FOCUS
IN QUEST FOR A NON-VIOLENT SOCIETY
A social worker associated with school children, while talking regarding a handicapped child asked if we could help get some quality used children’s clothes for needy children in village school around her place. Agreeing to join hands with her, in her concerns, we wrote to five local schools, if the parents of children of those schools would come-forward to give away the ‘used but presently unused clothes of their wards’? Visiting one of the five schools, we were saddened to see 3 small children kneeling outside the headmistress’ chamber. They were undergoing punishment for some mischief. Another four grown up boys were waiting to be called in. As we were waiting outside, these four students were called to explain their share of wrong-doings and were all treated by the standard weapon of most teachers. The wooden foot-ruler sternly landed with a slap sound on their extended palm, by turn. Fear was writ large on their face and as they underwent their ignominious retribution at the hands of HM, their eyes were bulging. We could only silently join them in their collective mortification. We felt profoundly sad at the collective helplessness of these children at the mercy of teaching fraternity. Of course, managing ‘wayward’ children was extremely trying experience for these ‘harassed’ teachers, HM claimed. But then, is punishment the only way out! Aren’t we introducing a degree of violence into the childhood little too early!
Violence in childhood, unfortunately is not confined to institutions of learning only. It has its tentacles found in other socio/political institutions as well. There are millions of families where child beating are as routine, as schools. Block headed parents have inflicted grievous physical and psychological trauma to these helpless victims of time. Many times it could be the poverty that took its toll. But then there are many in the socially mobile section of well-to-do, where children have continued to suffer in their helplessness. Then there are police stations where child beating is committed without batting eyelids with insensitivity which can only be called cruel. There are also orphanages and remand-homes where these helpless children are victims of violence of multiple nature.
Society somehow do not realise the seriousness of this attack on the persona of child, as he or she evolves into a grown up man or woman, through the inevitable adolescence. Are we all accountable to these reckless behaviour of grown ups towards the growing children, who are the citizens of to-marrow? Or are we side-tracking the issue saying, that, they didn’t belong to my family, they do not belong to my caste, they do not belong to my faith, or any of the many escape routes that all thinking, self serving men and women have no difficulty in inventing?
After all to evade responsibility or to remain non-responsive to our socio/political environ is a done thing. No questions asked.
Does this violent growing up through schools, homes and society leave its indelible scar on the psyche of these growing children, our citizens of to-marrow, as they step into adulthood?
Then there are other vulnerable section of our society like women, who are subjected to multiple kinds of violence. It starts as early as, Female feoticides. The lunatic Indian mindset for male child has earned notoriety. Unfortunately this is more among educated and well-off class. Not only those in India but also well placed NRIs. In a study conducted by University of California, where reproductive choice is protected by law, of the women who discovered that they were pregnant with a girl child during the interview period, 89% underwent abortion. So violence appears inherent in good number of Indians.
Child marriage too can be called a form of violence on minor girl child. Although child marriage was outlawed in 1860, even to this day it is prevalent in some pockets, that too patronised by elected representatives. Worst was when they became widows. They are condemned to a life of isolation shunned by society with their heads shaved.
Menace of dowry is another problem that trigger violence towards women, who cannot match the greed of their husbands and in-laws. Dowry death, although less these days, they are still not uncommon.
Domestic violence, involving husband is again a common form of violence against women. Although it is more prevalent among lower socio-economic section, the educated and well-to-do too indulge in this dastardly practice. In recent times even unnatural deaths of women have taken place in families of rich and powerful.
Thus the violence within the family environ is a fact of life which cannot be wished away, education or no education.
One of the most despicable form of violence against women in public space is rape or sexual assault. This has been happening at regular intervals. All round the 52 weeks of the year, one can find report in the media of these assaults taking place across the country. Men are becoming increasingly cruel in forcing themselves on unwilling females. Most vulnerable are the minor teenage girls, who cannot protect and defend themselves. Despite there being tough laws, this heinous crime has increased these days. It only show the failure of enforcing authorities in bringing the perpetrators to justice. A sad fact of life in India.
