Saturday, August 9, 2008

Indian Patriotism


It is a strange type of patriotism.


Forget the days of Mahatma Gandhi. The people who followed him did so without any idea of getting any returns. Today it is different.


In India, patriotism today is something that is needed only for the Forces and not for the common man. They don’t want to pay their income tax, property tax, water charges or any kind of taxes and rates. The income tax people never bother them, until they listen to and do what they say. I know a person who has houses valued at more than three cores and cars and shops, and this man has not paid any income tax so far. This is not the single instance. Mostly all do this and anyone can do this without fear of punishment.


The police won’t bother you until you go them. If you go to them for anything you are caught. They may even take away everything you have. So don’t approach the police even if you have been stabbed. The police will help even terrorists until a bomb explodes. Then for a few days they may search here and there and then as days pass by people forget and police will again join hands with miscreants. See the Railway stations. You can enter any of these without anybody stopping you and leave them unnoticed. The police or railway personnel won’t stop you.


There is saying that one should avoid bad people and be as far away from them as possible. and next come in rank the Avoid the police, politicians and they be followed by the government servants - central, state and local bodies.Terrorists, robbers rowdies take the back seat in India in crime. The red are the

perpetrators. Just watch them and be away from them and you will find life happy and peaceful.


People never pay property tax unless the local bodies compel them with dire punishments (they do all these just for records) like removing the water line and imposing a hefty penalty for delayed payments. This may make some 10% of the defaulters pay. Many never pay even water charges. The local body personnel visit areas only to learn who has to be contacted to make money.


You may get a plan sanctioned to build a house and build it without an iota of resemblance to the sanctioned plan and the local body people will give you advice on how to cover the breach. (Sanctioning depends on how much you can part with and no disbursement no sanction)You need not have parking space for cars, but can park on the road. Many even rent out the space before their houses, available on the narrow roads, for car parking and get good monthly income. The local body employees themselves will advice people on methods to by-pass the rules.


Students are taught by parents and teachers to break laws and tell lies. Most of the students who are getting scholarship are not actually eligible students as their parents get very good income. The principals of institutions tell them to declare low income and get the scholarship. Even government employees or quasi-government employees give false salary certificates about their income and get the freebees and scholarships for their children.

As for as Indians are concerned, real patriotism is something unknown or at best understood as something the politicians talk about on August 15th and January 26th or at times on October 2nd or Jan 30th if they remember the last two dates.


Ask even leading politicians why these dates have become important and many take time to give you the wrong answers. Why these dates have been selected is a question only a few can answer. For the young the first two are days on which cookies are distributed and the first three are holidays and the last one is invariably a troublesome one, not just for the young but also for the grown ups as they either forget the hour to observe the two minute silence or find it difficult to remain silent and keep looking down without talking or laughing. Indians find it bothersome to observe the two minute silence by way of showing respect to their great deliverer, Mahatma Gandhi. But they very patriotic and we should believe so. Many can not sing the ‘National anthem’ which has become obsolete today. Some may say that it starts with ‘Jana Gana Mana..’


People ask for and wait for alms distributed by the government. Even rich people get the free distribution made by the government. I know a person who, lives in a posh bungalow, got the free gas connection and free color TV issued by the Tamil Nadu Government. He already has two gas connections and three color-TV sets running at his place.


In India it is what the nation can do and give to one, rather than what one can do to the nation. Invariably what they do is destroying its integrity and encouraging regionalism and terrorism.


All is well that ends well.


Here is a video of the Indian R'day parade.


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