The great Indian betrayals

Anna Hazare, promise us, you are here to stay to take the nation forward beyond heroic acts, and find ways to utilise and sustain this support we are giving you, says Deepak Warrier.

I am proud to be an Indian. We all have collectively, massively and derivatively shown the character to move on and forget. Whether in question be our credence, allegiance or secularism, we have at each step been assured, reassured, further assured and finally betrayed and trashed without a pinch of guilt on the same grounds over and over again.

Conspiracy beyond visibility and treachery beyond intuition have time and again come to haunt and ruin our every moment of pride and exuberance. We were for once provoked and instigated to fight a foreign evil and start dreaming of being an independent nation with constitutional rights, and so associated growth and emergence.

But as Warren Hastings (the first governor general of India from 1773-1785) rightly envisaged, India was not prepared. We had the talent, but no planning. We fell into pieces and no one could really hold it together from day one. One man could have. He made us dream; he made us move our bones and instilled sense into our brains. We stood together for him, behind him and fought through him for ourselves. Not many of us then, would have had a clear picture of India after Independence.

But a man in his self-woven dhoti, walking hastily, took the nation by his hands and we all were to believe he is our saviour. Struggle followed and finally the foreign slugs were out of the map. Victory was still half-baked then. If thoughts were that his mission was accomplished, I beg to differ and probably argue that his mission had just begun at that night of Indian independence. But he chose to remain ignorant or rather too cowardice to understand the deep conundrums India would slip into. He was not appointed by anyone, but was trusted, supported and corroborated. But in the end, when we needed him, then more than ever, he retreated and let the nation reel in the clutches of unorganised, unplanned and unprecedented waywardness.

As an Indian, from my heart, bowing in front of the Mahatma for all his eminence and instaurations, with a hand on my chest, with much pain and bleed I would still say, you betrayed us. You showed us the light, but before we could reach, you slipped back, leaving us in deep-pitched darkness and scary futurity. We called you father. You abandoned your kid.

India runs on a stream of tolerance. Right from the first official political establishment in India, which Nehru virtually procured; to the current rubber stamps, nothing has changed much. All of them have time and again just found themselves rather shamelessly being molecules of indignity flavoured corruption. Starting from the Indo-Pak splits, which I believe was the first wrong step of free India, matters have only worsened. I wish the revered Nehrus and hated Jinnahs could come out of the grave and speak a few truths at least now that my children would learn the corrected and not the perceived version of history. We only complain and never act.

My friend Dipu mocks Nehru with his unique style on how he impregnated the India – China, 'bhai–bhai' concept. Nehru, we trusted you and followed you. But finally we lost a part of our body. Going by your words, actions and beliefs, we had started to bank our faith on you. But you eventually betrayed us. The first Indian prime minister, with all glories and accolades attached to you; how would you ever answer the Indo-Pak split conspiracy and the Indo-China war. Your betrayal has left deep incisions on us.

By now India has started to learn it the hard way.

Elections have become customary and voting has transformed from choosing the right leader to pinning hopes on the lesser corrupt ones. You gave me dreams and made me fly, but at every flight you cut my wings, one by one, till I fell, flat on the ground, nailing me to the filthy stinky arms of political evils.

If voting is a way of showing trust and expressing hope, then all the politicians in India have betrayed us, in sensational and provoking parameters. If ever a stainless person was found in the system, you played politics to either beleaguer him or no hesitantly throw him out of the political process ensuring his career comes to a total shut down.

When we had just learned to move along with all these nefarious politics, pardoning the corruption which has by now moved from thousands to lakhs, from lakhs to crores and from crores to lakhs of crores, we had a man here, trying to shake us once again.

Mr Hazare, we respected you and trusted your intentions. But we thought it was a barter. We shall support you, stand by you and start to dream again. But you have to promise this makes sense. 63 years back, the literal Indian politics, at its inception should have been clean. But look at us now; fighting one of the biggest corruption crises. Let it not happen that 120 years later my grandchildren would have to stand under the hot sun, sweating, braving the weather, shouting slogans and supporting a then Gandhi or Hazare demanding a complete whitewash on the then existing political system.

Where is your enthusiasm? Was it a mere kick you got out of an uprising support or was there a purposeful effort to dilute your character? While we Indians, irrespective of all divides assembled under you, there was a hope; at least a ray of it. Even after gathering so much of support if you didn't intend to take the nation forward beyond one odd heroic act, then we should probably compare you to the Rajnikanths and the Chulbul Pandeys of Indian cinema, who enthrall us, but not beyond the two-hour odd duration.

It would be unfair to mess up with the Indian 'janta' again. Promise us, you are here to stay to take the nation forward beyond heroic acts. Promise us you would get your aide issues sorted out and find ways to utilise and sustain this support we are giving you. To mould a healthier nation giving us severe comprehensions on true living.

It's easy to win our trust. Speak like how we think, talk like how we want to hear and express like to choke our frustrations. But let not you too be called a compatriot who betrayed.

Jai Hind.