Friendship is a relationship of equality: Why APJ and his ilk matters.

His whistling gets interrupted by the sound of clearing up of throat by the lady. He looks up and finds the beautiful Soviet sitting on the sofa in the other end of the hall, the golden Hammer and Sickle prominently engraved on the Red Star batch that she is wearing proudly on the collar of her suit.

The lady asks him – a bit nervously – “Who are you?”

He thinks for a few moments. Then replies – “A friend.”

In his office abutting the hall, Robert F. Kennedy, Attorney General of the United States of America, is trying to diplomatically resolve the deadlock with Anatoly Dobrinyn, Soviet Ambassador to the USA. This is the last round of diplomacy, in the event of the failure of which the two great powers of the Cold War era lead the world to nothing less than the Third World War – that too a nuclear one.

The scene is from the movie Thirteen Days and the background is the Cuban crisis, wherein the Soviets were secretly installing their nuclear missiles in the American vicinity.

The guy who is whistling in the hall is Kenny O’Donnell, Special Assistant to the American President; and although the movie does not mention the name of the lady, given the fact that she is accompanying the Soviet ambassador on a meeting as crucial as this, it may be safely assumed that she too must be an important official of her proud nation – though probably not as important as Kenny.

It is in this dark, sinister background – when an all-devastating war is lurking just around the corner – that the Special Assistant to the American President replies to a Soviet that he is a friend of hers. The same movie portrays how the Americans and the Soviets are trying to exchange Turkey and Cuba – minnows in the game – in an attempt to resolve the nuclear deadlock.  

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Can there be anything more humiliating and inglorious for a people than preparing an airstrip so that the air-planes of the invading nation can successfully land in their territory?

What the Austrian national and a respected Sergeant of the Nazi forces, Heinrich Harrer, witnessed on that bright, sunny day on the ‘Rooftop of the World’ was intriguing, to say the least. Having come from a part of the world where the Second World War had just kick started and where nations were furiously baying for the blood of each other, seeing people picking up earth worms from the pit being dug for the construction of a theatre left him completely baffled. When he put up the question to His Holiness (child) Dalai Lama, he got a glimpse into the age-old ‘wisdom’ of probably the most peace-loving race on the face of the planet. His Holiness said, “Tibetans believe all living creatures were their mothers in their past life. So we must show them respect and repay their kindness and never, never harm anything that lives.”

War is something that seems to be not really wanted by the normal people and peace – much more than even love – is what the human race, deep down in its heart, strives for. When the Hindus say Shantih, Shantih, Shantih at the end of their mantras, they are essentially praying to the Ultimate Authority for the reign of peace in all the three dimensions of their human existence – physical, divine and internal.

But then, there is nothing called free lunch in this world and there is certainly price that must be paid for maintaining peace. A prudent question to ask here would probably be, “Should a race as peaceful as the Tibetans even have a right to exist as a nation?” The answer, theoretically speaking, will be a yes. But then, in order to maintain their freedom and peaceful existence, they should have had prepared well in advance – both in terms of forging international relations and in terms of acquiring a minimum warring capability.

 After the Chinese have already invaded their northern borders in the name of national integration, an extremely sad and frightful conversation takes place in the court of His Holiness in between his Regent and the erstwhile defense minister.

-          “When you were defense minister to the previous Dalai Lama, then you wanted to reorganize the army. Can we do it now?”

-          “The People’s Liberation Army is 1,000,000 troops strong. We have 8,000 men with 50 pieces of artillery and a few hundred mortars and machine guns. The task is hopeless.”

-                “Then you refuse the appointment, do you?”

-                “No. I accept it with honor.”

A hopeless round of diplomacy is brought into motion. The Chinese generals visit Lhasa wherein His Holiness exerts the right of Tibet to exist as an independent nation. The war continues and Lhasa falls within a matter of a few days. A rag-tag army of barely 8,000 men with 50 pieces of artillery and a few hundred mortars and machine guns proved no match to the 1,000,000 troops strong PLA. 

At a time-period in the world history, where nations after nations were shaking off the burden of colonialism and gaining independence one after another, Tibet was lost into oblivion. It paid the price of taking the preaching of Buddha too seriously and not preparing well in advance for the impending national casualties.

(Movie: Seven Years in Tibet).

