When armchair elite step out of their ivory tower, listen to real India

It has been around six decades since India emerged as a sovereign nation and a beacon of hope for the cause of the marginalized nations and communities around the globe.

The most pertinent observation has been the emergence of internal colonialism, wherein brown sahibs replaced white sahibs, anglicized sections of India took over reins of the State and embarked upon an ambitious but lopsided programme of state building, leaving a vast section of the society marginalized, under-represented and suppressed.

The Indian state emerged omnipotent and the bureaucracy carried out diktats of the elite which was still under the spell of the West. The common people voiced their disagreement for the first time in a very vibrant and organized manner after the Congress party’s tyrannical Emergency rule marked by imprisonment of innocent Opposition leaders for a period of over nineteen months. Even elected members of Congress party like Mr Chandrasekhar, member of Congress Working Committee, and Mr Ram Dhan, Secretary, Congress Parliamentary Party were not spared in this witch-hunting exercise.

Today we can claim with a sense of pride that there has been a ‘Silent Revolution’ in India’s political spectrum with political monopolies being broken and commendable changes taking place in the socio-economic sphere. The subordination of the rural agrarian sector to urban industrial society has been done away with the rise of the leadership of backward classes who succeeded in placing the contribution of rural peasantry in the collective consciousness of the nation.

This has been marked by corresponding changes in the breakdown of the Congress party’s patron-client system wherein the marginalized got a chance to cast their ballot but hardly got a chance to be elected. Empowerment has been made meaningful with the democratization in the villages with redistribution of land, fair representation of all the sections of the society and strong measures against any form of oppression.

But we have a long way to go and strive hard to realize the unfinished goals of our leaders. We can’t afford to see only a minuscule section of the society benefiting and cornering the fruits of development. India empowered to me is when Gandhiji’s dream of Swaraj is realized, when roti, kapda, bijli, sadak, paani, shiksha is for one and all.