Not the Mirror - Not Now!

It is nice and warm to be at the hearth when the whole environment is pitch dark and cold.
We invented the 'zero'; imagine a world without zero, especially in this age of 0 and 1! We are a land of great people and 'Avatars'. We had the valour to win over the mighty Empire and drive them out. NASA is what it is because of our brains. The most dazzling diamond found out here is capable of buying out a couple of Nations!

When it is nice and warm at the hearth, it implies that the environment is icy cold!
Let us not fool ourselves with all these cliché’s. It doesn’t take an intellectual to point out to us where we really are. We are getting used to protecting ourselves with the shields of our past laurels; it's too dangerous an exercise - the past is already 'past' and what remains is just the trace of it. It can only provide an illusion of safety - when the rest of the world is moving fast ahead.

Let's not talk of "our 7% GDP growth when Europe toils in 1% and 2%" - growth percentages are gruesomely misleading when we do not consider the relative positions from where we grow. Our problems at hand are too obvious to be listed down - they are to be acted upon. The more time we spend looking in the mirror in a speeding car, reflecting our past, the more do we lose our focus on the present and the future.

All in the game

It is India's religion. It is a force that can bring people together. It unites and makes them rise in one voice.

No prizes for guessing what that is about - Cricket. And this phenomenon is in shambles. The country witnesses the worst crisis that the game has ever been in. The board is at cross roads. The captain and the coach are at war. The vision and the very purpose behind the Board are being questioned. What's more, the 2007 World Cup is approaching fast in, you guessed it, 2007!

Hold it folks! Enough of all the hype. The issue has been getting more than its share of the media glare. Shall we get down to earth?

Cricket is a game. Period. Eleven men dress up, fight it out with another set of eleven, and either win or mostly lose - before they dress up again. They endorse brands, smile in the media, go touring round the globe, build up their egos, fight for their slots in the team - and also play. Cricket is their profession - just like Medicine, Engineering, Sales . . . you name it. Of course, no one would be prepared to watch a Doctor or an Engineer on the screen for as long as they would be, to watch these guys. Naturally, companies pour their budgets on them.

Apart from the eleven players and perhaps the coach and the Board members, cricket doesn’t decide the destiny of anyone. (It has given rise to a new breed - the Bookies - that makes money out of people and makes fools out of fans). Cricket satisfies the need for entertainment - just as Movies and soap operas do. Cricket takes up the major chunk of sponsorship - and leaves the talents of other forms of sport in the lurch.

Cricket is nothing more than a game - and what goes on at the moment is an exercise to prove that politics is omni-present. There are a few people who have their destinies tied to the game - let's leave the job to them to sort themselves out of the mess and get on with their lives.

Traditionally, there are spaces allotted in the media for sports - let's try to keep cricket where it belongs and have the front pages filled with some useful stuff instead.

Authors of Destiny

The anxiety of Mr Cho Ramaswamy, the veteran political commentator, towards India becoming a model Democracy was understandable. However, he seemed to have jumped the gun when he suggested that Democracy was ailing the nation and the solution to fixing the woes of India was in a temporary 'Emergency' being declared - something akin to the ''shock treatment''.

The solution is too simple to be plausible or practical. Cho. has a point there, though. Democracy lets anyone walk out, anywhere, any time. Union workers, lawyers, doctors, Honourable Members of the Parliament . . . they all can choose to shut down their systems and go on strike, at their whims and fancies. Whether their claims are right or wrong is secondary - the fact is, that the implications of their actions are being felt by the weak and the hapless, those who are totally unrelated to any aspect associated with the strike.

But the solution doesn't lie in bringing in an Autocratic system that bans the freedom to protest outright, even if it is a temporary measure. Who would choose such a system? Who decides on its rights and tenure? How can such a system be trusted upon? And even if we answer these questions, would we then not have to rename our Nation from India to some “..istan”?
Temptations to come up with a 'Quick fix' for chronic ailments ought to be resisted. The patience and perseverance needed to "fight the system while staying in the system" have to be developed. We can not hope to change the course of a Nation's destiny on its head, in a matter of months.

What India faces now is not an aggression or suppression as it did in History - it suffers from Cancer; and its population is gleefully oblivious of the fact. Shock treatments may work in cases of external exigencies - not when the enemy is within. The results of short-cuts are bound to be short-lived!