 |
|
|
|
Modernising India
By M Nauman
Khan,
West Wimbledon, London
Aug. 28, 2008 |
 |
|
One of the
greatest attributes of India is in its diversity
and in lies its admiration, and that it
pronounces the soul and success of the country.
“A rich and complex mosaic of cultural
diversities which had evolved creative
mechanisms of compromise and collaboration long
before the colonial advent,” writes Ayesha Jalal
and goes on, “India through the centuries had
managed to retain its geographical unity despite
the pressure imposed by military invasion,
social division and political conflict.” India’s
cellars have multitude of differences and
corroding corruption – ethnic diversity,
difference of religions, languages, culture,
customs, castes, communal, prejudices,
philosophy and art, abound. After almost a
decade of painstaking field research, in 1999,
the Anthropological Survey of India identified
4,635 communities that make up the sum of Indian
society.
India, as Nehru wrote over 70 years ago, is “a
bundle of contradictions held together by strong
but invisible threads.” Indian identity is an
idea forged in diversity, according to Shashi
Tharoor, author and former under secretary
general of the UN who argues “every one of us is
in a minority.” Caste and language divisions put
everyone a minority. “It is the idea of an
ever-ever land – merging from an ancient
civilization, united by a shared history,
sustained by pluralist democracy. The whole
point of Indian pluralism is you can be many
things and one thing.”
With the dawn of independence in 1947 India
burst with freedom and idealism. Nehru declared
the dream not only “for India, but they are also
for the world.” Educated Indians discussed the
world and their place in it.
Today, quest for gaining political and money
power is tempting many Indians pandering to
political corruptions and religious pogroms. And
a new generation of educated youth seemingly
devoid of intellectual debates is aspiring for
culture of consumerism.
The Indian elite class appears to smartening up,
inside and outside of their country, and moving
up to path of power apparently oblivious of its
history and ostensibly ignoring idealism. “What
a shame it would be to win the lottery of world
power and have no idea how to spend it”,
remarked Anand Giridharadas, a columnist.
|
Comments: |
|
No
comment so far. |
|
Discussion on this topic is now
closed. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
