Hosting a prestigious (read, I never cared for this event’s existence before) commonwealth games is probably a dream come true for a nationalistic jingoist. Frankly, my knowledge of Commonwealth was limited to the awareness that it represents the erstwhile British Empire and a scholarship offered to students in India and elsewhere to study in UK. I might be labelled as a pessimist and even unpatriotic by the true patriots. But the current situation in our country warrants introspection by each one of us individually and collectively.
What was the motivation behind the games? Are we capable of hosting it, more precisely, at what cost?
I have not seen a good rational point being raised as to why the games needed to happen in India. The emotional argument can be elegantly summed up by BJP’s election campaign slogan, “India Shining”. These games were to showcase the Indian capability to manage and host a complex event like commonwealth games. After all our not so friendly neighbour hosted the grandest Olympic games ever. If they can do it, so could we. Petty ego clashes don’t you think.
Still, we went ahead. Jaya Bachchan, an MP went on record that we should also host the Olympic games. Poor ManiShanker Aiyer’s voice was drowned in the noise of the parliament. All he said was let us use our limited finances to improve sporting infrastructure in the country. He was vilified for a later comment wherein he went ahead and said something that meant he wouldn’t be surmised if the games failed. Whatever, lets not get into an argument over this.
What our jingoistic compatriots forget is that
IMHO, A nation’s economy and finances is managed very much like a family, although much more complex. Imagine a typical middle class family. Now the word typical means many things to many people. This family is mulling over the purchase of a second hand car. The pros and cons are being weighed again and again for weeks and months. Suddenly an unforeseen event happens and money is diverted for this emergency..say medical care of a member. The idea of the car gets shelved. Meanwhile the neighbours or our hypothetical family being richer have changed their Maruti to a say Ford Mondeo. Our hypothetical family will naturally feel a bit jealous. But, if sensible, it will move on as it did before till a better time comes. In this case an unavoidable emergency was given priority by the family, willingly or unwillingly.
Similarly our nation with its limited budget has gone ahead and decided to conduct an extravagant entertainment event, when its poor are reeling under the burden of price rises. It would surprise you that poverty in India is as rampant and penetrating as it is in the poorest parts of the world. A Kerala or Punjab is not the reality. On top of this, they have to deal with the direct and indirect consequences of corruption and mismanagement. The NDTV expose on food grains rotting in FCI godowns is the best example. How can any sane nationalist feel proud and go to games when, his fellow countrymen are starving and dying. Like the hypothetical family, our nation and its leaders need to prioritize our needs. Thankfully, we have supremecourt that was strong enough to order the sleeping Agriculture minister/ICC president Mr Pawar to distribute surplus food grains free of cost to the poor. Atleast there is someone to uphold morals and deliver justice in our country. When the judiciary does a praiseworthy act, it should be acknowledged. This was a landmark judgement. I am proud of it.
Look at the misfortune. Our ego told us that we can host a gala event at the expense of other important things. We forgot poverty and now deal with naxals. We forget how important good healthcare and sanitation is. Now Delhi is gripped by Dengue and nearby UP is witnessing deaths due to viral encephalitis.
But, do you know what the saddest part in the whole Commonwealth games has been. We have completely forgotten for whom it was meant for. It was a sporting event. Now its a controversy. A scam. I still believe that this money could have been better spent in improving grassroot level infrastructure.
India’ democracy should not sacrifice its poor and underprivileged for national pride. The commonwealth games were to be conducted by forcibily evacuating the poor, slumdwellers and beggars from the streets of the national capital. They said they wanted to present a sanitised India. An India that fits the “India Shining” slogan. An India that was more presentable for Indians abroad. An India that satisfies the egos of all Indians. How ironic that a city where fellow humans were planned to be cast out is now held hostage by a virus.
When I look at my country, I see that we are forgetting our past. We had to struggle to get our freedom from an oppressive foreign power. The Indian freedom struggle was not just one Gandhi, Nehru, Bhagat Singh, Bose or Azad. There were millions behind them, mostly, the poor. The freedom struggle was a movement. The Indian middle class arose from this very poor society that it now look scornfully at. It seems that the Indian middle class has climbed up the ladder of progress chasing after the rich maharajas and kicked it away from the poor. They should remember that the same could be done to them, by the rich like Ambanis or TATA. The Bachchans, Ambanis, or a page 3 celebrity might need a game like Commonwealth to showcase India to the rest of the world. These snobs don’t realize that the world has a good measure of us.
We, Indians, should be the last of humanity to forget the ideals of a democracy. This democracy is not US export. This democracy comes from high ideals established in our ancient past and that grew with interactions with great societies over time. When rest of the world strives for a practical mutual tolerance among different sections of humanity, our nation idealises mutual respect. If we want to earn the respect of the world, then it will come to us, when the moment is ripe. We will be judged by the way we treat our own countrymen. A wise saying goes something like this “we will be judged by the way we treat the least amongs us.”
It is in this context that I introduce this piece of article from Hindu newspaper:
http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/columns/Chandrasekhar/article520543.ece
jyothi
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