On Mon, 2013-08-19 at 18:19 +0530, Deepa Mohan wrote: > Rajeev Srinivasan on how Indians are satisfied with illusions, not > reality. A punishingly long rant from Srinivasan who appears to have been in a black mood when he wrote that....
And yes - on that note, as is my wont, I will attempt to dissect the state of mind that writes about obvious reality in India as if it did not exist before Srinivasan-ji suddenly discovered it and pointed it out. Who exactly started comparing India with China or Brazil? The people who compare India side by side with China and Brazil are not those who are contorting themselves trying to wash their bottoms on trains while lurching from side to side. It is people who smell "business opportunities" Nothing wrong in that except that people who try and sell India to others who smell business opportunities will paint a more rosy picture than reality would indicate. The only good news I have seen (but do not believe) in Srinivasan's rant is that Indian waistlines have become smaller. Nonsense, but I wish it was true. This may be an illusion that Srinivasan is propagating. Why must everyone be equally well nourished? Society is never equal. Let inequity persist. Capitalism is about inequality. Socialism is about spreading things out. Socialism is no good. If we do not worry about wealth, why worry about nutrition? And on those lines why fret about caste? After all what is the use of bringing up all people to have the same nutrition, health, opportunities, education and intelligence and then screwing them when it comes to jobs and wealth generation and claiming that the wealthier ones are smarter? We need people who will be watchmen and security men who can sit for hours and hours doing absolutely nothing. Why try and make everyone really well fed, healthy and smart? Whose idea was that anyway? I would like to point out that it is a typical rant arising from a Brahmin upbringing that claims to speak for the poor and the needy while simultaneously distancing oneself from the wealthy and powerful. Brahmins were always neither here nor there. They were rarely supremely wealthy and powerful, but had the education (and status in society) to not starve. The qualities demanded of Brahminism are an anachronism even if many are actually admirable. Honesty, self effacement, modesty, altruistic concern for others and society are requirements which conflict with the needs of many other professions, including good businessmen, political leaders and lawyers. And soldiers for that matter. I would be happy to be told that I am right and less happy to be told that I am wrong in Srinivasan's case. Srinivasan's rant about the welfare state leaves out all the ways in which the welfare state has benefited every Indian in some way or other. The subsidized postal service, the recently deceased telegraph service, subsidized fuel and cooking gas, cheap train tickets, air transport to way out destinations that would be loss making for any airline, "student concession" for travel, studying at IIT (as Srinivasan did ) and colleges such as my own Alma mater where the annual fee was subsidized to make it dead cheap or even nearly free for those who got in by "reservation". The fact that the Sachar committee report now places the status of the scheduled castes as higher than Muslims is testimony to the fact that at least some things have worked for some people, for all the things that did not work. The rate of increase in population and the demand for (and consequent lack of) water testify the success of public health programs (immunization, maternal health) combined with "freedom and democracy" that allows people to choose to have or not to have children with no coercion. What is the man so upset about? Who ever said that problems were going to be solved by mass education, mass health, attempts at mass equalization of people, and empowering everyone to do what they want? In India if you don't pretend to want equality for everyone and don't make token gestures showing that you support that then you get a "bad name" in international circles. Everyone plays the game, from the government down to Srinivasan. Why does Srinivasan accuse every Indian of living an illusion when the illusion is mostly his own. Srinivasan fits the description of the Indian that Nirad Chaudhuri made ages ago. Constantly complaining - if it's not about one's own woes, complain about woes that other people seem to have. It is the educated Indian's constant urge to achieve goals set by someone else that leads to depressed Rajeev Srinivasans. Don't worry. Be happy. shiv
