India at Cross Roads

That is how the great Victorian Poet Robert Browning sang. When he said that all was well with the world dissent voices were raised in a chorus of protest. They al cried. ' No, no. All is not well with the world' If all is well with the world what else is there for us to do? When that stage of perfection is reached, there can be no movement, no progress. Only stagnation and disintegration. But that is not what the poet means. He too knows the truth. He has simply left off, when, that transient temporal; yes; not now, but when the God is in His heaven, all will be well with the world. His great contemporary Mathew Arnold felt utterly pessimistic. He was baffled to see the world at cross roads.

The old values, the old systems were all crumbling fast, while the new had yet not taken shape. 'Ah! Love, let us be true to other' he implored. Even love was not honest, he thought. That is exactly the situation now, we find in India.

When we look at the past of India' writes Aurobindo, 'what stakes us next to her spirituality is her stupendous vitality - her inexhaustible power of life, and joy of life - her almost unimaginably prolific creativeness. For 3000 years at least - it is indeed much longer - she has been creating abundantly, incessantly with an inexhaustible many sidedness, republics, kingdoms and empires, philosophies, communities and societies, laws and codes, physical sciences, systems of yoga, systems of politics and administration, arts, spiritual, a plethora of activity, not fixed; not satisfied, she expands far outside her borders; her ships cross the oceans; her wealth brims over Judea, Egypt and Rome; her religious conquer China and Japan spread westward as far as Palestine and Alexandria; the figures of Upanishads and the sayings of the Buddha reecho on the lips of Christ! That was the ancient India when the world was still half asleep.

But the present is only a last deposit of the past still there, but waiting there to assume new forms. But a momentary helplessness of the mind is apparent in the midst of unprecedented conditions. But this apparent in the midst of unprecedented conditions. But this state has soon passed and now the direction in which the country is moving is quite clear. It cannot be on the lines of the west where everything centers round the materialist attitudes. Nor can it ape the Russian way of socialism which differs in the means of realization but at the core is not much at variance with the other; both exaggerate the importance of life. Therefore, it should rightly be the Indian way, and this approach should be based on its recovery of the old spiritual knowledge and experience in all its splendor depth and fullness.

The path we have chosen to move along is not the socialism of the east; nor the capitalism of the west; we call it democracy, but it is both capitalism and socialism combined - socialism with freedom for the individual and capitalism cut to size. In a sense it is liberalized socialism and restricted capitalism. 'we are not merely out to get more money and more products. We ultimately want to become human beings, said the first Prime Minister of India.

Nationalization of banks and insurance companies, government's control over large industrial establishments, slab system of income tax, wealth tax, etc, are all aimed at arresting the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few. Though the plan is excellent, it has failed to deliver the goods. 47 years after freedom the poor remain poor while the rich are getting richer and richer. 33% of the nation's wealth is concentrated in the hands of the country's 5% rich.

Who are to blame for this colossal failure? Man's corrupted mind, his selfishness, his greed, lack of understanding, absence of sympathy, are to blame. The farmer who toils day and night grows food for the country. But the man who acts as a go between the producer and the consumer cheats both - he denies the producer the price he deserves and charges the consumer with a price that he cannot pay. The industrialist who grows with the toil of his work force, exploits them, he adds the government in his cheating list. He maintains a double 'entry' system, one for this own perusal and the other for the government. His back money swells. It is estimated that it exceeds 300 million rupees at the most conservative estimate.

The government officer is not better. His itching palms need continuous greasing. It is a malady that defies the surgeon's scissors. It is now manifest in a hundred forms, growing in stature, it becomes a national peril. It acquires sub standard guns and, outmoded warships, constructs invisible dams and bridges and smuggles out the country's secrets. In times of natural calamities, when the government rushes its aid, its will rarely reach the real sufferer, the money goes to swell the bank accounts of the people who supervise, and the materials of food and medicines change routes reach new destinations.

Corruption has become a national problem that needs a national solution. When the dispenser of justice himself becomes meaningless. Oppression goes on unchecked. The exploited will forever remain exploited. When the law maker himself breaks the law, who will protect the weak, the ignorant and the innocent? Crime continues to thrive; violence becomes the order of the day, suffering goes on unmitigated.

We pride ourselves with the thought that non-violence is our gift to the world. But the violence that erupts in the land time and again on insubstantial reasons is a humiliating experience.

Something even the common man on the streets cannot help wondering whether there is any more unity in this hand of diversity. We talk of national integration, but disintegrating tendencies are on the rise like the terminal cancer. Language, religion, caste, river waters - anything can become the subject of contest and confrontation.

We are at cross roads. Old values, old aims and ambitions all that we have cherished for ages, are crumbling like structures on sand. But this is only an intermissions, a passing state we say. We agree that the malady is every where and we are all equally to blame. This realization alone will atone us. When we rediscover our ancient spiritual grandeur our stupor will go; our vision will become clear and we will find our path again. A land that has been preeminently the land of Dharma, a land that has searched for the inner truth, a land that has found cosmic activity in the human heart, the land which saw the divine glory in every living being will certainly re awake, shake off its stupor and march ahead to a brighter tomorrow. The darkness will soon vanish, the interregnum will end.

Manoj Thampanoor is a freelance writer and has written content for several web & print media projects. He also writes optimized content for better Search Engine Ranking. My Love Poems
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