Thus the culture of violence that started in childhood has grown into adulthood to become a social menace. There is indeed a great need for a serious debate on the issue.
All over India, the print media readers are privy to stories of violence of different kind and different degrees only leading to degeneration on a societal scale, of human values that lead to suffering in solitude or in a state of helplessness. Then one day like a breaking of a great dam that burst open and comes out gushing, the power of latent pain of suffering in silence, an equally violent response.
Take the story of some 300 families of Kasturba Nagar slum in Nagpur, Central India. They suffered at the hands of one Akku Yadav and his gang for over a decade, with police not only being quite witness but a supportive party to the atrocities of the gang. Of course the phenomena of action and consequent reaction being an ongoing process, it had to happen someday. One day the women of the slum decided to hit back. Hit back, they did, right in the Nagpur Court premises. Protective police were accompanying this Akku Yadav to the court and the nonchalant way of the criminal, primarily due to over-confidence of police support, done him in. A barb, and the altercation that followed, between the criminal Akku and a woman of the slum was the opportune moment for the women of Kasturba Nagar. They attacked this Yadav from all sides with vegetable knife, chilli powder and stones. Escorting police ran away, and Akku dropped dead on the shining marble floor of the court. This is the story of how a peace loving community had to violently hit back to protect themselves and their growing children at the utter degradation of the police, who are supposed to protect the weak and vulnerable but sided with criminals for their own selfish corrupt aggrandisement by the crumbs thrown by the criminal and their gangs.
Another day, another time, memory raced back to Mumbai. Enemies of humanity struck at an unsuspecting nation. Hatred tried to incite hatred, as a response to perceived hatred. On 13th July or 13/7, as a lexicon that will remain etched in the violent history, of recent times, of the city of Mumbai, in the latest series of explosions in Central Mumbai, some 18 died on the spot, and some more succumbed later to grievous injuries.
Back to the lexicon 27/11, compared to the events of those 3 days of Nov.2008, this 13/7 was small. But innocents, totally unconnected to any reprisals, died unsung like debris of a falling building. Lunacy won the day. Yes, if 27/11 was a kind of war on the Indian state, this was a reminder that we are still a nation of poor learners and therefore an eternal sitting duck. The attacker would come, attack and go. Public will groan and moan, would go back to work the next day and the life is ‘back to normal’. The 24x7 TV channels and Union Home Minster would pay tribute to the ‘resilience of Mumbaikar’, forgetting that there is little choice for most Indians, including Mumbaikars, to get going with life.
After the attack in Dadar, Opera House and Zaveri Bazar in Mumbai, Prime Minister, Home Minister and UPA Chairperson, all came calling and mouthed inanimate clichés, that all sound so familiar that we heard them so many times in the past.
Reportedly, the last, almost a decade, witnessed some 13 terrorist attacks on different places in Maharashtra, where Mumbai is the capital city, the financial nerve centre of the country. Over 500 have paid with their supreme sacrifice at the alter of hatred. Who is the cause of it, is a moot point. But what caused these ruptures that resulted in these horrendous loss of life and property worth thousands of crores of precious wealth of the nation, is a question that defied ready made answers for all these years. The reasons are as complex as this country of over 1200 million people with kaleidoscopic variety of cultures, languages, faiths and a mind boggling diversity that the nation is home to.
Long years ago, I remember to have read some thinking Indian’s, an extremely gratifying hyperbole. “Millions of Indians can co-exist peacefully in one state, A STATE OF HARMONY. Millions of Indians fought for independence in one language, THE LANGUAGE OF FREEDOM. Millions of Indians can worship to-gether with one belief, A BELIEF IN MANKIND”.
They are beautiful sentences with deep meaning and a reverberating message. But where are we now?
