Shekhar Kapur

if you are strong, and able to look, check out these pictures of the terrorists attacks from Suchitra’s blog:
http://www.suchitra.com/colabacarnage.pps

Now that all of India is soul searching, and blaming politicians for where we are at. Not just on terrorism, but almost everything else, is it not time to look into our own hearts and see whether we ourselves have become self serving selfish people ? So it is good to listen to P Sidhu’s point of view – who had a great romantic view of his ‘mother country’ which was shattered on his first visit. I do not share his views completely, but there is truth in what he says. I think we are changing :
“First of all I am a Canadian born Indian who has spent alot of time in India. Before I ever went to India my opininion of Indian people was based on my interactions with Indians living in Canada, both Canadian born and Indian born. What I had come to realize about our people is that they will do just about anthing to make a buck regardless of the morality behind their actions as long as they can get away with it. Before I had ever gone to India my beliefs about the country were based soley on the 1960`s to 1980`s bollywood movies that I grew up with, not to mention my parents stories about the India that they grew up in. So I always assumed that Indians from India were honourable and moral people. My first trip to India shattered this illusion quickly. A country were it almost impossible to get Government service without paying some sort of bribe. The people have a massive inferiority complex to the white race and have forgotten who they are. The vast majority want to be western and are throwing away their culture. Getting to the point, the country has always been divided and the caste system doesn`t help. Indians believe that some are better than others and so naturally assume that it is right for some to have so much while others have nothing. The country was sold long ago. It is overpopulated and may of its poor will simply die out as food is running out due to depletion of the ocean life and water shortages in the near future. Some of the money will trickle down, but not much. The poor will simply die out. Sad, but true. The rich and middle class will survive along with a smaller poor population that will function to serve the middle class and elite.”

I am always pleasantly surprised when I get responses from villages and rural areas in India. It means that the blogosphere is reaching out to villages, and the people of India are finally becoming one. And the great Indian divide between rural and urban India is being done away with through technology. This letter is from Bhavanandam from Tamil Nadu. Welcome Bhavanandam to our blog community and we would love to hear more from you on how you see India from a rural point of view – where the true India lives.
“I am from small village in Tiruvanalli in Tamli Nadu, I think this modi is good leader. in all small villages like mine, simple poor peoples like me are inspired by the modi. I sold tea for 4 years, now i am computer teacher in village, modi will bring I think the good economic development here. Inspired by him, even in madurai and salem, many of the goverment officers dont take bribe inspired by his nationalism.. this is good change”

I think someone should tell Mr Rane, who was so dissapointed for not being appointed Chief Minister of Maharashtra, that no one in India will be surprised if politicians had supported terrorism. So he should just carry out his threat of spilling the beans. No one cares anymore. That is what we, the people of India now think of Politicians. As the citizens of Mumbai and the rest of India come to terms with the immensity of what is facing their lives, their children’s lives, the future fo their country, the politicians are back to playing games with the nation. One resigns, another takes over, another threatens to topple the government. Nothing changed. They are not listening to the loud and clear message of the people of India. That India needs an entirely new force of leadership, and the old guard is completely irrelavent. Why does the Media even give them any attention ?

Change in India is not going to happen by the resignation of the Home Minister. Nor by high profile dialogues in high profile news channels by high profile people. One of the reasons that India has not been able to change is it is still a feudal society where hundreds of millions of its citizens barely survive in degrading inhuman conditions. With no right to justice, education or dignity. Our greater crime is not just that this state of the nation exists, it is that we, the more fortunate ones accept it so easily. Yes we pay lip service, but do we really care ?
Change in India is not going to come from elections either. 60 years of freedom has proven that to us clearly. The political system has been subverted to serve only those that manage to push their way into the so called ‘elitist club’. Through any means.
Change comes from HOPE. And the majority of the people of India live without hope. It is a true indictment of our political system that we have not been able to give the people of India hope. We need a leader that can give us hope.
We need another Mahatma Gandhi. And if there is a movement we need in India – it should be a movement to look for that leader. One that has no affiliations to a party. One that is outside the completely corrupted political system, but one that the people of this nation, the rich, the poor, the downtrodden, the elite, the young, the old, will completely follow, trust and respect. Hindu’s and Muslims, Sikhs and Christian – all of them,
is there such a man or a woman that can lead us to our ‘true tryst with destiny’ ?

As I had written earlier, all indications are that despite the high cost in innocent lives and terror, this was a failed attempt on Mumbai. Precisely as it had been planned, something went wrong with the terrorists planning. They had planned to kill 5000 people and blow both the Taj Hotel and the Oberoi, making this truly India’s 9/11. While nothing can be quite clear and one captives testimony cannot reveal the whole truth, thiis does show how vulnerable we really our. Terrorists can hit us at will, land anywhere n our coast, carry explosives anywhere they want and hit us with impunity. Nothing and nowhere seems safe anymore. Especially there is no indication that other terrorists are not holed out in the streets of Mumbai.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s statement that the government will punish the perpetrators of this crime ruthlessly carries no weight. Those of us that saw his address to the nation were taken aback for his lack of conviction and determination. He seemingly was being told what to say and looked like a man scared of the events that had overtaken his government. For the first time I actually believed that Mr Manmohan Singh is a great economist and completely non corrupt, but is an ineffective leader, or is not allowed to lead.
This an appeal for a strong leader in India. The US has found Obama, will India find a leader that is strong and determined ? One that is compassionate yet ruthless when needs to be ? One that has the love and the respect of the people ? Someone that can lead us to greatness ? Out of corrupton, out of dirty messy impossible politics, out of casteism, out of communalism, out of elitism out of ignorance and into the country that the people of India deserve, aspire to and are capapble of but for the political non leadership they have been subjected to – a leadership that has kept a whole generation downtrodden under the illusion that we were a poor country with insurmountable problems. What a lie ! We are a great people kept downtrodden by a corrupt political system and by a false democracy.