India is a nation with a very rich historic background. The Independence Day, India (Swatantrata Divas) is celebrated on the 15th August to commemorate its independence from the 150 years British rule and its birth as a sovereign nation on that day in 1947. It is one of the 3 national holidays in the country. Flag hoisting and distribution of sweets is done all over the country. This is a proud day for the Indians. The prime minister raises the national flag at the Red Fort in New Delhi, and delivers a nationally televised speech from its ramparts, which is viewed by millions of nationals. He highlights achievements of the government, important issues and gives a call for further development through his speech. Every Indian out there knows that the country achieved independence from the British rule on August 15, 1947 and this year marks the 62nd year of independence! Many of us also know from the history books in our schools the recorded sacrifices that were made to regain the sovereignty of our motherland! Equally familiar is the fact that on this day the country celebrates this landmark achievement in its usual customary and colourful ways! The National flag is hoisted in the national capital of New Delhi, and at the various state capitals and union territories. The Prime Minister lists the achievements of the country since the last Independence Day, raises the current and important domestic and sometimes international issues, and urges fellowmen to come together to solve it! Various cultural events are held, and special shows to honour the martyrs and the surviving freedom fighters are staged.
And so another Independence Day quietly comes to an end, the very day our forefathers and great leaders of pre-independent India dreamt of. But for us it is just another national holiday, a mere show of pomp, special shows on television, everything but an occasion to celebrate the spirit of independence, and relive and revive the spirit of fighting!
Why should we fight today? And against whom? Or what is there to fight for? Well, in my opinion we should ask ourselves why we have stopped the fight! After all, we have so many nagging problems, big and small, around us! Isn’t? Unfortunately, today we have ‘learnt to live’ with these problems and as long as they don’t ‘severely’ make a dent on our personal lives, we just don’t care! But have we ever wondered where we went wrong! I know this will kick start the blame game! There is corruption, red tapism that slows down development, and there are no good politicians, no leaders, no vision, no resources, and so on! But do we also realise that we too are responsible for this dismal state of affairs? Everyone knows that there cannot be a change overnight but I hope we will agree that there has to be some beginning somewhere!
Independence vs freedom
What is independence and what is freedom? For most of us political independence is freedom enough! The term ‘independence’ and the sense of ‘being independent’ has outshined the freedom struggle fought by our leaders and countrymen. What they sought was an independent India and more than that the ‘freedom’ to govern ourselves and to be dictated by some foreign force! Sadly, we have achieved the political independence but only some degree of real freedom. Real freedom is what will turn our country into a strong and united India! And every one of us should be fighting for it now!
Take for instance the personal freedom, a freedom that can be exercised by one individual without violating the other person’s freedom. In a nutshell, the freedom to express my views, do my own things without hurting others’ sentiments, and feelings and sentiments. It is a part of the civil liberties that protect an individual from the government of the residing nation setting limits for it so that it cannot abuse its power and interfere unduly with the lives of its citizens. Now how many of us can proudly say that we enjoy complete personal freedom in our ‘independent’ country?! I am not questioning here the rights of the government in upholding the law of the land or punishing the guilty and extending protection to its citizens.
Every government has the right to do that! But this is more about the apathy, of the government and a few individuals and groups, in the name of caste, religion, tradition, and gender that directly or indirectly violates my personal freedom to express my views or do my own things! It is an irony that only a select few have personal freedom which is only misused in restricting the freedom of others. There are more unwritten and unspoken laws being followed here than the customary written ones on bound books, which are almost never followed! Many of our laws are only ‘said’ in the right spirit but not ‘done’ in the right way.
Rights are not allowed to be fully exercised
Similarly we do not fully enjoy the civil rights, social rights, cultural rights and the rights to quality health, quality education, and defence to name a few. Even the right to vote has often been not allowed to exercise in the way we want it to, and needless to say the right to education is dictated by castes and money! Quality health services are denied to many. Everything comes with a heavy price tag! There can be several reasons for this but unfortunately our ‘muted mumbles’ is only making things get worse!
How many of us can proudly say that we enjoy all these rights to the fullest! Right from getting a birth certificate for our babies, to admissions in schools and colleges, and to get the jobs that we deserve, we compromise on everything. This compromise is not ‘ahimsa’ that Mahatma Gandhi stood for; this is typical ‘meek’ surrendering to the apathy of the few bad elements in the society! Of course, there will be a very few out there who would have not experienced the apathy of the officials at some point in time! But that’s only a handful of the population! A majority of us are still in the dark about our rights even on everyday issues! Even after 62 years of self-governing independent India we cannot get to exercise our rights and get things done in the way it ought to be done! Superficially, India has improved leaps and bounds in many fields. The quality of life has improved but sadly the quality of ‘living’ has not! Many of us do not even realise that in some parts of the country, far from our busy cities and our so-called social consciousness, some people are still fighting for some basic things, not with the British Empire but with the Indian government.
Wake up, India!
It is startling that we have failed to realise the gravity of the situation we are in. Or is it like we have meekly surrendered to the official apathy and gone numb to issues around us? Or is it simply because we have lost the spirit of fighting that our leaders and millions of citizens in pre-independent India displayed against the British? May be, it is a bit of all of them. The freedom struggle for independent India was not scripted by Gandhi and Nehru and other leaders alone, there were millions of people who stood up at that time to fight. The only reason was they wanted to be the masters of their own destiny, to help themselves and the country, the single most important persona that each one of us is missing today! What we need today is freedom, freedom across all spectrums and at all levels and the political independence is only just a beginning. If this happens, India will be a real force to reckon with!
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