Former Prime Minister, Late Indira Gandhi, in her monumental work of brilliance – ETERNAL INDIA – writes “The secret of India’s greatness and resilience is the acceptance of life in all its fullness, the good and the evil, and at the same time, trying to rise above it all. In all the ups and downs of its long and chequered history Indian customs, mores and traditions have been continuously evolving. It has not hesitated to adopt, adapt and absorb new and fresh ideas and issues. And inspite of various foreign influences of over thousand years, the roots of Indianness has remained strong and healthy. The Christianity came to India from outside, so was Islam. Parsees driven away from their homeland, found refuge in India. All of them made India their home and flourished. While others only spoke of secularism, India truly practiced secularism and sustained our scriptured sense of tolerance and compassion”.
But Indira Gandhi, herself became victim of violence, shot and killed by her own body guards who were men. The reason to kill was their sense of ‘deep hurt’, that she ordered the military intervention at their holy shrine, the Golden Temple at Amritsar, which had become a haven for violent separatist elements, who were even called terrorists. So, truly speaking she didn’t do it for her personal benefits. She did it to save the ‘Idea of India’, and had to pay the supreme sacrifice. She was only attending to a law and order problem, when terrorists were holed up in the Golden Temple. Unfortunately these terrorists were being actively supported across the western border, so also from U.K. and from Canada, with huge funding to destroy the ‘Idea of India’ to create a separate country. The western neighbour saw this as an opportunity to pay back, what India did in creating Bangladesh. Again unfortunately even Bangladesh was the product of huge bloodshed. So its bloodshed and violence everywhere. So what is the way out to live in peace without any armed intervention. Why has armed conflict become a necessary exercise ostensibly to secure peace? Is peace possible with violence and bloodshed?
In the current global violent scenario, Jehadi groups like Al-Qaeda, Lashkar-e-Toiba, Taliban are accused of perpetrating violence in different parts of the world. These acts of violence are variously described were ostensibly because of Palestinians’ unresolved nationhood, U.S. invasion of Iraq or its intervention in Afghanistan, uncertainties in Kashmir, or the ire of Muslim Pakistan which helped create Indian Mujahedeen against Hindu majority India, because of their perceived persecution of Indian Muslims, or Indian terror groups, with Hindu background, wanting to settle score with their attackers. There are many factors, real and imaginary, which have contributed to the violence worldwide.
It is true that every action has reaction some time less than equal, some time for more than equal. Human civilisation is really a history of unremitting violence. Who started it, after all, may be a question of futile exercise. It is the human avarice for power and fortune. That led to violence and more violence, which slowly and surely led to creation of nation states. The identity politics became the order of the day. The theological evolution made the scene more murky and difficult. The organised religions, which were the products of this theological evolution, created more and more walls of suspicion and distrust, among members of human civilisation. The acrimonious debate, as to which of the religious faiths better than the other, became intense.
World is slowly inching towards a time bomb waiting to explode. When will that happen and how will it happen is a question staring at all of us.
Is there an escape, or a reprieve. Yes probably! The question here, who is responsible for the state of world affairs, besides the nature’s autonomous dynamics? It is we humans and humans alone. Without getting into rhetorics, it is as simple as changing one’s mindset! Human knowledge is aware and realise that there are any number of complex issues which have lost its complexity due to some very simple interventions! Theosophist Ruby Lilaowala says “In order to bring change in the society, it is important that you change your thought pattern first.” So if all people in the world had peaceful thoughts then we would have peace in the world.
At a recent Theosophical Conference, a well known speaker tried to explain how consciousness is made up of the assembly of people’s individual and separate thoughts and how each one of us is part of collective human consciousness.
Thus, if your idea is to create world-peace, create peace with your spouse, children, family, friends and even strangers. This is sure to have ripple effect on society when everyone tries to live peacefully. “But for this to happen, you need to achieve peace and inner harmony within your own self” informs Ruby Lilaowala, and asks the question and answers herself “How? By being responsible for the thoughts you have”. Yes like the Mahatma had said long ago “If you want change in the world, be the change, yourself first, before you ask the world to change”. Every long journey has its very first step. To get to anywhere is to start from where you are. So get going looking at the pole star. PEACE IS ONLY AS FAR AS THAT.
