Five key events have occurred in the past few weeks. Exhilarating pace. Great news. Amazing unfolding of these events is happening in front of our own eyes, due to the power of the 24 by 7 news channels and websites. I am talking about Cricket, Corruption, Japan, Satya Sai Baba’s passing away and the Royal Wedding.
Many more events are also happening at the same time, but we will leave it for another time.
Cricket India’s spectacular win at the World Cup has captivated the entire nation. GuruMaa is a big fan of cricket and coined this phrase, ‘jitegi bhai jitegi, India ki team jitegi, Baba ki puch se, shani ke din, lanka ko haraegi”. Should we believe in our cricketing skills or the betting barons ruling the game? My skepticism is not helped by the fact that, allegedly the wealthiest and most corrupt politician is the head of BCCI. Another well-known corrupt official, Lalit Modi who has taken self-imposed exile in UK, led IPL until the last season. What to believe?
Corruption Kalmadi, Raja and all politicians in general have become the symbols of corruption, while we have Anna Hazare leading the fight against it. The Government has agreed to write and pass the Lok Pal bill as soon as possible. Corruption is so endemic across the nation, at all levels, in all the three branches of the government and in the police system, that any effort will be frustrated without any doubt. Do we have any hope? Mr. Panda writes in TOI that: ‘There are startling parallels between today's India and the experience of the other large democracy, the US, over a century ago. The latter part of the 19th century, known as America's Gilded Age, saw the rapid growth of its economy as well as unprecedented levels of corruption, exactly like present-day India. Enormous fortunes were made by new billionaires, the so-called robber barons, and massive corruption among elected officials became commonplace. Nevertheless, sustained economic growth transformed a nation of farmers into an industrial superpower where the size of the middle class kept growing rapidly. Their sensibilities, and outrage, led to what is called the Progressive Era in American history, in the early 20th century. The progressive activists pushed through many political reforms that tackled corruption and underlined good governance, and even motivated the robber barons into turning great philanthropists.’ Are we going through a similar phase? Do we have any hope? Is Anna Hazare the Gandhiji of our generation? Will the American gilded age and the Progressive era come to India? What to believe?
Japanese disaster The Japanese revere nature, but also worship technology. The triple disaster of earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown has hit the nation at a time when it was barely recovering from a prolonged recession. It was proven once again that nature is unconquerable and consistent abuse of our inheritance will only produce more disaster for our generation, and coming generations. Are we getting closer to the ‘predicted’ disaster in the world, which will change the way we live today? To make things worse, the natural disaster led to the Fukushima nuclear meltdown. And India is embarking on a major expansion of its nuclear power plants. Is this a very shortsighted strategy? Should we re-visit our power strategy?
Satya Sai Baba BBC writes, “Sri Satya Sai Baba, India's revered spiritual guru who counted presidents, prime ministers, judges and generals amongst his millions of followers around the world, has died at the age of 84. Until the last, he was a man who inspired passionately conflicting emotions. To his devotees, Sai Baba was an avatar, an incarnation of God in human form, who appeared on Earth to preach his inspirational message in one of India's poorest corners. To his critics, he was a fraudster.” On YouTube, there are scores of clips, which has analyzed the production of vibhuti and other articles from thin air. It clearly shows that these were common magician tricks. Despite the controversies, Sai Baba attracted millions of devotees from around the world, from all religions, and from all social classes. He preached a peaceful, spiritual message, which more than overshadows the controversies. He has led several great social projects to alleviate poverty in rural India. We should respect such an individual without any doubt – in fact, we should respect anyone who has done more good than us.
The Royal Wedding After being one of the two billion people watching the Royal Wedding on television, I became one of the million, who went to the Palace to see the Windsor and Middleton families greet the people from the famous balcony of the Palace. It was an exciting and exuberant environment on the ground. But much less than the earlier Royal Wedding, 30 years ago. Should we be wasting our time on a wedding in the Windsor family ruling an island nation of about 61 million people? Especially with the recent history of extra-marital affairs, divorces and dysfunctional behavior in the family. Is it just a good marketing ploy to attract tourists, or a distraction from the economic crisis? Or just a piece of good news in a world with nothing but bad news? I believe it is the latter. Let us have some fun in the light of the bad news overflow. Whenever I ask GuruMaa a question or raise a doubt, She simply says, “Have faith!” This is what I am planning to do. I will definitely select hope over despair, and always celebrate special moments.
.. within 6 hours of completing my editorial, dramatic news came of the killing of the most wanted terrorist in a ISI safehouse, in the military cantonment city of Allotabad, not too far from the capital city of Islamabad. I have been joking for years that he has been living in the guest bedroom of Musharraf while he was the ruler of the country!! The American aid to Pakistan was nothing but ransom money. Can India learn from this, and track down Dawood and the 26/11 Mumbai attack masterminds, and kill them similarly?
