Mera Bharat Mahan...

this was actually meant 2b a comment 2 an earlier post ("Spare a thought" by vivek) but it out grew a lil and i decided it'd be a good post by itself. so here it goes...

hmmmm. read ur post vivek (here). i always thot this way all along. u gotta admit (sadly) that as much as indians tout themselves as democratic and assimilating and resilient (and wat not), they (we?) are the least of any of those i think.

1)democracy:
yeah. Indians take pride in portraying themselves as democratic. giving chance to every1, huh? I DONT THINK SO. sitting here in the Urban landscape, which is far more disconnected from rural (and mass india) than u think it is, its good 2 think india is democratic. i'll attack the Urban hypocrisy abt democratic values a lil later. but take it for now that india never was and definitely IS NOT democratic.

We have some of the most seriously flawed social structures in the world. The burning of the so called lower caste dalit family in khairlanji is still fresh in my mind. I recently saw a picture in TOI (bang on d front page) of a man wid his hands tied back and then been draged on d road behind a motorcycle, till he fainted. he was then jailed instead of been taken 2 hospital. and the biggest shock comes wen the perpetrators of the crime are revealed 2 u. they were the policemen in Bihar. the crime committed by d victim was chain snatching. NO CRIME MERITS SUCH INHUMAN TREATMENT.

u'd ask, hows this related 2 democracy... yeah, hows it related!!! its related to the most fundamental principles of democracy. respect and consideration for the rights of fellow beings (humans and i'd include non-humans too) the moment u infringe the rights of a fellow being, u defy democracy. and we do it all d time in our (beloved?) country! WE ARE NOT A CIVIL SOCIETY. now d critics wud take this opportunity 2 compare other societies and pass a judgement that ours is far better than theirs. they'd go on and rant abt the value systems of USA, stiffling of non-muslims in Pakistan, sub-standard living standard in africa and then satisfy urself that we live in a far more civil society. is it? i dont think so. we largely dont respect our fellow humans. dats it

2)assimilation:
this is the one thing that irritates me 2 no end. indians take pride in claiming that hinduism and india in general has always assimilated other cultures and religions and diverging viewpoints. this is one of the MOST hypocritical statement i've ever heard!!!! blacks in USA have been able 2 assimilate in USA to a far better extent than dalits in india. and its been only 300 years of black existence in USA (yeah. african american if u'd prefer. but i'd rather call em black. ok, lemme digress a lil. ppl dont like 2 call em black coz black is considered to hv negative connotations. i'd rather not see been black as something negative. so y not just take pride and say, "yes im black and im proud of it!" rather than avoiding the term black as if its a foul word! if u think calling a black man black is insulting him and hence u call him "african" i'd say u'd still be insulting him. y dont u then avoid calling a white man white? u'd take pride in been called white. rite? we gotta get rid of this negativity associated with black color. its just a color! i'll get bak on track now...)

i was saying that its been 300 yrs of black existence in USA while so called dalits hv been here for 3000 yrs. and the level of assimilation is worse than blacks in USA!!! and we talk abt assimilation. i find it very annoying wen some housing societies dont allow muslims or non-vegetarians to rent houses in their societies. this inspite of any level of education. EDUCATION HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH HYPOCRISY. (Urban Hypocrisy?) But they'd happily serve foreigners binging on meat and alcohol. and we talk abt assimilation. INDIANS ARE LEAST ASSIMILATING. and dats a blanket statement im making with no Ifs and Buts or conditionalities. so vivek how do u expect people with such a fuckall attitude to assimilate south india and rajnikanth? he's more foreign to such people than brad pitt.

3)resilience:
hinduism is resilient. indians r resilient. HA HA HA. yeah. i'd call it stubborn. resilient to change. indians DO NOT CHANGE. i was talking to a girl once in marathi. the gal pointed out 2 me that a particular "mistake" in my pronounciation/grammar and commented that nowadays our language is getting "bhrasht". then she explained 2 me the correct pronounciation in Marathi and how it was actually derived from another sanskrit root word. this is wat was my argument to her...
languange(s) are like living beings. they EVOLVE. we speak a particular language. and as we interact with a block of people speaking a different language, we absorb some words and lend some words from/to the foreign language. hence marathi spoken in vidarbha region (from where i hail from) is very different from that spoken in Marathwada or Konkan or khandesh. vidarbhan marathi has picked up nuances from Hindi (been close to madhya pradesh) and even from from telugu (been closer to andhra pradesh). so a vidarbhan marathi is seen to be sprinkled with words like potti (gal), haow (for ho, meaning yes) while marathi from solapur will hv a lot of kannada influence (and vice-versa). if this is wat you'd call languages getting "bhrasht" and you'd look down upon a rural guy speaking a "Bhrasht" language, then i'd personally hold u in low regard. languages like sanskrit which refused to evolve eventually died a sad death. A classic example of a highly evolved language is English (another good reason to learn english). English spoken even 100 years bak in england (if not unintelligible) was so much different! while it'd be difficult to understand Shakespearean era english without difficulty. so is the case with Marathi and all languages. They all evolve. but the point is can you call such evolution "getting bhrasht"? i dont think so!! its this REAL pride in our evolving heritage which is lacking. and wat we actually see in its place is only an egoistic arrogance. and we call it resilience!!!

you must be getting an idea that im one of those persons who doesnt see the brite sides and cringes about the dark sides of life. lemme say this that its only the darker side that needs 2 get enlightened. im a proud indian and i've faith in my country inspite of its deficiencies. but the issues need to be highlited.

Im a fan of south indian (yeah vivek. i know u dont like ppl using that term. but i know d difference bet telugu and tamil. so dont worry. i actually am referring to d entire south indian film industry) movies and music. a telugu friend of mine introduced me 2 a song called "Mansanta Nuvve" and i just loved it. I learned the ENTIRE SONG by rote (though i didnt understand a single word) with all d correct pronounciations. i then listened to many more telugu songs and learnt many more by heart. i later started listening 2 some tamil songs too and i luved em all. i've seen Arya (a telugu movie) 19 times till date (though i dont understand telugu, i can make out a few words and i cud get the broad story of d movie)

4)Racism:
yeah. i can go on and on aby the flaws. but i need 2 mention this one. INDIANS ARE MORE RACIST THAN WAT THE EUROPEANS AND AMERICANS HAVE BEEN ALLEGED/KNOWN TO BE. DATS ANOTHER BLANKET STATEMENT IM MAKING. u got counter views, lemme know. i'll fight it out. I PROMISE.

as 4 the question in you mind vivek, about why non-south indians dont even count Rajnikanth as a superstar, u mite find ur answer in the above points. a north indian frend of mine wen told dat i watched Arya 14-15 times gave me d most annoying response: she hated "andu-gundu" movies. u get the point, rite vivek? Indians hv never fuckin FELT Indian.

(ps: guys, temme how did u like this new layout? is it good? or it needs 2b changed?)