India's moral bankruptcy

As a popular saying goes:”When good people look away, bad things happen”. It's true of what happens in India. In the 1950's post-independence euphoria, some people in the world thought India had a moral high ground and that India stood for certain ideals, given the way India won it's independence. Now it's clear that India is morally bankrupt. Indians don't care about standards of any sort. The path of least resistance seems to be the Indian way. This is readily apparent to anyone who follows news from India.

 

Khap nuisance

The Khaps of Haryana and the daily reports of rape from Haryana and New Delhi, in particular, are clear indicators of the Indian moral compass gone askew. Now, many people will say, don't judge the whole country based on a minority. I will disagree with this statement. Clearly, this is no accident. India is one of the few developing countries where the overall socioeconomic indicators are falling contrary to Indian popular opinion which talks of an India shining. There are some parts of the country which contribute to the fall of these indicators more than others. But, the problem is with the whole country. The status of women and minorities is dismal compared to many countries in Africa. While this disgrace plays out in Haryana, the central and state governments can only stand by and watch.

 

Apathy leads to insurgency

The now mature Maoist insurgency really started as a cry for help from dispossessed farmers and sharecroppers. The step motherly treatment (with apologies to step mothers) by both the central and local governments have contributed to exacerbating the situation and made this movement a threat to Indian security. Now, the central government overreacts and calls the peasants terrorists. Well, if the governments cannot solve their problems, you can hardly blame people for taking matters into their own hands. Though I personally wish they had taken a democratic form of action. For instance, organized as a political party to sway the government. All this while, the citizens of India have towed the government line instead of trying to understand the problems of these people. The same can be said of other insurgencies in the north-east and Kashmir where in spite of Pakistani interference, the Kashmiris did not rise against India till 1989 when the Indian government tried to fix elections to it's liking. Again, the Indian people sat on their hands and still continue to do so. The only way to find a solution to these problems is for the Indian people to express support for their fellow citizens.

 

Souls for sale

Some of the Maoist affected areas have also seen a rise of conversions to religions like Christianity. This is a result of persistent efforts by christian groups particularly in the US to bring more Indians under Christ. But, this is also a result of the alienation that those people feel with Indians at large and one way to change their condition is to organize under one umbrella to seek more political power. The likelihood that some Indian states may be run remotely by religious leaders such as Pat Robertson, the US evangelist, is not inconceivable. Interestingly, poor dispossessed Hindu farmers in Andhra Pradesh seem to prefer voting for candidates who have a decidedly pro-evangelical Christian leaning because these candidates are the only ones that make a difference in their lives. These candidates offer the people gifts for voting for them. There are souls for sale and the global evangelical and Indian christian organizations seem to be on a buying spree. The apathy of the majority and the lack of an Indian alternative led the poor to seek an alternative elsewhere.
 

A culture of looking the other way

Goa according to news reports is a paradise lost. Though most tourists still seem to enjoy their stay in Goa. Over the last few years there have been reports of rape and criminality not just by locals but by non-Indians too. The penetration of the Russian mafia in Goa has led to a lot of heart burn for locals. The Russian mafia is accused of trafficking both drugs and guns. The latter to the Maoist insurgents. The seriousness of the gun running allegations is self evident. But, by and large the attitude towards the trafficking of drugs is shocking. The attitude seems to be that it's just the non-Indians that come in and consume drugs. This is far from the truth. The recent arrests of college students and IPL players in Mumbai at rave parties should be a red flag to authorities and citizens alike. This is only likely to spread. Apart from the Russian mafia, the local mafia are involved in this too. Goa seems to becoming the crackhouse of India. I am willing to bet that Dawood Ibrahim and gang have their share of the market too, though I must state that I have no evidence to back that statement. What better way to get back at India than to poison it's youth? The attitude that it's alright that a few Israeli kids get high and "flip out" just leads to more and more drugs coming in and more Indians getting hooked. This is neither fair to the Israelis or other tourists nor to the locals. All this is leading to tourists clashing with the locals. The central government needs to step in and bring some sanity to this situation. As a comparison, if you look at the Mardi Gras celebrations in New Orleans, there is a lot of fun had in spite of heavy policing. The police in New Orleans do a great job of both controlling crowds and busting drug peddlers while letting the festivities continue. The Goan police clearly have not figured this out nor has the Indian government.
 

Inaction on Tibetan and Myanmar

India, which won it's independence from tyranny to become the largest democracy in the world, has been one of the poorest supporters of democracy in the world and more disappointingly, in it's immediate neighbourhood. The two most striking cases of it's inaction have been Tibet and Myanmar. The Myanmarese military junta have recently relaxed their grip on the nation. But, before they did, India overcame it's compunctions and started to trade with the government of Myanmar. Some called this a policy of engagement and not appeasement for gain. Some have even credited India for playing a very positive role in changing the minds of the military junta. Even so, the lack of public criticism of the repressive policies of the junta has left India looking weak and lacking moral fortitude. The more outrageous case is that of Tibet. The Tibetan people are being ethnically cleansed in their own homeland. About 44% of the current residents of Tibet are Han Chinese. The culture of Tibet is being replaced by Han Chinese culture. The Tibetan people themselves are being brainwashed and oppressed. The Indian government which claims to be a friend of the Tibetan people, has recognized Tibet as an integral part of China in spite of the Chinese government still making territorial claims within India. The Tibetans that live in India live as refugees having been refused Indian citizenship by the Indian government. India, the great deocracy of the East, cowers like a coward in front of the Chinese communists. Shame on India.

 

                     As I said in opening, the path of least resistance seems to be the Indian way. When problems come closer to home, people feel like they are being victimized. In reality, there are very few victims. There are people who expect conflicts to resolve themselves and problems to just disappear. Foreign diplomats still call India a “vibrant” democracy. This is clearly condescension because it cannot be true. A democracy is only as strong as it's people are and for all the reasons stated above, the "nice" people of India are clearly not "good" enough to be up to the task of building a truly vibrant and strong democracy.