Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Anger Management 2011.

I woke up on a lazy Republic day. No shrill voices of my family interrupting my much needed sleep, pestering me to watch the parade that was almost a ritual in New Delhi. No restrospective guilt for having woken up at the almost sinful hour of one in the afternoon, contemplating my brunch when half the world had already wrapped up their patriotic addresses/ speeches/tweets/facebook posts/ bbm status statuses and a then some, pedestalizing a 61 year old constitution that was India; a resilient economy, that has survived a global meltdown, some twenty scams and scandals and a barrage of corrupt politicians, media personalities and corporate lobbyists who received their fifteen minutes of fame this year.

I flipped through the pages of our resident badboy daily, The Times of India, looking for more of this glorified patriotism, imbued with a dash of nationalistic fervour and some political pandering to decadent ideologies. To my great shock, disgust and anger, I read about the attack on Dr. Talwar, by a labelled 'lunatic'. For what? Well, that little snippet of information is open to speculation and gossip, just like the climax to a Shakespearean tragedy.

Was this man angry? Was he just your average stifled man, struggling with daily nitigrities, so suffocated with the failures in his profession, so betrayed by the ideals of constitutional India that he attacked a man probably fighting for justice for his lost child? The operative term, here being- PROBABLY.

No. This 'lunatic' was a graduate from the prestigious National Institute of Design and had previously attacked former Haryana DGP SPS Rathore, accused in the Ruchika Girhotra molestation case.What truly shocks me, is not the act itself, but the way this man chooses to play out his violent outbursts. Does he sneak in from the backdoor and slash someones neck? Does he send out some goons to roughen up a speculated victim/ defendant in a high profile crime? NO. He attacks in public, in the glare of the media, in the eyes of the common man.
I'm not trying to exhibit some kind of reluctant awe for this alleged criminal or somehow insult the family members of Aarushi Talwar. I just want to use this example to highlight the ANGER of the common man. Governmental failure to probe into any unjust crime, the complete failure of a 61 year old republic to grant justice to a victim, the insensitive reportage of all media houses on these issues- all this and more has made the average sane individual reconcile with the innate brute in man, as Rousseau ad Descartes suggested.
ANGER is the emotion reverberating in the consciousness of every citizen this year. Unfortunately, the lack of outlets to voice these strangulated emotions results in acts of institutionalized lunacy , as seen in the attack on Dr Rajesh Talwar.
We need answers and fast. We need expedient justice. We need eradication of the Kalmadis and the Rajas.
We need to redefine sedition. We need to sensitize the media. We need a self-reflexive look unto ourselves.
Then again, Rome was not bult in a day.
 SO MUCH FOR EVOLUTION.



11 comments:

  1. There is much in what you say. The minds of people are bottled up with anger. Our national politicians are too busy to look at this simmering volcano that could blow up any time and lead to catastrophe. Look at what's happening with the BJP's attempt to hoist a flag in Srinagar. Look at the amount of effort that went in stopping it. Maybe it would have been easier and less complicated to simply help them hoist the flag and get everything over in an hour. No they (government) spent days in stopping them. Manpower, money, effort---just to stop the flag hoisting. Both sides playing a game. And not spending any thought of anger that exists in the society. Its dangerous. There is outlet. Rising prices, lack of employment...all these contribute to this seething volcano. We can only hope that it does not blow up. That would be a sad day that ensures we may be be proud of our republic then!!
    anil sharma

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  2. When their is any form of rebellion , or terrorism as they would like to call it now , and also "anger" the more mild version of the 3 , reflects on the failure of the government as a body.
    So this year , lets hope for more onions in the fields, fewer fundamentalists and politicians with a conscience.

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  3. Government is busy collecting money..fighting with each other..do they really think that common man exist? we learnt to paint over our pains!
    A guy killed countless innocent people on 26/11 and right now that man is the safest guy in our country! Right now Kasab gets the best to eat nd common man fyt wid a lot of problem to eat sufficient food! This shows how lame constitution is nd ow blind our government really is!