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One thing that history teaches us in no ambiguous terms is that friendship is a relationship of equality. Probably the last known instance of friendship among unequal partners was the one between Krishna and Sudama. And, even this comes to us from mythology and not history, and is a relationship in which the all-benevolent Lord is more powerful than his human partner.

In the impossible situation of the human being more powerful, would it still have been the same?

In spite of the Bible preaching us the wonderful idea of ‘Love Thy Neighbor,’ we humans seem to be simply incapable of following it; and the failure is certainly not only at the individual human level, but at the level of nation states as well. Both history and the current times suggest us amply that neighboring nations are seldom – if ever – good friends – Britain, France and Germany, India and Pakistan, the two Koreas, Japan and China, Brazil and Argentina, the lesser known example like Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan and likewise. If we take Easternmost Russia and Alaska, we find that even Russia and the USA are not really far off geographically and can very comfortably considered to be neighbors for that matter.

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‘Everything is fair in love and war’ goes the famous saying. One must travel extra miles and, if the situation demands, go unconventional while preparing for wars and attempting to secure one’s territorial and geo-political interests.

Strength can be defined in two ways. One is the power to restraint yourself. Here, you are powerful and yet you desist from using your power. You power lies in controlling yourself. The other is you are not as powerful as your adversary is, but still – instead of meekly surrendering to the aggressor – you fight with all the men and material forces that you can gather. Here, the strength lies in not surrendering, come what may.

Philosophically speaking, both these kinds of strengths must be respected. But, practically speaking, it, no doubt, is always better to accumulate as much power as you can and yet restraint from using the same by keeping diplomatic options open. The above two examples certainly point to the same.

Keeping that in mind, two dates automatically become extremely important in the national history of independent India – 18^th of May, 1974 and 11^th and 13^th of May, 1998, both connected with the successful carrying out of nuclear tests by the country and eventually entering the prestigious club of handful of nuclear-weapon-armed nations.

And this is where APJ Abdul Kalam and his ilk become extremely important for the Indian nation, which being flanked by China to her North and Pakistan to her West, is the nation that probably (and unfortunately) has the longest running hostile international borders in the world.

True that wars must be averted for as long as possible by keeping the channels for talks open and by forming international alliances, thus trying to balance the international power equations, and this is precisely what is being attempted by the coming together of India, USA, Japan and Australia in drills such as joint naval exercises.

But then, it’s ultimately a dog’s world out there, wherein everyone needs to standup for the protection of his/her own self-interests. This is what the current occupation of Ukraine’s Crimea by the Russians and forceful, illegal Chinese construction of airstrips on Spartly Islands (claimed by Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan) suggest. In both the cases, although a lot of hue and cry has been made, no real and concrete action seems to be taken by the international community. Tibet is another perfect example that fits in this picture.  

It is in this context that a minimum deterrent warring capability needs to be built up and accumulated and it is in this attempt that the nuclear tests conducted by APJ Abdul Kalam and his team of scientists on that fateful day in the summer-baked deserts of Rajasthan gain importance. This, when coupled with the successful 'Integrated Guided Missile Development Program' (IGMDP) – which has armed the nation with missiles such as Prithvi, Akash, Trishul, Nag and Agni – gives the country a respectable military position internationally, which no doubt the nation must keep indigenizing and further investing in.

As far as matters purely international are concerned, respect flows out of fear and nothing else. And hence, it becomes important that the country has poison enough in her arsenal so that she is able take care of her strategic geo-political interests on her own.

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राष्ट्रकवि श्री रामधारी सिंह 'दिनकर' की कविता 'शक्ति और क्षमा' से -

क्षमा शोभती उस भुजंग को, जिसके पास गरल हो,

उसका क्या जो दंतहीन, विषरहित, विनीत, सरल हो. 

सच पूछो तो शर में ही बसती है दीप्ति विनय की,

संधिवचन सम्पूज्य उसी का जिसमें शक्ति विजय की . 

सहनशीलता, क्षमा, दया को तभी पूजता जग है,

बल का दर्प चमकता उसके पीछे जब जगमग है. 

Photo: http://www.tecake.com/india-tests-first-nuclear-capable-ballistic-missile-agni-v/3635/

क्यों लिखता हूँ हिंदी में?

