India needs a vision

In this 60th year of our Republic, India needs a vision. India needs an able administrator. India needs someone capable of driving this vision through. No, I am not talking about corruption, police incompetence, judicial delays, political dishonesty, pathetic levels of education, extreme poverty or lack of basic health facilities. These are all basic necessities and need to be fulfilled not necessarily by our politicians but definitely by our bureaucrats. All these are jobs for which, the bureaucrats have been siphoning off money since ages now. It is them who need to be made answerable not the politicians. We don’t even need politicians to fulfill these basic requirements.
We need politicians to bind this great nation together. We need politicians to create a vision and to show us that vision and to let us all feel a part of that vision. Leaders don’t get down to brass tacks. That is for the soldiers to do. Leaders need to break free and create a vision which the rest of us can see too and feel for. Nehru had a vision. So did Indira. Rajiv too had a vision. In fact he had a dream - the dream of a young nation. God only knows where it got swept away during the floods of Mandal, Kamandal, Communal and Terror.

We need a new dream and a new vision and we need it now. We need to break the mould, break the barriers to our own thinking and say, Yes, we can!

What is it that will create the magic pull for each and every Indian from each village, town, city, state and union territory? What is it that will take some time to form and yet will fire the imagination of each and every citizen of this great nation? What is it that will truly be a great tribute to this land with more than 5000 years of history and the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world? What is it that will bring a lump to your throat every time you see it or feel it or talk about it? What is it that will fill your chest with pride and unite you with each and every other citizen of this great land? What is it that will pay a tribute to the culture of this civilization while also inspiring its young citizens towards far greater achievements in the future?

The task is humungous but the answer is simple.

Our great visionary will build a massive complex which when seen from the sky will look like a Swastik representing the great Indian civilization and the ancient importance of this all powerful symbol. The complex will comprise a series of monuments and buildings each dedicated to the millennia through the ages. Each monument would depict something of importance right from the Vedic era right up to 1947. Be it the reign of Ashok or Samudragupta or Akbar or even Aurangzeb and Gazni. Another set of buildings will denote important episodes in the history of this great civilization like the Indus Valley civilization or scenes from the Ramayana or Mahabharata or the arrival of Saint Thomas in Chennai. Yet another set of buildings would depict educational systems during ancient times such as the Universities of Taxila and Nalanda. Even the not so goods of India would be shown here such as the Caste system, the Dowry system, the sati pratha and so on.

Towers in between the various arms of the Swastik would be dedicated to depicting the life and times of important personalities right through the ages culminating in the tallest tower being dedicated to all the people who died fighting during India’s struggle for independence.

This entire complex will not only be a one stop shop for all things truly Indian but also will be a living and breathing economy on its own providing jobs for thousands of people. It would have schools, shops, small scale businesses, handicrafts, pollution free industries all within the larger complex.

This complex will house the DNA bank and research facility for all Indians across the globe where they can search for their antecedents should they ever want to.

The architecture of this entire complex will reflect the development of architecture right from the Vedic era to the modern age keeping true to the age that a specific monument represents.

Where will this massive complex be built? Well, of course on the banks of the river Ganga, the holiest of holy rivers in India and just a stone’s throw away from Varanasi, the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world.

Why would this construction create a shared vision for each and every Indian? Because for the construction of this massive complex, bricks will be brought in from each and every village, town and city of India no matter how far or how inaccessible. At least one individual from each village of India will be offered a job at this massive construction site along with permanent housing within this complex when the project is completed. This would result in a mini India, right on the banks of the river Ganga, within the holy city of Varanasi, the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world!

From across the river Ganga, the ever smiling, ever benign, ever peaceful Buddha would be looking over this entire complex. His statue would be the tallest Buddha statue carved from a single stone perhaps taller than the Bamiyan statues.

Why would this be a unique complex? Because the tower dedicated to those who died fighting for our independence would be the tallest independent standing tower in the world with individual names of freedom fighters etched on it in stone.

Further something that would add to the uniqueness of this monument to India, made in the shape of Swastik, would be that it would be the only man made construction in India that would be visible from the moon when we reach there in 2015.

Who can deliver? It is the one and only, our very own, Behen Kumari Mayawati who would be able to realize this great vision in the name of Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar and with the blessings of the 10th incarnation of Vishnu, Lord Buddha.

Showcasing India's poverty

Its surprising indeed that a young and possibly one of the future Prime Ministers of this nation believes genuinely enough that the real India is reflected through the eyes of a poor dalit woman residing in one backward village. What is further ironical is that the Indian media including the press too tends to believe this. Why ironical? Because the media, specially the press, goes only to the literate few in India who can afford to buy newspapers and magazines. So obvioulsy this poor dalit woman living in a village is not one of those who would normally be buying newspapers and magazines.As for the television, i doubt if very many poor dalit women in rural india would have cable connections or even terrestrial tv with electricity in the house to watch the idiot box.One can yet excuse a budding Prime Minister who has studied abroad, has had a girl friend from an exotic land, has an Italian mother to boot and was born to a family of Prime Ministers, when he thinks that he is not from the real India but that the real India lies in a rural setting in the house of a dalit woman.WHat comes as a shocker is that even the media tends to believe that it is not part of this "real" India since clearly this "real" India is not part of the core or even the larger target readership / viewership of the Indian media! So all along for so many years we have been led to believe that the free media in India speaks for the common citizens. Its only now that we discover that these common citizens that the media purportedly speaks does not actually constitute the real India.How on earth or in any other country for that matter can a budding prime miniter take a visitor to a poor family and claim that to be the real India with the entire Media celebrating the great act? Is that really the real India? What does "real" India mean? Does this go on to mean that there are no despicably poor people in the socalled developed countries? If there are, then why doesnt the Indian set of ministers ever go to meet these "real" people? Are all the urban dwellers part of some "fake" India? Are all the rural middle class people part of yet another "fake" India?The media has celebrated an act that should have been castigated even before it happened. I think the budding Prime minister and the media should together apologise for this despicable act of showcasing thepoverty of a rural woman to outsiders. And for that matter, considering it happened in Amethi, what has this family of Prime Ministers been doing for so many decades? They havent been able to set their constituency in order all this while and they hope to rule this nation?! I call for an apology from Rahul Gandhi and would want him to desist from such inhumane and insensitive acts in the future. To begin with, i wish Miliband and Rahul have a sleepover at one of the rural poor people's houses in the UK to see what the "real" UK is all about.Sincerely,From a concerned tax paying well travelled international citizen

Election Manifesto for the BJP and RSS

1. Within the first 12 months of coming to power, the party would make sure that the prominent Hindu religious places will be made steadfastly clean. As clean as the Gurudwaras in India and the Churches in Europe
2. The important cities of India like Nagpur, Varanasi, Puri, Gangotri, Jaipur, Udaipur, Agra, Mathura, Veraval, Somnath, of course Ayodhya and so on will be made clean.
3. The mighty river Ganga will be made a national heritage and the river cleaned up on priority within the first 24 months of the party taking office irrespective of whether it is a coalition or not.
4. The party will pledge to ensure that each state where it is in power, the police will be made independent of the politicians as per the Supreme Court judgement and that massive funds would be released to increase the staff strength by 2011.