Independence

India celebrated its 63rd Independence day yesterday. And as usual Patriotism is in full swing in the fortnight. Everyone from FMCG, retailers to street hawker is in mood to offer you goodies at discounted price just in the name of Independence celebration. But all that just looks like a business deal nothing at all. Same discounts would be available next month for Onam & then for Diwali & henceforth.

But coming back to Independence & state of our beloved country. So much of stuff happening all across India that you wonder if this is what those heroes of freedom-fight had in mind when they were laying down their lives for Independence. Corruption, mis-management & chaos is the highlight of current day. Switch on any news channel & you are forced to switch to some other channel or switch off TV because all you get to hear is corruption, scams, violence, & lawlessness all around. Kind of news we get to hear & see makes daily soaps look all soothing to eyes, ears & heart despite all melodrama in them. Thank God I am getting to watch only cartoons these days because of my little one.

We Indians talk of being super-power & getting equal status in world matters with countries like US, China, UK, Germany & others. But do we even put 1/10th of effort these countries put in to have success they enjoy. See how US arm twisted BP to shell (pun intended) out big bucks for the oil spill. But India simply allowed the Bhopal tragedy kill its citizens without doing much. All they did was to allow Anderson flee country with red carpet rolled out to him. China organized one of the best (if not the best) Olympic games in history. India on other hand is still thinking if we can start CWG on time. All we see & hear is that OC (organizing committee) is busy in ensuring that they get all wealth possible not worrying at all about Games or common stuff. No national pride in mind at all. Just busy & occupied in milking the money cow.

We have such a good habit of asking others to fix our house for any & every thing. For any issue, we look towards US to say a few soothing words to make us happy.

Although India attained its Independence long back, there still are areas in India which dont get basic necessities of life like electricity, fresh water etc. Still every year we depend on Monsoon to cater to our agriculture needs. Some rivers are drying & some have floods every year but nothing happening on connecting the rivers linkage project. We have such a huge divide of urban & rural sector that guys in big cities dont even know what kind of life people live in rural areas.

Simple mantra is that if its not affecting me, I dont bother what happens in Kashmir, UP or North-east. But if you get affected then we say, why Govt does not do anything.

Common sense is so uncommon. Education & Literacy is something that is becoming more & more disjoint these days. so called literate folks behave like uneducated. Everyone is in a hurry to not even bother how their actions affect others. But will crib if you are on the receiving end.

As they say it takes a tiny step to start on a long journey. Hope some of us take this difficult part of taking tiny step towards the right direction.

I still get goose bumps on hearing the national anthem. And hope I can manage the courage to not fall into trap which makes me part of this herd which does not value freedom we have.

Wondering

Some random thoughts have been crossing mind from quite some time now.

Thoughts like corruption, cribbing, common sense, morals etc. But then these words are the most overused & abused in day to day life. Everyone has their own version for these words as per convenience.

For e.g. Traffic cop giving you a ticket for jumping the signal. You will crib that everyone does this in India then why give me a ticket? Some other day instead of giving 100 bucks as official penalty, you will quietly pass on 50 bucks to same cop. He will be happy to have those 50 bucks going in his pocket.

Now the same scenario needs to be looked from a different perspective in which you are a third party. You will say sitting on your cushioned sofa at home that this is corruption & India is corrupted. There is no future of this country & blah blah. But is not it very convenient to just avoid doing some introspection.

Agreed everyone wants to avoid any kind of unease which comes their way by following rules & guidelines. But these very small acts are no different from large scale scams being unearthed every day. Government ministers openly take kickbacks & continue to enjoy the luxury of being ministers just because of coalition politics. How different is this from where you simply agree to part some money to an official in Govt office to get your work done as you dont want them to take ages to do their job & keep you running in loops.

We all will say that this is the system & this is how it works.

But then why crib when you see bigger fishes going for bigger bites. Is not it that deep inside we feel envy from these sharks? Given a chance we wont miss taking such a bite ourselves. I know some of us might not agree with this analogy but then who said world has to be in alignment for everything.

Just collection of random thoughts & before anyone gets an impression that I am trying to be a Saint here then its not the case. I aint Saint myself.

But then I strive & try to be Saint in some ways. ;-)

Heart & Mind

Heart & Mind conflict has been in place ever since Adam & Eve. Heart has its own mind & Mind has its own heart or something in similar nature. Its always a conflicting thought which originates from heart & mind. So the point is what one should pay heed to?

Mind in all probabilities gives you a scientific & practical ideas whereas Heart usually has emotional & sentimental angle attached to it.

Reason I am dwelling on this age-old conflict is that I have also been getting these conflicting ideas from Mind & heart for sometime now. And they are related to everything from job, personal life, etc.

If someone is practical with no emotional strings attached then it is pretty simple. Go with what your mind says. But when emotional tangle comes into picture then mind starts taking a beating from heart.

Now I know every person has their own way of thinking, some even club the heart & mind to take their decisions. Some go by just with the heart which some even say as gut feeling.

I have seen friends who keep emotions on backburner and just go by what the mind says and for the world they are doing good. The very same folks had no qualms about doing stuff which their wives/GFs might call acts of infidelity if they get to know. They dont care about if their decisions will have any bearings on friends/family. But then why give stress on heart which already has so much to take care of.

Just for the record this blog is not about infidelity or anything related to that.

Point I am pondering upon is how one can just keep sentiments on one side and go with your mind. But then that is easy said than done. For some folks (like me) emotions play a huge part in the decisions they make. But I have seen emotional folks getting a beating from folks who know how to curb their sentiments.

Guess this question & debate will go on. I better get back to what my mind telling me right now. For a change heart's idea is easy to ignore here.....