Valentine’s Day has lost its original significance. It has metamorphosed into a day when people exercise their right to express their love of freedom.
This February 14 brings a fresh twist to the Valentine’s Day celebration. So far anybody keen on defying the moral police had just ignored them and gone about life normally. Otherwise those who wanted to avoid trouble would seek police help. This time, it’s different, this Valentine’s Day has acquired a shade that reaches beyond expressing love for one’s beloved, this time it’s about espousing a love for freedom, a freedom to love, a freedom to choose one’s expression and a freedom to simply be yourself. So paradoxically, somewhere down the line, love is not a priority among youngsters anymore.
Now the Pink Chaddi campaigners are on a ‘pub bharo’ operation to protest against the Managalore pub assault even as the likes of Shri Ram Sene are set to foil every such attempt made at ‘westernising society’. After all, this is not the first clash of its kind. Each year Valentine’s Day witnesses such clashes over the right to expression of love and ends on a bitter note with promise of more controversy coming the next year.
Perhaps this is one of the reasons why V-Day seems to have lost its zing among the youth today. People in love no longer make conscious decisions of professing their feelings on this ‘auspicious’ day or celebrating it with flowers, cards and gifts. It is just another day for most young people these days who feel that the hype around Valentine’s Day is completely unnecessary.
In fact there are many who do not even approve of the concept anymore and think its ‘not cool enough’ to receive or give gifts and bouquets on V-Day. “I do not have a problem with it because it is originally a western tradition. I just don’t understand why we should restrict ourselves to just one day to show how much we love someone. For people in love, everyday should be Valentine’s Day,” says techie Priya Shah, adding, “This occasion lost its significance for me the day after I celebrated my 19th birthday. It is just a teenage thing I feel.”
Though most 20 somethings like Priya think that Valentine’s Day still excites the 13-19 age group, those in this bracket deny it completely and say that the day is just a reason to celebrate. “It has got nothing to do with love or anything. We use such occasions just to get together and celebrate like we do on a birthday party,” said 16-year-old Medha Rao.
With the youth almost ignoring the basic reason for the V-Day being on the calendar, such “Valentines Day special” campaigns too are losing their sheen. “There are several other issues in the country that need more attention, both of the youth and those who claim to be serving the nation by protesting against the celebration of Valentine’s Day. Why attach so much importance to just one day,” asks adman Sabyasachi Sengupta who feels that “it (V-Day) is nothing but a marketing opportunity and should be left at that.”
However no amount of explanation seems to suffice the fundamentalists who are all geared up to attack every pub and gift shop across the country today that has special Valentine’s Day packages on offer. “We have no problem with people loving each other. We have a problem with MNCs encashing on such events and making money. We will target every place that has anything special on offer for Valentine’s Day,” said G Ramesh, the state co-conveyor of Bajrang Dal who along with his men plan to keep a check on every pub and greeting card gallery in the city today and punish all those celebrating the “western event”.
The youth are unanimous in condemning the view of such outfits. They feel that these groups create unwanted hue and cry about all kinds of occasions only to gain some cheap publicity. Agreeing with the youth on this, filmmaker Anurag Kashyup says, “it is only such groups that even talk about Valentine’s Day these days and make so much noise quite unnecessarily. Otherwise people are hardly bothered as to who is doing what on this day.”
Even though youngsters might decide to be at a pub today to make their drive a success, it is interesting to note that many active participants of the Pink Chaddi campaign also attach little or no significance to this day. Nitin M, a teacher by profession, admits that he has never celebrated Valentine’s Day and is part of the campaign only to condemn the “communalisation of love”. “Why try to gain political mileage from such events? Why can’t these groups just let people be and do what they want?” is Nitin’s only question.
Not denying that the concern of people like Nitin is justified, sociologist G B Reddy says that differences regarding the concept of Valentine’s Day arise only because neither the youth nor the right-wingers know much about the day. He said, “Not only these groups but even the youth blindly ape the west in observing the day without knowing anything about the mythological background. Who said Valentine’s Day was only for the youth. Anybody of any age can express their love to anyone on this day. So why such extreme reactions?”
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