Bharat Mata Ki Jai

Our country is indeed incredible! But do we really mean what we say? Some time ago, we came up with the slogan Incredible India; as the dictionary tells us, the word can mean “fantastic”, but that’s about the only positive connotation that covers the original word. If we look closely at India, which is now actively being renamed Bharat, the pejorative inferences are: unbelievable, implausible, farfetched, inconceivable, improbable and absurd. Yet India is all these things and more, because Mother India is a consciousness, is a divine connection, is the closest holistic concept that defines us all. Somehow, we glorify the Motherland and at the same time we debase Her to the utmost. Just a cursory glance at our cities and towns will indicate the sordid truth that we really are all talk and no action. I hope to illustrate this verity in the coming weeks, not to wallow in despair in this new year, but to initiate a change for the better, which, I am sure, will do us all great good, personally and societally.

Let me provide you with an example to illustrate this truth. My home is nestled within the confines of an ancient human habitation called Veteran Lines, in Pallavaram, part of the Cantonments comprising St. Thomas Mount and Pallavaram. Veteran Lines was, to all those people who knew and savored and treasured it way back then, a slice of heaven on earth. Not anymore; alas!

Once you enter Veteran Lines, you will notice that that roads are straight, with lanes at right angles to the two main streets. All the roads are now either black-topped or concretized. Discounting the houses and lanes to the south of St. Stephen’s Church Road, Veteran Lines has two streets, now identified as First Cross and Second Cross, that have (in reality) seven Lanes. This small tract of land was home to some 60 or 70 families and though many properties have changed hands, the topography remains basically the same. For lovers of Jane Austen’s rustic settings in her incomparable novels, Veteran Lines once provided the lore (and sometimes the gore) that gave life to the myths and legends of the past (and even up to our own time). Not anymore!

A way of life has passed. Today there are grandiose buildings that pierce the sky and shut everything else out with tall boundary walls, the likes of which I have only seen in Riyadh, in Saudi Arabia, complete with CCTV surveillance and perhaps sundry other gadgets to ward off the evil eye of the beholder. It is as is the soul of the place has upped and vanished into the gloaming, for there are very few happy smiling faces to be seen, fewer voices to be heard sharing a joke or an anecdote. All of us now seem to be locked up in our shells (cells?), watching and waiting (for Godot?). Alas. Alas, Alas.

Fortunately, my part of Veteran Lines is still cocooned—during the night. Day time brings hordes of amateur cricketers, punks on noisy motorcycles, sundry lovers seeking a secluded spot, and phone-wielding youngsters eager to convey to their friends that they have been there and done that. Everything seems to be one-up-man-ship and privacy is a thing of the past, too, unless you live in a private fortress

I could go on and on, dear Reader, but to what purpose? Like Ulysses, I too, must continue: “to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield”.

I have much more to say on the subject and I will give you the low-down in the near future.