सीधा सा जवाब है - भई हिंदी भाषी हिन्दुस्तानी हूँ इसीलिए. अगर पाकिस्तानी होता, तो अवश्य हिंदी में ना लिखकर उर्दू में लिख रहा होता. पर ईश्वर की असीम अनुकम्पा से वो तो मैं हूँ नहीं.

पर क्या जवाब वास्तव में इतना सीधा-सरल है? शायद नहीं. सीधा होता तब, जब यही सवाल किसी जापानी, फ्रेंच, जर्मन या चीनी से पूछा जाता कि भई आप अंग्रेजी में ना लिखकर जापानी, फ्रेंच, जर्मन या चीनी भाषा में क्यों लिखते हो?  पर हम हिन्दुस्तानियों के साथ मुझे नहीं लगता कि ऐसा है.

लोग हैं जो अक्सर यह पूछ बैठते हैं - "आप बिहारी हो?"

"हाँ. हूँ." - मैं जवाब देता हूँ. और यदि पूछने वाला राज ठाकरे जैसी मानसिकता का शिकार नहीं है तो अक्सर मुझे यह पता होता है कि अगला प्रश्न क्या होने जा रहा है. 

"फिर तो आप बिहारी जानते होंगे?" - अगला प्रश्न. पता नहीं क्यों काफ़ी लोगों को ऐसा लगता है कि "बिहारी" कोई भाषा भी है.

"जी नहीं, बिहारी तो मुझे नहीं आती. और बिहारी कोई भाषा है भी नहीं. हाँ, बिहार में बोलियाँ अवश्य कई सारी बोली जाती हैं जैसे की भोजपुरी, मैथिलि और बज्जिका. मैं बज्जिका-भाषी प्रदेश का रहने वाला हूँ, पर खेद इस बात का है कि मुझे बज्जिका भी नहीं आती." - मैं अपनी इज्जत को ताक पर रख देता हूँ. 

हाँ! यह शत-प्रतिशत सही है कि मुझे अपनी ही बोली नहीं आती. नानाजी नौकरी-पेशा थे और एक ट्रांसफरेबल जॉब में थे, शायद इसी वजह से माँ को कोई स्थानीय बोली नहीं आती थी. नतीजतन घर में हमेशा हिंदी का ही प्रयोग हुआ. कक्षा ४ से हॉस्टल में था इसलिए महनार आना जाना भी छोटी-छोटी छुट्टियों में ही हो पाता था. इसलिए बज्जिका भाषा से बदकिस्मती से अछूता ही रह गया. (यह बात अलग है कि विद्यालय में बंगाली की पढ़ाई होने के कारण बंगाली सिख गया. पर बंगाली को जानना बज्जिका को नहीं जानने का बहाना तो नहीं हो सकता ना?)

फिर दूसरा प्रहार तब हुआ जब विद्यालय से दशम वर्ग कि परीक्षा उत्तीर्ण की.  इससे पहले की भाँप पाता, हिंदी से भी धीरे-धीरे कब दूरी बढ़ती चली गयी पता ही नहीं चला. पहले तो वह कक्षा ११ और १२ के पाठ्यक्रम से गायब हुई, और फिर आहिस्ता-आहिस्ता अखबार तक अंग्रेजी हो गया. हद तो तब हो गयी जब यह पाया कि भई हिंदी सिनेमा में भी हिंदी की देवनागरी लिपि का नहीं बल्कि अंग्रेजी की रोमन लिपि का प्रयोग हो रहा है. बताइए, हिंदी को सशक्त करने का सबसे सटीक तरीका शायद हिंदी सिनेमा ही होगा, और हिंदी वहाँ से भी निकाल बाहर की गई. यह तो गनीमत है कि ऐसी स्थिति अभी तक अन्य भाषाओं की नहीं हुई है. और शुभ यह है कि आजकल कई हिंदी टी.वी. सिरिअल्स देवनागरी लिपि का प्रयोग करते दिख रहे हैं. 

