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     Vjavasi Side Hero Username: Vjavasi Post Number: 4072 Registered: 11-2009 Posted From: 192.127.94.7 Rating: N/A |
origins of bandha, hartha, raasta roko,burning public property gurinchi discuss chesaadu | ||
| Linkmaster Hero Username: Linkmaster Post Number: 15235 Registered: 02-2008 Posted From: 205.172.134.23 Rating: N/A |
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| Vjavasi Side Hero Username: Vjavasi Post Number: 4071 Registered: 11-2009 Posted From: 192.127.94.7 Rating: N/A |
http://www.dailypioneer.com/275768/Revolution-goes-on!.html Revolution goes on! Sunanda K Datta-Ray When he was Railway Minister, the late Madhavrao Scindia was fond of recounting a possibly apocryphal story of public-spirited commuters on Calcuttaâs Metro (this was before Delhi had one) angrily pouncing on a man who had screwed up his used ticket and thrown it on the platform. Apparently, they forced him to pick it up and deposit it in the litter bin. The Metro was theirs; it had to be kept tidy. Such concern for public property has been rare since this week shook the mighty British Empire 68 years ago. For, what the Viceroy, Lord Linlithgow, called âby far the most serious rebellion since that of 1857â also sowed the seeds of persistent public disorder in the name of patriotism. âQuit Indiaâ may be forgotten but the message of the catchy jingle â âSarkar ka maal/ dariya mey daal (Into the water with state property)â â associated with it continues to dictate public action. India hasnât looked back since August 9, 1942. It was a day of widespread disturbances that exalted protest and made opposition a way of life. Its legacy incorporated words like hartal, gherao, bandh, andolan, sanghatan and satyagraha into everyday speech. From Jayaprakash Narayan to the Communist Party of India (Maoist), the state is the enemy and its property up for grabs in this land of a million mutinies. Inquilab Zindabad, the revolution goes on. Attacks need not be frontal. The highly-placed criminals whose thievery over the Commonwealth Games has disgraced India internationally are as vicious saboteurs as any terrorist. Nor is every murderer on the rampage in Jammu & Kashmir or involved in the attacks that have devastated Mumbai since 1993 an Al Qaeda warrior in Pakistani pay. Many of Indiaâs worst enemies are Indian. They do not see Governments as a national possession with authority over all but as creatures of the ruling party and, therefore, fair game for those of other persuasions. An all-out war of independence such as the Americans or Vietnamese fought and Subhas Chandra Bose contemplated might have avoided the confusion between âthemâ and âusâ that underlies civil disorder. But transfer of power meant a bewildering overlap, with no one quite knowing how to cope with rebels become rulers. An amazed world watched the bizarre spectacle of a Government protesting against itself when this happened in West Bengal in 1969. It might happen again with equally explosive consequences in 2011 when the State goes to the polls and a change of guard is widely expected. Itâs difficult to say how much of the Quit India violence was premeditated. âIf any people think they are helping Gandhiji by these ruinous activities, they are deluding themselves and bringing cruel discredit on him,â Chakravarti Rajagopalachari admonished, magnanimously exonerating Gandhi of blame for lawlessness. But Gandhiâs own attitude was more ambivalent than Rajajiâs comment suggests. The Mahatma stood for non-violent non-cooperation and made a fetish of the sanctity of means over ends, even to the extent of reiterating that means were the end. But his âKarengey ya Marengey (Do or Die)â exhortation at Bombayâs Gowalia Tank went further than the Congress resolutionâs pledge of âa mass struggle on non-violent lines on the widest possible scaleâ which sanctified violence and vandalism in the name of freedom. Mobs set fire to railway stations and signal boxes and tore up railway tracks. Bridges were bombed, telephone and telegraph lines cut, and post offices, police stations and Government buildings burned down. In one instance, a group of policemen were doused in kerosene and burnt to death. Many irons sizzled in the swarajist fire. Anti-Brahmin militants seized the opportunity to establish âpeopleâs courtsâ. Apart from the Congressâs own musclemen, the criminal underworld took over in many places. Some historians believe âBirla Brothers and the Marwari communityâ financed strikes and sabotage âso as to hit the British capitalists hardâ. Since âviolence breeds violenceâ â a Gandhi aphorism â the brutal official response triggered further resistance. Precedents were set for Chhatra Sangharsh Samitis, Naxalites, khaps and Maoists. If the jurist, GD Khosla, is to be believed, the Indian psyche sees no conflict between condemnable means and laudable ends. He wrote an article in the 1970s listing a number of instances from the epics such as stealing the nectar of immortality from the churning of the ocean, deploying the hermaphrodite Shikhandi or the âAshwathama hatah...iti gajaâ legend to show that our culture sanctions deceit for a good cause. I remember orthodox readers rumbling their disapproval but no one challenged the examples. Not that current rumbustiousness can be attributed only to atavistic duplicity. Trains are derailed and roads blockaded because 63 years after the British quit, there is still little sense of identification with Government. Agencies like West Bengalâs Tram Bus Fare Enhancement Resistance Committee or Biharâs State Struggle Committee of Workers and Employees Against Price Rise and Professional Tax are as proud of defiant titles as of being able to bring life to a standstill. Venal politicians and civil servants who wallow in the pomp and protocol of the Raj (shades of Orwell's Animal Farm) extend the distance between ruler and ruled. Winston Churchillâs dictum that if you have ten thousand regulations you destroy all respect for the law remains relevant for liberalisation notwithstanding, India still bristles with doâs and donâts. The 1942 protest was originally going to be called âGet Outâ but Gandhi thought it impolite. He preferred Quit India. Rajaji opposed it for the sound reason that disenchantment with the British was no reason to welcome the Japanese âwho will be ten times worseâ. Mohammed Ali Jinnah called Quit India a âHimalayan blunderâ. Communists argued at the 1948 Calcutta Conference whether it was a movement, a revolution, a revolt or an uprising. Eventually, they decided on âAugust occurrencesâ. The politically correct speak of August Kranti. Whatever the name, it marked a watershed. When announcing his reforms as Finance Minister, Mr Manmohan Singh memorably reminded listeners that Indians are no longer pitted against the East India Company. But who paid heed? He may have convinced rich Indians (whose households for the first time outnumber low income households, according to the National Council of Applied Economic Research) that all multinationals donât nurse imperial ambitions. But ordinary folk clambering on the bandwagon of protest have yet to be persuaded that Government is, indeed, of, for and by the people. |
