Every 2nd October, when Gandhi Jayanthi is commemorated, the show begins on a sombre note in the Indian official calendar, with the usual proclamations and dedications in the name of the Father of the nation. Television channels blare out on the significance of his arrival in the nation's social-political landscape; print media splash his images, in their various avatars. While the advertisers seek to lure their clientele by offering sops, make lofty claims of emulating the Mahatma, his frugality, austerity and principles even while marketing things otherwise ostentatious - as the issue of Mount Blanc luxury pens surfaced some time back.
Gandhi and his metaphors continue to captivate the nation subconsciously, while at the same time lawlessness, dismal governance, official apathy and public policies with their usual ham headed approach continues to derail the aam admi’s day to day existence. In the present context one may ask as to what is uncommon in the present commonwealth games? The games held at a magnitude bereft of any credibility, defy all established norms, exposes all the chinks in the official armor of the Indian state and its sporting establishment. The spirit of Gandhi ji would have been left traumatized, with the appalling conditions, cold indifference and the inflated bills for organizing such events. The recent instance of the treatment meted to the Ugandan delegates who met with an accident at the venue is a case to be carefully studied. Our Afro-Asian solidarity and Gandhian principles on resisting unequal racial relations, his experience in South Africa, has come in for close scrutiny and censure, given the official apathy towards the accident victims.
What perplexes the common masses is the propensity to invoke Gandhi and yet indulge in un-Gandhian activities. The Gandhians' feel that it is the Indian state and its people who have failed Gandhi. While others and some skeptics, who question the ‘officially designated’ Gandhians' feel that it is the Gandhians' who have let down both the Indian people and Gandhi ji. They point out that these ‘angels’ who invoke Gandhi from their official precincts, never walked under the blazing Indian sun (Dandi yatras’) nor undertook any arduous journey as undertaken by people like Vinoba Bhave, Baba Amte or Sunderlal Bahuguna. So one may conclude that Gandhi ji remains a totem, which is omnipresent yet missing within the social and spiritual domains of the Indian populace at large.
While one may strongly agree in spite of the tumultuous times that we are witnessing, that Gandhi ji remains a pivotal point for questioning all kinds of inequality and injustice in any part of the world. Incidentally the Palestinian movement tried to invoke Gandhian tactics but failed, whereas late Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela could come out with remarkably successful results. The mobilization techniques deployed by Gandhi ji still remains relevant, notwithstanding the changes that have taken place over the last six decades.
The fact that an average politician howsoever grudgingly, comes to our doorstep to seek our vote, in spite of his/her ‘social standing’, is also the part of the legacy left behind by the saint of our freedom struggle. Gandhi ji was a master diplomat, an able statesman and a great political strategist who invoked religious values and spiritualism with a universal perspective, for the betterment, lest it polarize people to its narrow confines.
Yet this Gandhi Jayanthi too leaves us with many unanswered questions about the state of the nation, the discontent within the society, empowerment of the weaker sections, rotting food grains in state go-downs, while poor die of starvation, judicial recourse in day to day existence, matters of faith seeking to call the shots, after the parliament having pandered to it once, around two decades ago. Hence ‘revisiting’ the Mahatma and also waiting for one seems to be the perennial ritual in the annals of the nation.
Gandhi and his metaphors continue to captivate the nation subconsciously, while at the same time lawlessness, dismal governance, official apathy and public policies with their usual ham headed approach continues to derail the aam admi’s day to day existence. In the present context one may ask as to what is uncommon in the present commonwealth games? The games held at a magnitude bereft of any credibility, defy all established norms, exposes all the chinks in the official armor of the Indian state and its sporting establishment. The spirit of Gandhi ji would have been left traumatized, with the appalling conditions, cold indifference and the inflated bills for organizing such events. The recent instance of the treatment meted to the Ugandan delegates who met with an accident at the venue is a case to be carefully studied. Our Afro-Asian solidarity and Gandhian principles on resisting unequal racial relations, his experience in South Africa, has come in for close scrutiny and censure, given the official apathy towards the accident victims.
What perplexes the common masses is the propensity to invoke Gandhi and yet indulge in un-Gandhian activities. The Gandhians' feel that it is the Indian state and its people who have failed Gandhi. While others and some skeptics, who question the ‘officially designated’ Gandhians' feel that it is the Gandhians' who have let down both the Indian people and Gandhi ji. They point out that these ‘angels’ who invoke Gandhi from their official precincts, never walked under the blazing Indian sun (Dandi yatras’) nor undertook any arduous journey as undertaken by people like Vinoba Bhave, Baba Amte or Sunderlal Bahuguna. So one may conclude that Gandhi ji remains a totem, which is omnipresent yet missing within the social and spiritual domains of the Indian populace at large.
While one may strongly agree in spite of the tumultuous times that we are witnessing, that Gandhi ji remains a pivotal point for questioning all kinds of inequality and injustice in any part of the world. Incidentally the Palestinian movement tried to invoke Gandhian tactics but failed, whereas late Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela could come out with remarkably successful results. The mobilization techniques deployed by Gandhi ji still remains relevant, notwithstanding the changes that have taken place over the last six decades.
The fact that an average politician howsoever grudgingly, comes to our doorstep to seek our vote, in spite of his/her ‘social standing’, is also the part of the legacy left behind by the saint of our freedom struggle. Gandhi ji was a master diplomat, an able statesman and a great political strategist who invoked religious values and spiritualism with a universal perspective, for the betterment, lest it polarize people to its narrow confines.
Yet this Gandhi Jayanthi too leaves us with many unanswered questions about the state of the nation, the discontent within the society, empowerment of the weaker sections, rotting food grains in state go-downs, while poor die of starvation, judicial recourse in day to day existence, matters of faith seeking to call the shots, after the parliament having pandered to it once, around two decades ago. Hence ‘revisiting’ the Mahatma and also waiting for one seems to be the perennial ritual in the annals of the nation.
