Nine years ago, when India celebrated 50 years of independence, I joined hundreds of other girls from Sophia College, where I was studying then, and dressed in the tricolour, we marched from Breach Candy to Azad Maidan, carrying flags, singing patriotic songs and revelling in the spirit of freedom. When I look back, it's possibly the best morning I have ever spent, saluting my country in the most cheerful, most appropriate way possible. Every other year, August 15 has been spent vegetating or picnicking or just going about the sundry business of life. This year, I planned to meet friends for lunch.
And I know I should cringe when I say that but I won't. Because what could I do to celebrate independence when, across the country, security was sky-high as the possibility of another terror attack loomed ominously large?
When, just about a month ago, hundreds of innocent Indians died as terrorists blew up commuter trains in Mumbai and nothing concrete has been done yet? When every single day, thousands of Indians die from disease, malnourishment, violence in myriad vile forms or inhuman conditions of work? When communalism is causing millions of fissures in a country that prides itself on its secularism? When the divides between the rich and the poor, the urban and the rural only seem to be growing wider? What could I do to celebrate this Independence Day? That I am still alive, still healthy and still sane despite the mess that is India?
I am not an India-basher. I am not a hopeless cynic. And I am not a pessimist by nature. But when I look at the reality around me, I wonder if it isn't better that we just get on with our daily lives on national days like Independence Day because we don't seem to care about the responsibilties of being a democracy. Why aren't we, as Indian citizens, out on the streets protesting against issues? Why aren't we raising our voices loud enough, strident enough, often enough, choosing instead to convince ourselves that it will achieve nothing anyway? Why do we only complain and whine and bitch and never do or even encourage those who try? How are we living up to the lofty ideals that the brave men and women who fought for independence lived and died by? How are we respecting their sacrifices? What are we doing, dear people, to even deserve a day off on August 15?
When we marched back, on 15 August 1997, from Azad Maidan to Breach Candy, we took a longer route, via Marine Drive and down Babulnath to Peddar Road. All along the way, cars stopped and people joined in our songs. They took flags from us and walked a while, or drove alongside. And when we reached college, after four hours, hoarse voices rose in the national anthem and most of us wept quite copiously. We were hopeful, less cynical, the world was less of a dangerous place, the country seemed headed for a better future.
In these complicated, bleak times, that memory is quite sacred. Even today, the national anthem gives me goosebumps and if I was asked to carry the flag and march for four hours, I would. But I would stop to wonder what it would achieve. Because in India, today, we seem to have lost direction and hope and, most of all, the aspiration for either.
Chinmayee Manjunath
