Cry in the wilderness

India never stops hogging the headlines for wrong reasons, sadly. If earlier it was about our unflattering place lower down the order on the Happiness Quotient beating  our smaller cousins in the  neighbourhood – Nepal, Bangladesh, and even the-perpetually-at-war our pesky northwest neighbour – here comes another stinker, though hardly surprising: on the pollution front. Our state of Delhi being propelled by the double engine of Kejriwal and the almighty Centre (though often pulling in opposite directions at most times) outshines (pun intended) all the world capitals in being the most polluted of all. Hold on. There is more. 35 of the 50 most polluted cities in the world belong to India. And out of the 15 most polluted ones in Central and South Asia, as many as 11 are in India. In other words leaving aside just 4, all the rest nestle on the very bosom of our mother India.

I recall that during the Congress rule, it was the US of A’s CIA that was the favourite whipping boy. All the blame for negative reports – howsoever credible and genuine - about India was conveniently slapped on the face of CIA. But now in the present dispensation the narrative has undergone a sea change. Now the Hindutva flag flutters high and merrily almost touching the murky Indian skies with the air of defiant hubris. Now, the media, once so vibrant and fearless, admired and coveted even by the West, is now a tail-wagging His Master’s Voice. And therefore the blame game has become more radicalized. Now the culprits and rascals who spread such ‘damn lies’ are part our very own and part from the hostile West out to pull the rug under India’s feet. So we have these abominable ‘anti-nationals’– also called by names such as Urban Naxals, civil society activists and the pseudo-secularists etc. –  who can’t keep their mouths shut; and, of course, the whole (undesirable) tribe of the ‘lesser others’ who are not Hindus. That’s why, all such rogue elements are warned in no uncertain terms through a non-stop barrage of aggressive volleys of videos, memes and text messages being manufactured ad infinitum by the WhatsApp university, to keep their bloody traps shut; or else…

Well, I am not here to pontificate or nitpick; nor assume Cassandra’s role. It is a dicey thing to do anyways these angry times– when hatred and violence has become the air we breathe … more so for a superannuated ‘leftist’ like me daring to stick his weak, vulnerable (brahminical) neck out.

I only wish that all the major political parties took notice, rose above the mire of dirty, petty politics for nation’s sake and putting their heads together arrived at a cogent common minimum national agenda on the burning developmental issues like pollution, climate change, poverty alleviation, employment, health and education etc.

I also fume and fret why there is not a single political party with any ‘green’ agenda on its anvil? Why no politician speaks his/her ‘man ki baat’ about it in the parliament or state assembly?

But I know full well that with our criminal-infested political parties tirelessly lunging for each other’s jugulars, it is but a wild, fanciful dream. Where the sole raison d’ etre of politics is to bamboozle the masses and win elections any which way, these silly idle outpourings of a ‘doofus’ like me, are nothing but a cry in the wilderness. Rightly has Ghalib Sahib, the Shakespeare of Urdu shayeri, put:

क्या किया ख़िज़्र ने सिकंदर से

अब किसे रहनुमा करे कोई

जब तवक़्क़ो' ही उठ गई 'ग़ालिब'

क्यूँ किसी का गिला करे कोई I

                                                *