Commentary/Saisuresh Sivaswamy

India and Bharat, each personifying the ersatz and real societies of our persona, have drifted further apart

It is not the fortune of many countries to turn 50 without the accompanying signs of advancing dotage; thankfully, we in India have been lucky to see the nation maintain its dignity and not waver from its original commitment to certain ideals.

These ideals may have been more often breached than conformed with, but the departures from the path we set for ourselves have not been as radical as they could have been. Which is more than saying for those nations who took their tentative steps towards self-governance at the same time as India.

If there is one thing that has come out stark and clear in the early phase of celebrations to mark the occasion, it is that freedom is an absolute ideal, and petty politicking is not to be infused into the event which is of supreme significance to the entire nation, from Kashmiris to Kongu Nadras, Mizos to Maharashtrians.

An attempt was made, to rob the ceremony in Bombay of its grandeur merely because the elected alliance in the state was not perceived to be conforming to certain ideals of certain sections of the political establishment. The fact was overlooked that if the call for a boycott had been heeded, it would have been tantamount to humiliating the population of an entire state. Luckily that risk was foreseen, and avoided.

But what this incident has highlighted is the fact that in the 50 years of Independence, the differences within two wings of the political establishment have only sharpened. Further, India and Bharat, each personifying the ersatz and real societies of our persona, have drifted further apart.

In purely medico-legal terms, the country is fit to qualify as a case of multiple personality complex. It is undeniable that there are two levels existing in the country. The difference cannot simply be measured in demographic terms, like the urban and rural divide, or in economic terms, as in the rich-poor or have-have not divide. The difference goes far deeper than that. It encompasses the divides mentioned earlier, and at the same time transcends them. For lack of any better term, I could call it the value divide.

And this division, while it exists in the society at large, also exists within each and every constituent of this society. Within us are two personalities, with varying value perceptions. Which one triumphs depends on the given moment.

It is not fashionable to subscribe to the theory of historical baggage. As modern individuals, one is not expected to look back, recognise the past that has the habit of very often coming knocking, disguised as the future. I believe that to know the past is to know your future, but that is not a theory that has many takers or subscribers.

And it is this conflict between the past and the future, perceived as the latter may be, that lies at the epicentre of the great Indian Dilemma, that is the cause of the complex I mentioned earlier. And every year that the nation as a whole marches on without sorting out the mess within itself, there will be mounting entries in the Unclaimed Baggage section.

To give just one example of the clash of the values of different times, take the caste question. For thousands of years, the nation had been stratified into a rigid communal pattern; yes, that was a very iniquitous system, it differentiated men on the basis of birth, and no modern society would subscribe to its continuance in any form. Its deliverance from this evil was the crying need of Bharat when we were unshackled, but has now India dealt with it?

Yes, we have abolished the menace in letter, but bred it within our hearts. If caste truly did not matter in a Free India, then its agents will have no business emphasising this factor on the plethora of government forms a free Indian fills up from birth to death.

When the government tells people to root out this evil, and yet guillotines this knowledge in their hearts, and when this dichotomy continues over decades, the dilemma of the masses will find violent outbursts. Whether it is Uttar Pradesh or Ghatkopar in Bombay.

There are any number of instances of the country existing on two levels. It makes no difference whether it is the elected representatives espousing austerity to the masses from the comfort and calm of an Airbus pressurised cabin or whether it is our simple leaders urging the people not to condone corruption even as their near and dear ones are caught with their hand in the till. All these are individual symptoms that go to make up the whole malaise. No one who has observed these patterns of behaviour can hesitate to term our society sick.

This sickness has festered for five long decades, and even as the nation is commemorating the landmark 50 years it has managed to endure, the viruses are at work, gnawing away at our defence mechanism, constituted by the judiciary and the fourth estate. This leaves the body politic so weak that it is vulnerable against even an ordinary sneeze, leaving a quick grave as the only salvation.

Of course, there is no time limit as to when it will happen. Given the nation's resilience, it may as well take another fifty years, or it could happen before the new millennium. And so long as the two differing personalities continue to co-exist, the risk of a terminal breakdown will continue to exist. Longevity can be assured, but only if the difference between myth and reality is bridged.

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