Today is our Independence Day. And led to a thought. What is Independence ? And are we truly independent. India celebrates its independence with a lot of show. There is a grand parade in Delhi and an address by the Prime Minister from the Red Fort. Its traditional to highlight the successes of the previous year and project a bright and even more successful future.
63 years later, as a nation, have we succeeded or failed. And unfortunately, most urban Indians I think would believe we have failed. I believe the exact opposite. There’s no doubt that we could have achieved much more, but then isn’t that true of every individual, company or country ?
So why do I think we have succeeded. When what everyone is talking about is potholed roads, traffic jams, dirty cities, lack of basic facilities, slums, corruption ... Its an endless list. However, its a lot like the glass that has 50% of water. Is it half full. Or half empty. Whilst all of us think its cliched and obvious, we all are optimists and always think in terms of half full, we fail to do so when it comes to our country or society.
We keep asking, and criticizing. And saying that nothing happens. But we need to look at 2 aspects. The first, can we ignore the huge amounts of progress made. Huge by any measure. The second, what exactly have we done. Lets examine the facts.
Lets first examine progress. Most of us, including me, use the US as a benchmark. Comparing the US of today, to the India of today is a little like comparing a music student and a music teacher and commenting that the student is not comparable. But if you have to compare, compare with what the teacher’s performance was when he was at a similar phase of growth or age. Lets not forget, that the US of today has the majority of its visible development in the last 6o years. Based on a foundation of over 200 years. Does it mean we need to wait for another 140 years Of course not. As society evolves, the time to reach certain milestones decreases. As an example, my kids know much more at 15 and 13 as I knew when I was their age. Even what they learn at school is far more advanced. I’m neither a social scientist nor a economist, but if I had to guess, my guess is that we should be on par with the advanced nations in around 25 – 30 years.
The second aspect is what have we done. Let me give you a few specific example. How many people realize that in the US, there are 1000’s of death every year due to starvation and homelessness. How many realize that there have been more deaths of US soldiers in the last 10 years than Indian forces in Kashmir ? That the total number of terrorism related deaths in the last 10 years in the US exceeds that in India.
Yet, we are perceived as a country where millions die of hunger, extremely unsafe, and so on. I guess at the end of the day perception is greater than reality. I’m not defending India or the ills that plague us. All I’m saying is that we need to highlight the good, whilst we try and do our bit to reduce the negatives. As an example, lets take corruption. If we decide not to bribe, slowly but surely corruption will reduce. If we pay our taxes honestly, the system will have more resources to put into development projects. If each of us pays for the education of a child, we’ll soon have a literate population that can lead us to progress. Accelerated progress.
We may be independent, but are in dependence, In dependence of each of us. To do the right thing. Its not easy. But then doing the right thing never was.
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