यह सिर्फ हिंदी की नहीं, बल्कि कमोबेश इस देश की तमाम भाषाओं की वेदना है. देश इतना वृहद् और विभिन्नता भरा है कि इस देश को एकजुट रखने का और परस्पर एक दूसरे को समझने-समझाने का सारा श्रेय अकेली अंग्रेजी के झोले में चला जाता है. ऊपर से समूचे विश्व में शायद हम ही एकमात्र ऐसे देश हैं जहाँ सारी की सारी आर्थिक तरक्की एक मूलतः विदेशी भाषा के कन्धों पर टिकी है. मजाल है किसी की जो अंग्रेजी ना जानते हुए भी इस देश में एक अच्छा कार्पोरेट करिअर बना ले? जापान, फ्रांस, चीन या जर्मनी में तो ऐसा नहीं होता? और ये सारे के सारे राष्ट्र विश्व-भाषा अंग्रेजी को ना जानते हुए भी हमसे कहीं अधिक बड़ी आर्थिक ताकतें हैं. 

ज़िन्दगी जीने की दौड़ में लगे-लगे हिंदी कब व्यक्तिगत रूप से भी बस बोलचाल की भाषा बनकर रह गयी पता ही नहीं चला. स्कूल, कॉलेज की पुस्तकें अंग्रेजी में, हिंदी सिनेमा अंग्रेजी में, दुकानों के बोर्ड्स अंग्रेजी में. यहाँ तक की आजकल छोटे से छोटे होटलों के मेनू कार्ड्स भी अंग्रेजी में ही होते हैं. कभी-कभी तो ऐसा लगता है कि अंग्रेजी सही में हमारी ताकत है या केवल आज-तलक गुलाम-मानसिकता में जकड़े होने का प्रमाण. राजनैतिक नेताओं के तरीकों से मैं इत्तेफाक नहीं रखता, पर हाँ इतना अवश्य मुझे समझ में नहीं आता कि अंग्रेजी के साथ-साथ अपनी ही मातृभाषाओं को होटलों के मेनू कार्ड्स, दुकानों के बोर्ड्स या सिनेमा के पर्दों पर बराबर की जगह क्यों नहीं मिल सकती? 

एक बात है, अंग्रेजी चाहे कितनी भी महत्वपूर्ण क्यों ना हो जाए, रहेगी वह हमेशा व्यापार की भाषा ही. उसका सम्बन्ध हमेशा पेट से पहले होगा और दिल से बाद में. और रोज़मर्रा की ज़िन्दगी से हैरान-परेशान इंसान कितना भी अंग्रेजी में टाएँ-टाएँ क्यों ना कर ले, सुकून के, अपनत्व भरे दो पलों के लिए वह वापस अपनी मातृभाषा की तरफ ही मुखातिब होगा - फिर उसकी मातृभाषा चाहे हिंदी हो, मराठी हो, बंगाली, पंजाबी, कन्नड़, मलयालयम, मणिपुरी हो या उन १,६५२ भाषाओँ में से कोई हो जो इस देश में बोली जाती हैं, कोई फर्क नहीं पड़ता. विश्वास नहीं होता तो अपनी भाषा में लिखी कोई साहित्यिक किताब उठाकर देखिये कि वह किस प्रकार आपको मरुभूमि सरीखे ताप से भरे व्यापार जगत से दूर किसी ठंढे, शांत, सुरम्य प्रदेश में ले जा छोड़ती है. 

जब ब्लोगिंग शुरू की तो अंग्रेजी में की. हिंदी से दूरियाँ इस कदर बढ़ गयीं थी कि यह सोच पाना भी मुश्किल हो गया था कि कभी अपनी ही भाषा में कोई ढ़ंग का आर्टिकल लिख पाऊँगा. पर फिर एक कोशिश की तो पाया कि थोड़े से परिश्रम की आवश्यकता है - हिंदी लेखन को भुला नहीं हूँ, बस वह पीछे कहीं खो भर गया है. बस तभी से कोशिश यही है कि अपने हिंदी लेखन को और सशक्त किया जाए और अपने इस ब्लॉग को एक द्विभाषीय ब्लॉग का जामा पहनाया जाए. 

हिंदी में बस इसलिए नहीं लिखता कि एक हिंदी-भाषी हिन्दुस्तानी हूँ, बल्कि इसलिए कि हिंदी में लेखन पूजा है, प्रायश्चित है, साधना है, भक्ति है, इण्डिया बनने की होर में दूर कही पीछे छूटते भारत को पकड़े रहने की कोशिश है. हिंदी में इसलिए लिखता हूँ क्योंकि हिंदी में लेखन एक ज़रिया है खुद को ढूंढ़ निकालने का.

