INDIA: What a controversial state!

Well! This all started way back in 1951, when India finally became a sovereign republic nation and became its own master. Now, There must be a question arising in your mind; was there nothing before that?

According to many, the answer is “YES”, because they believe that the era before 1950s is just filled with misery, slavery, blood, massacre and colonialists. But if you look at It deeply you will realize this is not quite true. There have been a lot of good things then also. But the adversities overpower prosperity when one thinks of that era. Anyways we are not here to talk about Indian history. It is what it is. But instead shift your lens’s focus to the current situations of the nation. To be specific, to economic, political, social, and environmental conditions (Not to cultural because it was always rich and thriving).

Well! talking about Indian economic development, we can recall a handful of cities. And development is defined by different people differently, irrespective of the guidelines issued by the World Bank. For some people merely having a home is development, whereas for some it is investing billions of rupees and making billions out of it. But how does a common, middle class, partially satisfied person define it? If you try to see through his glasses then you will find that he generally wants a safe and gentle locality to live by, good schools and hospitals so that his family doesn’t suffer and a handsome salary. But after pushing his vision, you will see that there is a good chance he also wants to see his nation grow by moving up in several indexes defined by international committees, a few good looking skyscrapers, an effective-efficient transport system and minimal city aesthetics to feel proud about.

But we all know that India is lagging behind in many areas. Instead of making our economy and our living standards thrive by making some bold and beneficial decisions, what our political legendary leaders are doing is just playing dirty politics. I mean just look at your surroundings and what is being marketed. Whenever you try to listen to some politicians’ speech, you will find just some vague promises and bluff. This is insane, the way our government is taking decisions these days is just ridiculous.

Well let’s first consider the Indian economy. Talking about it, you will see that every right wing politician speaks of a 5 trillion economy by 2024. Maybe it’s feasible but they are claiming it when our GDP rate is dropped to 4.2% and during the pandemic, it made a huge achievement by taking a leap to negative 23.9%. Nobody tried to pay real attention to the actual and relevant figures. If we are going to have a growth rate of 4.2 only, then for sure, India can’t be a 5 trillion dollar economy by 2024. Let’s elaborate it. See in order to be a 5 trillion dollar country India needs its GDP to grow by at least 17.75%. But the statistics do not look that promising, despite actual facts’ harsh reality, many economists are claiming that we will move now with double digit growth. But on the contrary many known economists (not related to politics) say that no one can pre-project the GDP growth rate, it is just an assumption. And remember that assumptions always come in the absence of facts.

Well speaking of Indian politics, it seems dirtier than sludge. You will be amazed to know that India’s rank in democracy index is 51st and more amazed by knowing that it was in twenties in the recent past. Amazing! isn’t it? See how much growth. Well that’s quite acceptable that India is a very large country and with vast diversity, so we are gifted with political challenges. But if a good number of people are raising their voices and trying to say that the thing just happened was not right then the chances are it is not. Just take an example of farmer’s protest these days going on. It is very well visible to everyone how our dear government passed the farm bills in a hurry and despite having so many counter statements. Now when the farmers are not accepting it and demanding to take it back. The government is not ready to do so. Well off course you must be thinking that this is not an easy task. But don’t forget democracy is “of the people, by the people and for the people''. If people are not happy with your democratic policies then what good will it do?

Here comes now, the social aspect of India. Here we can’t blame the government or our protection system. It is well and good (but exceptions are always there). But still there are social adversities in the society. Do you know what India’s image in the world is? Well known as a dirty place with quite unmannered folks. Now you must be thinking; thanks to god we haven’t gained much reputation as the country with maximum rape cases. Okay! That's true but that doesn’t show that India is a very good place in terms of women safety. How did India become so dirty and a place where people don’t have social etiquettes? The answer is quite simple because of you gentle person. We all are the part of the creation of this bad reputation. To ensure calm and smooth transition of life of people the government. has passed so many laws and made rules and regulations. But it is a typical mentality of ours or yours which forces you to create a mess around you. It has not appeared out of the blue that the government. bans drugs’ usage and advertises to avoid smoking and drinking. However, there is one more precious commodity against which there is an urgent need of taking action and it is ‘Paan’ a typical Indian shit. People slurp it and then just go on painting the streets. This is a humble request to all those, stop this, our streets are very well on their own. This is just the one thing, there are a lot of them. Try to recall how meticulously we park our vehicles on footpath and how neatly we forward our house’s garbage on to the streets just the way we forward a funny joke on whatsapp. But you don’t see that by making these minimal mistakes you are ruining your cities’ essence of beauty. To improve the social status of the nation we need to improve the social intelligence of every individual.

Lastly, talking about our environment; it seems like we have forgotten about it. Recall how recklessly we go on cutting down the trees for our collective personal benefit. It is one of the hot topics these days that the govt. of Goa has approved three major projects which will be demanding a mass destruction of the Mollem reserved sanctuary. An estimated 60 to 80 thousand trees will be cut for the success of these projects. Just think about how much this development is worth which costs our environment.

At the end of the day, we are not completely fucked up yet and it is a point to be noted that there are lots of lots of people who still can think positively and in fact every upcoming generation is being intelligent and very responsive in order to protect the environment and are also on the track of sustainable development, but there is a very big room for more improvement. At last just shift your focus from ram mandir and religious disputes to some relevant issues like economic slowdown and real development issues.

A very popular saying that “Intelligence is knowing the right answer but asking the right question is wisdom” defines India’s controversy very well.