Nurturing the Beast within

Referring to a wretched incident that occurred in Kondhwa, Pune around April 21^st 2015:

Nurturing the Beast within

He needed food. He didn’t have any. Neither did he have any means to conjure himself up some.

So, he did what every other of his ilk would. Wandered looking for whatever bits could come his way.  He entered a house. A group of little innocent boys, tender aged, present there were delighted.

 They fed him sumptuously, showered heaps of affection and compassionately decided to let him stay along.

He would have died to believe the above sentence to be factual. Or at least remotely close to it. But yes, he did die.

Because he had entered hell. The keepers of this hell were indeed boys between age 10-12, and they were indeed delighted. Delighted to see the hapless target that would feed their savagery.

The subject referred to in third person until now is an eight month old puppy. He was simply looking to satiate his own hunger. Unfortunately, so were they. But their hunger was of that to torture, to hear their victim cry and wail in agony. Their intention was to maim and mutilate another living creature, limb by limb. And they took their own sweet time, savored and relished while the eight-month old hoped for an immediate death. He was later hung on a tree, where life dripped slowly out of him. When found, the puppy had his jaws broken, there were marks on his back and blood was dripping on the floor.

These kids, unfortunately being kids are bound to get their juvenile privileges. But their appetite for cruelty at such a tender age is bound to snowball, if let go. These naïve murderers have distinctly set themselves on the murky path of psychopathy, which generally begins with torturing animals as they cannot retaliate. This budding extremism needs to be nipped in the bud, before it exemplarily raises its ugly head again to strike, maybe one of us.  

Politics in the Shower

   

Standing under a cold shower, you hurriedly turn the knob to beat the mounting heat. A jet of cool water gushes out, but then fine streams of water harmlessly roll off because of the showerhead nozzle in place. In the absence of this perforated shower head, the water flow would have never been divided. The flow would have been one solid jet and its force could have been quite threatening rather than harmless.  What’s amazing is the replication of this very apparatus in our caste politics, the trap that almost all of us have fallen into, time and again.

Now isn’t this very free-flowing water; in its elemental drive just like us: the masses, the massive Indian electorate?                                                                                                                                                             

 And there stand our political parties, very aptly playing the role of the nozzle; dividing the gullible electorate on the lines of religion & caste. And finally, out we run from the showerhead through the well-laid channels of castes and religions meticulously created for us, thus ensuring their win through our support, well-formulated, in advance by them.

Just like the jet, we could have been formidable, had all been together. But, today the world’s largest democracy lays shambled, embodying rivaled factions.

So, we could all very well conclude the above-mentioned routine to be a battle-tested conspiracy of the nefarious politicians. We can satiate our appetite for politician-bashing by engaging in the same and then, call it a day.

But then, this division works, doesn’t it? That’s why they do it, because it works. And why does it work? Because such provocation unleashes a mind-set suppressed somewhere deep within all of us.

These political parties merely mirror the divisiveness that dwells within us.  We, the great Indian minds, still have our biases. We still have our prejudices, and our pre-conceptions.  For the majority of the voters, a man’s identity starts with his caste. Since it prevails within us subconsciously, all that the politicians need to do is tap into it opportunely, and resultantly, cash on it.                                                                                                                                                                 

 In the end, the sole objective of fighting the elections is winning. To meet that end, they simply chose expediency over moral driving us spirally deeper into the cesspool. Thus, them having studied the great Indian mind well, our consciousness of caste has always been meticulously vivified and brought forward at the time of elections, driving the wedge deeper.

Thus, India’s political parties do not need to conjure any novel strategy to win after making a caste-based selection of candidates. Because mere caste-based selection of candidates is the time-tested way to win.

As a case in point, consider the remote areas of states like Maharashtra where the count of uneducated electorate is large enough to influence strategy. Here, the naïve populace looks up to a representative of the same caste and soil, keeping fingers crossed for the Promised Land. Factors unfortunately almost never considered when endorsing the candidate are his ability, education & nobility of intention. Often, to sharpen the barb of the campaign, the caste and religion is propagated to be in danger of subjugation, which helps the candidates win the trust votes, in desperation. Consequentially, post-elections, what almost never changes is the ground-reality. The misled await their promised tomorrow, hat in hand.

Caste not only has survived all the milestones of the nation’s modernization; it still holds potency over merit & competence. More than a quarter of India’s parliamentarians have some criminal case registered against them. But another fact is that they have been voted to power by us, albeit the absence of merit.

We pay our taxes. These taxes are to be utilized; not misused, by the government’s representatives. These same representatives are the ones we, the very same people vote to power. In short, we choose the people whom we are to trust our money with. And when we choose people known for running chaos, should we not expect a greater chaos when they assume the seat of power? 

Maybe, we cannot eradicate caste from the hearts of all. But, we can all contribute to the nation’s progress by just voting for the deserving candidate, by making a choice driven solely by merit.  To begin with, we should at least give the meritorious a chance. 

Our vote holds power only when it sticks for performance; or when it swings away due to the lack of it.

To say it all over again, Caste definitely can’t be allowed to be India’s destiny.