Note: I always come with disclaimer! The views expressed here are purely personal. No Offence is intended. Any unintentional offence is apologized before hand.
Two days ago, a friday I was planning to go to Bangalore for the weekend to a friend's house. I have been in chennai for a month for now as my work brought me here. Now, this is what happens - The day starts in a board room with a presentation from a leading open source company in our company. I was very much taken by the professional environment that prevailed in the room for this was my first job and the first such meeting and as I am only one month world in the corporate world. This our first bookmark - I am part of India that is professionally competent with anybody in the world.
Fast Forward to the end of the day. I am in the CMBT bus terminal of Chennai to catch a bus to Bangalore. As I walk into the bus stand I see many people sleeping on the floors outside the terminal. This is not a new sight to anybody but still I was moved at the site. After I go inside the terminal I wanted to take of the pressure of my kidneys as I had long night journey. So, as I go towards the toilet I see a huge line into the toilet. Everybody is closing their noses as the stench is intolerable. The flushing system has taken a long vacation I guess. Those two minutes were unbearable to the passengers. There is a wonderful fountain outside the terminal and yet there is no cleaning mechanism in any of the urinals. This our second bookmark - I am still part of the India where the government is working awesomely wonderful!!!!
I reach Bangalore on Saturday morning and we go for a movie in the Forum in the afternoon. The movie starts with the hero throwing a party to friends in Sydney or somewhere and he is shown very affluent. After the movie we go for lunch to a mess a nearby and find an old man living as a destitute seeking help. We give him a ten rupee note and go for food. But the point is I am still part of two worlds.
Later on we go out seeking to buy a wrist watch for me and when I entered the showroom I saw too many good watches which for a moment thought I should have. Third Bookmark - Too many desires and craving to own too many things
This is the problem as I have always seen(refer to previous blog) - We are living in a world that is extremely powerful in communication and media. The media is glamourizing affluence like anything while there are still millions for whom a square meals a day is a luxury. Only a month ago there was a huge coverage for a french flight that crashed - I don't remember the details - but the amount of coverage for the kids suffering in poor nations in africa or other developing nations for an entire year would not be probably equal to that. We are living in a bipolar world and it is going more and more bipolar by the day. It is very easy for a millionaire to earn another million in a year from now than for a person with income of around Rs100 a day to make it something like Rs200 a day in a year from now. If the big guys(nations) want to prevent/eradicate Terrorism, I suggest them invest in poverty eradication than in arms.
The ideas that I have pondered over till now are anything new. But this blog is a snapshot of an Indian youth caught up between affluence and poverty. I know that I am a part of the solution and not the problem. The new economic story of India post reformation by our beloved Prime minister Dr. Manmohan Singh way back in the 90's is what we have seen in our formative years. Thousands and thousands of people like me are in the beginning of our careers and are gowing to a life that is comfortable materialistically but have come from middle class or lower middle class background. Education had made this possible - Don't we have the responsibility to take the other 300 million in India alone and over 1billion in the world to take us along with us?
We are caught up between two forces - One driving me crazy in the form of media towards material world and the other which is morally holding me.
Probably we can use the money spent in a bowling alley for better purposes like helping a kid get his education. Probably we can help millions if all of us give one day of our salary every year for lesser privileged people in this world.
I am a part of the generation that will go down the history with probably the most number of challenges. Will we be able to pass on the great Indian cultre which we got from our parents to our kids when our turn comes? Will we as Humanity be able to give future on this planet for three generations from now? Will we go down as the ones who took the right decisions? - Only time will tell.
