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Many
a times, I wonder with whom should I identify
myself. I come from a district with Sasaram as
the main nearest town. That is associated with
quite some important historical personalities-
Shershah, Veer Kunwar Singh, and Jagjivan Ram,
and now Meira Kumar, the daughter of Jagjivan
Babu is it’s people representative.
Shershah came from a family of small jagirdar of
Sasaram. On his own strength, he grew that tall
and reached up to the throne of India. During
his 5 years of reign of Delhi, he achieved what
no other ruler of Delhi could do with much
longer reign. Akbar continued his land reform
process. Shershah is also credited with the
Grand Trunk Road from Bengal to Kabul through
Sasaram. And he died in harness. Shershah’s tomb
inside a big water tank is unique,
architecturally important and huge with no
precedent from any earlier era. Should I not
identify myself with Shershah?
Many a times in my life, I found my friends of
other states introducing me as one from the land
of Jagjivan Ram. I used to respect him too. For
the first time, I as school going boy I heard
him in an election rally in 1952 after hearing
Pandit Nehru in an earlier rally. I found his
content and delivery more attractive. He held
important portfolios in cabinet all along his
life. He was very able minister. But he hardly
did any thing to improve the condition of his
district, not even anything for the
underprivileged community. He could have done
something to make the history of Sasaram for
attracting tourism and related sector. He could
have converted the roads connecting Sasaram to
Buxar and Arrah as national highways. He could
have got some railway based industries, some
good educational institutes or hospitals for the
districts. As people said, he amassed lot of
property. But his only son died a premature
death. Her daughter Meira Kumar is now a
minister and represents Sasaram. She could have
brought some significant improvement for
Sasaram- a historically important town and its
very fertile hinterland. Even Sasaram lacks the
basic infrastructure facilities. Electric power
supply is poor. The whole town is dirty with not
even a single good hotel or eating place there.
It does have any good school, professional
college or institute. Properly planned
investment in tourism sector for all the places
of importance nearby could have made a
significant difference. Would not Jagjivan Ram
and now Meira Kumar have done something in this
regards? Didn’t they owe it to Sasaram? Should I
identify myself with Jagjivan Ram or Meira
Kumar?
It is really a bad luck for Sasaram to have
these leaders as its representative. Today
Sasaram is the head quarter of the district of
Rohtas. But you can’t see anything that can be
called a step for its developed future. The name
‘Rohtas’ relates to Rohitaswa, the son of
legendary mythological King Harischandra -
famous for his charity and truthfulness.
I am sure there must be many reputed sons and
daughters of Sasaram and from its neighbourhoods
who would have reached very high in professional
life in India and abroad. Why can’t they do
something to develop and uplift the condition of
this great old town? If they can’t do it alone,
why can’t someone take a lead and form a
well-wishers group of Sasaram to take up the
cause of development of Sasaram?
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Comments: |
Sasaram certainly needs upliftment
and has got a lot of potential but
requires a lot of backup. Meira
Kumar being local MP and minister is
concerned for the development but
unless some people living in Sasaram
come forward with viable projects
nothing much can be achieved. -
Vinod Bhanti - June 8, 2006
I agree with you that you should
feel proud to connect yourself with
Shershah and not with Jagjivan Ram
and his daughter Meira Kumar. Every
one who has even a little knowledge
of Indian history knows very well
the contribution of Shershah. In
contrast, can either person from
Sasaram claim that they have done
any great work for their area? In
fact, that is the same story with
all our esteemed politicians those
who only talk.
In fact, today I was aghast to read
the statement of Meira Kumar about
reservation in private sectors. This
is the last thing India needs to
start taking backward steps towards
dark ages. Instead of using such
short cut way to vote bank, our
politicians should take clues from
history lessons which says if you
abuse your power then you are bound
to loose it.
But the tragedy of India is that we
have no one to look up to. The
youths of today do not have any role
model. All our politicians are aged
and power hungry. Once they come to
power, they feel they have the right
to use any way to ensure their vote
bank for the next term. Thus it
leads to the way of our bureaucracy
taking the path of bribe and
corruption. The young brigade which
is making its way in the parties are
taking the clues from their
respective fathers and relatives.
Thus we have young people like Rahul
Gandhi, Rahul Mahajan who evade a
direct answer on the question of
reservation or use drugs and deny it
flatly. - Seema Jyotishi - June
8, 2006
A very wise comment and a very
interesting article. Even though I
am not a native of Sasaram nor do I
hail from the district of Rohtas, I
do have allegiance to Bihar as I was
born there and continue to have my
roots in the state.
The problems which engulf the state
with regards to under-development
and no development are common to
most of the districts. The
unfortunate part of our miseries is
that we as individuals only crib
what the others have not done and no
one is willing to take a lead to
change the system. No one is willing
to bell the cat and hold them
responsible for not doing enough for
the constituency they represent as
an MP. Besides, the other
disadvantage is that we have such a
large flock of masses who are blind,
ignorant and fools who simply go out
and vote for these selfish
politicians who should be hanged in
a public square for robbing the
people and the nation of their
valuable tax-payers money for their
individual gains which should be
judiciously spent for the
development of the state.
The six million dollar question
remains who will bell the cat and
take a lead. The logical solution,
we have to deal with such leaders
with an iron fist, we should file a
PIL SLP in the Supreme Court against
such leaders and hold them
responsible/accountable and punish
them. - Mithilesh Kumar - June 8,
2006 |
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