The winds of change that sweeps this country are huge. Having won independence in 1947, we embraced socialism for a long time and discarded most of it in the early nineties. We embraced secularism and it is in debate whether what we have is the real secularism. European secularism is a negation of religion whereas Indian secularism is a co existence of religions. Our value systems now put the clever criminal on the same pedestal as the police officer. Good and bad overcasts each other, so does our sense of what is appropriate. Amidst such there used to be some unquestionables such as the Mahatma. Even those who did not agree with him respected him.
The Gandhi name has now been associated with a family and the political party but in a story by the Malayalam satirist VKN, the young generation recalls all Gandhis but finally arrives at Sonia as ‘the Gandhi’ . I read it in the early eighties. Then came a survey by a magazine as to the awareness of the Indian youth about Gandhi and there was this response from a youngster , “I think he was some old man who made salt out of seawater” .
Gandhi was depicted as improbable and impractical at least in two Malayalam movies one with Innocent and the other as Madhu as lead characters although I forget the movie names. Last day I showed my son some pictures of great men and he was able to recognize Gandhi, but when I asked him further, he said ‘I think he was a complete loser’. I did not dare ask him further. To the generations after mine I think the Mahatma is totally remote. Sad as it may be, the march of time is irreversible. Like all great men Gandhi has found himself in the bookshelves of history, irrelevant and worthy of not much mention ….. I do not know how to respond to my child. The competitive world that he sees today at age 11 has already made categorizations of winner and loser in his mind and put Gandhi in the latter. Should I be happy or sad, I really do not know…. Should’nt we discard the past to march on or should we embrace the values… I do not know… Is there nothing more to look at even if as a symbol and as an ideal?
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