Shahid Diwas! Yes, it is a memory that needs to be again and again awakened in the indian consciousness, especially these days. The current indian mindset, it can be easily argued, shows a societal framework that is much fractured. The Meerut Murder of a husband, with the help of a paramour (and, may be, the maternal family) shows to what level the society has generally sunk.
The people involved are typical middle class indians. The woman's family, the woman herself, the husband's family are what go in to the making of the mass(es) of Indians. The paramour with his lust for dark rituals, too, reveals the superstitious bent of most Indian minds. Unfortunately, such cemented, refrigerated, pressure-cooked bodies, men committing suicide, women as victims of horrendous harassment are no longer one in a million instances either. Such brutalities are so typical and regular that 'a horrible headline that the media milks till the next senseless sensation happens' is becoming the numbing norm.
The Meerut Murder today is a horror. No longer is the moniker, unlike the Meerut Massacre, a bright chapter in the glorious narrative called Indian Freedom Struggle. It is hence but normal that great revolutionaries beginning with the triune Lal-Bal-Pal to the trio Bhagat Singh-Sukhdev-Shivram Rajguru to Savarkar to the nameless others who suffered hugely due to their participation in the Independence Struggle need to be reverentially remembered, and repeatedly. But for their sacrifices, the independence Indians today enjoy with so much blase feel would not have materialised.
Like Tilak in the earlier generation, Bhagat Singh was both, an activist and an intellectual. In 2007, his centenary year, I wrote in a magazine entitled 'Kirloskar' a detailed article on his multifarious contribution. I read up hence his writings. The sheer volume and brilliance are astounding. As part of that article, i translated quite a bit from the Punjabi/Hindi to Marathi.
It is hence tragic that either such greats are forgotten in the humdrum realities of the Meerut Murder variety or glibly paid tribute to by smart-ass professionals because such a mention would add sheen to their dull profile. Such creeps are never ever true to their own professions, avoid deviously duties which would not bring them any publicity personally, would gang up in the most deceitful but subtle way, would be politicking in the meanest way.
Such snakes in the grass, when they praise the poor revolutionaries in a public way, are hypocrisy incarnate, and, in my opinion, destroy absolutely the already tattered fabric of the societal consciousness and conscientiousness! Poor revolutionaries! They sure deserve better!
Pratima@ A (wo)man may simper and simper, and yet be the worst villain! This universal truth is brought in to sharp focus by the glib but hypocritical tributes on such days.
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