    I hope someday people like Kalmadi, sheila Dixit forget about jst making money nd care for us, abt comman man. I hope people like Kasab, Afzal, Rathore are punished. I hope someday people get food, fuel at reasonable prices. When all this will happen, I'LL B PROUD TO BE AN INDIAN!

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  4. There is anger in all of us - a lot of it quite useless & more of an expression of personal frustrations. But when it is intelligently channelled into something positive - we can do wonders. I dont mean the kind of outlet that Talwar's attacker sought - more like the anger around Jessica's murder. Silent and solid, which moved the system to achieve results. Anger Yes, Violence No!!

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  5. "ANGER is the emotion reverberating in the consciousness of every citizen this year."
    Well said! I think we're starting to become more uncomfortable in our comfortable lives looking at the broader horizon of the world we live in; very Swift-ian in that sense.
    Loved reading this.
    -Ekta

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  7. Protest in a peaceful manner is still a better and effective way of telling government that we disagree. However, in a society where multi-billion dollar scams are being unearthed every month, all that uncontrolled inflation, price rise, it is hard not to feel angry. We have a society where people are standing at the edge of a cliff, all we need a little push and bam we go nuts. It’s high time we have got to start putting all that energy all that anger at better use. Half of the battle is won if we keep ourselves sane at the time of distress.

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  8. Guys, we agree with all of you and appreciate the echoing sentiments of a nation clearly in transition..
    please feel free to keep visiting our blog and adding to our database!

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  9. Most people might give Gandhi the credit for Indian's freedom... but never forget the number of attacks made by the extremists which was the main reason the british were made to realize they can not control India anymore. They struck down the peace followers with no shame and would not have stopped had they not been attacked back. Lets relate this to the government today ... clearly they have a lot of their plate ... from the international peace talks... defending our own land ... making money by purchasing toilet paper ... forgiving and making murdurers into celebrities ... and just like the british did not care of the consequences till they got what they want ... the government ... the big shots ... the people who get away with scandals too ... the one's who can never be brought to justice ... need to be handled in the way the "lunatic" handled the case ... its trageic that educated intelligent people have to go down to such levels ... but again leaving a select few who i personally respect dispite knowing they are guilty of treason... and respect cause while they make money they do this contry justice and work hard for it's development... our government is full of uneducated, unhygienic, dement, selfish children producing, arrogant, White Kurta Pajama wearing, Gutka eating and spitting everywhere, lunatics who will not understand the peaceful conversation and i assure you no one can bring them to justice. So if you were in a position where you had been cheated by such a person ... would you smile and turn the other cheek? Or would you look for the best weapon-self provided justice followed by a lifetime of fame.


    PS Honestly the 'lunatic' attacking Dr.Talwar is right or wrong i can't really take a stand. Its too complicated too many views and fact of the matter i really couln't care less, i can pretend it makes a lot of difference to me but honestly what movie HBO will show at 9pm today is more important to me. Its the same with 90 percent of you. Just that i can shamlessly admit this!

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  10. Everything in this country or rather the world needs to change...A systemic change, right from the people's mindset, their actions and how their collective conscience gives a direction to the society. And everything else will fall in place. The constitutional framework, the policy framework and the judicial framework. I think the key here is "How" the people are disposed to things that doesn't directly affect themselves or their close ones. Take an example of Mumbai, Mumbaikar's pride themselves for being able to go to work the morning after it got attacked. They forgot! And there is nothing you can do about such forgetfulness. We need years like 2010 to constantly assault our 'attention span problem' with problems which exist in the society! We will have to see the idea of the transition that we wish to see. Its going to have a great cleavage and its going to have to look good!
    This can be achieved by the tapping onto the gravity of our nationalistic qualities we grew up with: I-am-proud-to-be-an-Indian, will unify us and will prove to be the horizontal idea of getting things mended.

    Jai Hind

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  11. We have to SELL the idea to this country :)

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