The high school students who killed their classmates, the terrible thing in engineering colleges called ragging... that is far more dangerous than a stray criminal. These crimes are intertwined in the society.
I also see a backdated notion of going with the flow where families keep on obliging to dowries just because it has always been the norm. Why do we still have the idea of arranged marriages? Why do we expect a child to be an engineer just because his father is one? Why does a woman still feel that she should give up her career when she has a baby otherwise people will think that she is neglecting the newborn? Why would a man feel ashamed to do simple household chores? Worse still, why would a woman, an educated working woman still believe that a woman's place is in the kitchen? These make no sense to me.
People have taunted me with "why did you leave the country" when I bring up these things or talk about helping the underprivileged. I don't feel like explaining that at times you can (and I am) doing much more from outside than from living there. Patriotism runs much deeper than being merely present within a political boundary. Maybe some day people will have the passion to do something good, however small, but still an act of kindness.
You tried to liberate us from foreign rule, but there are so many things that we need to liberate us from now. I don't know who will be able to do it... we need to change the mentality of a 1.26 billion people...who will do it? Who can do it?
Yours sincerely
Sayari
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