I have been paying a lot of attention to all sorts of news items that appear in newspapers and the electronic media ever since I have landed in Jamshedpur. There is not much to do once I come back from office in the evening and the news never fails to provide enough snippets to ensure that all sorts of emotions come rushing through.
Here's a random collection of some stories that aroused my curiosity:
A minister in Rajasthan has been censured by the media and her party colleagues for glorifying the practice of Sati. I am amazed at the resilience of Indian beliefs or worse, at the shameless pandering to local sentiments to garner votes. It is a pity that nearly 60 years after independence, we still have to grapple with issues that would make the Dark Ages seem like a supernova in comparison. And to think that the minister in question is a lady herself.
Parochial sentiments too refuse to ever die out. And Bongs with their infinite fondness for Sourav Ganguly are not the only ones to blame. At the recently concluded Mr. India contest in Mumbai, the favourite was a son of the soil – Shyam Rawathe. He was however, upstaged by Bijit Gogoi of Assam, who went on to win the coveted title. The Shiv Sainiks however, were in no mood to raise a toast to him. Instead, they rode up to the dais in droves, brandished knives in front of the judges, announced that a person from North East does not deserve to win any pan-Indian award as they are all terrorists, kicked Gogoi out of the stage and forced the judges to reverse the decision and announce Rawathe as the winner. When the media finally caught up with a shaken Gogoi in Guwahati, he brushed off the incident as an act of immature people and in an admirable gesture, appealed to his Assamese brethren to ensure that this sort of treatment is not meted out to athletes and spectators from across the country who would soon arrive in Assam for the National Games. My salute to this brave man – he deserves to be Mr. India.
The North East has traditionally been given the cold shoulder by the media, by other Indians and the Government in most areas of national life. Somehow, we have never been able to accommodate them in the national mainstream; a fact, borne out by the above snippet. And yet, this part of the country has made us proud on a number of occasions. Dingko Singh gave us a boxing gold in the Asian Games, half of the indigenous talent that we are still able to produce in football come from Manipur, it was in Imphal that the Azad Hind Fauj waged a valiant guard against the British, with considerable help from the local populace, Tripura gave the Hindi film industry its finest composer duo of S.D. and R.D. Burman etc. And yet again, a simple, unheralded Buddhist monk from Arunachal Pradesh has made us sit up and take notice of the region. Lama Tashi has been nominated for the Grammys in the world fusion music category for his album on Tibetan chants. Lama Tashi is multi-phonic singer which means that when he sings, it seems that a whole lot of people are singing together. A rare musical genius and doctors from around the world are conducting studies to figure out the secret behind his unique gift. Unperturbed, he promises to continue enchanting us with his soulful music.
And to wind up, an illuminative piece of wisdom from Carl Jung:
All the greatest and most important problems of life are fundamentally insoluble. They can never be solved, but only outgrown. This "outgrowing" proves on further investigation to require a new level of consciousness. Some higher or wider interest appeared on the horizon and through this broadening of outlook the insoluble problem lost its urgency. It was not solved logically in its own terms but faded when confronted with a new and stronger life urge.
Most of the Indian politicians won't know Carl Jung from Carl Lewis, but they seem to be faithful adherents of the above maxim :))
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