PS - विकिपीडिया के मुताबिक १९६१ में हुए सेन्सस में यह पाया गया था कि भारत में कुल १,६५२  मातृभाषाएं हैं. सम्बंधित आर्टिकल के लिए यहाँ क्लिक करें. 

The Power of Ideas.

It is still not long back that a MAN rose. Although he was born near the Western coast of the present day India, he found his purpose in life in a land on the opposite end of the Indian Ocean. It so happened that one fine day he was travelling in a first class railway compartment with a valid first class railway ticket. However, since he was a black and the compartment was apparently reserved only for the white masters, he was asked to move to the third class compartment. Strangely enough, he refused and had to be forcefully thrown out of the compartment.

The far-off land was South Africa. And the man was a young barrister by the name of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi.

Now, incidents like this must have had been a daily affair all over the slave-world in the times when colonialism was the order of the day. Hundreds of people must have been thrown out of their compartments in a like-wise fashion. A few were men-enough to rise against the atrocity and claim their rightful place in the order of the humans. One of them was Mohandas.

The resources, if any, that he had to support himself and rely upon during his initial period of struggle were scanty. And the enemy that he was daring to stand up against was an empire so large that the sun never set completely on it. However, Mohandas had an idea that he wanted to implement, and he had so much faith in that idea of his that he was ready to work upon it, gradually evolve it and, if necessary lay down his life in order to prove it. The idea was Non-Violence and Satyagrah.

All that he had to say to his fellow countrymen was - "Speak truth. Be non-violent. Koi agar tumhe ek gaal pe thappar maare to dusara gaal aage kar do. Maar khao, itni adhik aur itni nirlajjata se maar khaao ki ek din maarne waala maarte-maarte thak jaaye aur wapas jahan se aaya tha wahin chala jaaye."

Weird, crazy and a laughable idea indeed. I wonder how he even dared to utter this idea in front of the public in general. Was he not afraid of being branded as a madman and being laughed at?

Whatever! The struggle began. The team started getting built up slowly. Over a period of time, the movement caught fire. The idea worked. And on 15th of August, 1947, a new star arose on the horizon. That star was India. Gandhi had achieved mostly what he had set out to achieve. He had made a land as unique as India all the more unique. While all the other nations were getting independence by violent means, we were the only one to get it mostly by a peaceful and non-violent method. And in the process, he himself had graduated from being just Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi to Gandhi and then to Mahatma and Bapu. By the time the nation got independence, Mohandas was no longer important. It was Gandhi all over.

With the support and deadly determination of those who believed in them, it has always been IDEAS that have evolved the world. And the strange-most thing that seems to be with these world-changing ideas is that they always come in packages so simple that they, in most of the cases, if not all, tend to get overlooked. In their early stages, they are so weird and laughable to look at that it needs immense courage and belief on the part of those who believe in them to hold their ground. And this happens to be the case with all the walks of life – be it Science - where a few crazy scientists dared to go against the Church and said that it is the Earth that goes round the Sun and not the other way round and were in fact hanged till death for their courage to go against the institution that claimed to represent the God himself; or be it Business – where Muhammad Yunus comes from Bangladesh, believes earnestly that poor can be bankable, works on the idea and proves it to the world that the big multinational banking giants are in fact highly mistaken when they say that poor are not credit worthy.

Most of us must have had some crazy idea or the other at some stage in our life. And most of us decided to give that crazy idea a cold shoulder and either ignore it completely or leave it to be worked upon at some later stage in life. It is sad - the way the ideas get overlooked because of the lack of courage on the part of the humans. And it is important that they be worked upon. After all those who live in the memory of the human race long after they are gone are those who, against all odds, believed in their ideas and dared to implement it. The rest, once they die, get lost as if they never existed at all.

The history of the world is truly the history of a few men who had faith in their ideas.

 Believe in your IDEAS. In most of the cases, they are worth dying for.

Agreement 123: Which way should India go?

Definitely, the way the Prime Minister Dr. Man Mohan Singh wants her to go. Why?

First of all, our Prime Minister is not a politician.

He is a statesman, a scholar, and an economist who became a politician by default. That being, it can be assumed safely that he has no vested interests in the agreement getting signed. Unlike the politicians, he himself has no intention or greed for remaining in power, and hence has the capability of thinking in terms of the best possible national interests of India.

Second, he is a man with foresight.

Remember the economic reforms of the 1990s? It is Dr. Singh who is still credited for the same. At the time the reforms were being carried out, there was fear all around that by allowing foreign companies to come into India, we are moving towards imperialism again, that we will not be able to stand up to the competition with international business houses and ultimately our companies will be taken over by them. Well, nothing of that sort has happened. On the other hand, today it is the Indian business houses, whether they be as well known as Tatas and Birlas or someone as little known as Maneesh Pharmaceuticals, that are on the shopping spree in the international market. Interestingly, India, today, is the third largest foreign investor in United Kingdom; thus turning the empire of yesteryears on its head.

Now, India of 1990s was obviously far less confident and shaky than what she is today. If this can be the miracle story of a courageous step of a far less confident and economically insecure India, just guess what the impact will be of giving the power-hungry India a completely new source of energy through 123 a few years down the line.

Third, let the nation not be high jacked by the communists.

Communists are a failure all over the world. There is not a single nation the world over that has succeeded under the rule of the communists. A country as powerful as USSR, incidentally also the birthplace of communism, was brought down to its knees due to the wrong policies of its government, and the biggest offshoot of its disintegration Russia is rapidly embracing capitalism today. True, there is China. But even there, capitalism has been embraced completely. They are in fact far more successful in attracting foreign capital to their country than what we have been. In the backdrop of their history the world over, how far will it be judicious to let the country be high jacked by the communists and let go of such an important agreement?

Fourth, we need to diversify our energy basket.

We import three fourth of the petroleum that we need in order to keep our economy moving. And most of it comes from the highly unstable Middle East. With Asia in the rapid growth trajectory, there has already been huge competition in the international petroleum market, which has resulted into the crude reaching never before prices. We need to explore potential alternative sources energy and start diversifying before it is too late. Agreement 123 is surely a step in that direction. With it not only will we be able to produce huge amounts of electricity, but will also be ready in time to embrace the new age transportation that is increasingly going to consist of vehicles running on alternative sources of energy, electricity being the most important of them all.

Fifth, global warming needs to be reversed. And fast.

This is something that needs little discussion.

The island nation of Kiribati is probably going to be the first sovereign victim of the rising sea levels, it being predicted that the whole country may be submerged by the middle of this century. Its government has already started negotiations with New Zealand and Australia to find asylums for its citizens when their nation has gone.

In the Indian context, Himalayan glaciers, on which whole of North India depends for its perennial supply of water, have already started vanishing. Besides, it is predicted that half of Bangladesh and major portions of coastal India, including Mumbai will be sub-merged due to the rising sea levels caused by global warming; leading to the kind of human displacements mankind has never seen before. If the damage to the global climate is not reversed fast, the future seems to be bleak for us as well.

Under such conditions it becomes hugely important for India to start shifting to some non-polluting source of energy for the sake of its own future; nuclear energy, no doubt, will be a smart move in that direction. Thus success of 123 is vital not only for our energy needs, but is also linked with our survival.

Sixth, we need the Americans and the Americans need us.

The matter, as it stands today, is that USA is worried of the rapid rise of communist China and needs a counter-balance in this region; and there is no other nation besides India that can fulfill that purpose. While we no doubt resemble the Chinese in our vastness, population and economic potential, we also cherish the ambitions of being a tough competitor to China, apart from being a global power someday in the future. Moreover, because of our being a democracy and having an almost completely peaceful past, USA will obviously be more comfortable with us as a major power rather than that position being occupied by China.

On our part, being a developing nation we need to be as close as possible to the nation that has contributed the most towards the development of the human race. Moreover, a visit to the post World War II era will make it amply clear that the nations that parted with the American block during that period are today far more successful than those that took side with the Soviet Union. The obvious comparisons can be between Western Europe and South Korea on the one hand and Eastern Europe and North Korea on the other.

Putting our seal of approval on the 123 agreement will not only open up a vast source of energy to us, but will also take us closer to the American nation, thus opening up a huge lot of potential opportunities for us in the future.