J.Shriyan
A social worker associated with school children, while talking regarding a handicapped child asked if we could help get some quality used children’s clothes for needy children in village school around her place. Agreeing to join hands with her, in her concerns, we wrote to five local schools, if the parents of children of those schools would come-forward to give away the ‘used but presently unused clothes of their wards’? Visiting one of the five schools, we were saddened to see 3 small children kneeling outside the headmistress’ chamber. They were undergoing punishment for some mischief. Another four grown up boys were waiting to be called in. As we were waiting outside, these four students were called to explain their share of wrong-doings and were all treated by the standard weapon of most teachers. The wooden foot-ruler sternly landed with a slap sound on their extended palm, by turn. Fear was writ large on their face and as they underwent their ignominious retribution at the hands of HM, their eyes were bulging. We could only silently join them in their collective mortification. We felt profoundly sad at the collective helplessness of these children at the mercy of teaching fraternity. Of course, managing ‘wayward’ children was extremely trying experience for these ‘harassed’ teachers, HM claimed. But then, is punishment the only way out! Aren’t we introducing a degree of violence into the childhood little too early!
Violence in childhood, unfortunately is not confined to institutions of learning only. It has its tentacles found in other socio/political institutions as well. There are millions of families where child beating are as routine, as schools. Block headed parents have inflicted grievous physical and psychological trauma to these helpless victims of time. Many times it could be the poverty that took its toll. But then there are many in the socially mobile section of well-to-do, where children have continued to suffer in their helplessness. Then there are police stations where child beating is committed without batting eyelids with insensitivity which can only be called cruel. There are also orphanages and remand-homes where these helpless children are victims of violence of multiple nature.
Society somehow do not realise the seriousness of this attack on the persona of child, as he or she evolves into a grown up man or woman, through the inevitable adolescence. Are we all accountable to these reckless behaviour of grown ups towards the growing children, who are the citizens of to-marrow? Or are we side-tracking the issue saying, that, they didn’t belong to my family, they do not belong to my caste, they do not belong to my faith, or any of the many escape routes that all thinking, self serving men and women have no difficulty in inventing?
After all to evade responsibility or to remain non-responsive to our socio/political environ is a done thing. No questions asked.
Does this violent growing up through schools, homes and society leave its indelible scar on the psyche of these growing children, our citizens of to-marrow, as they step into adulthood?
Then there are other vulnerable section of our society like women, who are subjected to multiple kinds of violence. It starts as early as, Female feoticides. The lunatic Indian mindset for male child has earned notoriety. Unfortunately this is more among educated and well-off class. Not only those in India but also well placed NRIs. In a study conducted by University of California, where reproductive choice is protected by law, of the women who discovered that they were pregnant with a girl child during the interview period, 89% underwent abortion. So violence appears inherent in good number of Indians.
Child marriage too can be called a form of violence on minor girl child. Although child marriage was outlawed in 1860, even to this day it is prevalent in some pockets, that too patronised by elected representatives. Worst was when they became widows. They are condemned to a life of isolation shunned by society with their heads shaved.
Menace of dowry is another problem that trigger violence towards women, who cannot match the greed of their husbands and in-laws. Dowry death, although less these days, they are still not uncommon.
Domestic violence, involving husband is again a common form of violence against women. Although it is more prevalent among lower socio-economic section, the educated and well-to-do too indulge in this dastardly practice. In recent times even unnatural deaths of women have taken place in families of rich and powerful.
Thus the violence within the family environ is a fact of life which cannot be wished away, education or no education.
One of the most despicable form of violence against women in public space is rape or sexual assault. This has been happening at regular intervals. All round the 52 weeks of the year, one can find report in the media of these assaults taking place across the country. Men are becoming increasingly cruel in forcing themselves on unwilling females. Most vulnerable are the minor teenage girls, who cannot protect and defend themselves. Despite there being tough laws, this heinous crime has increased these days. It only show the failure of enforcing authorities in bringing the perpetrators to justice. A sad fact of life in India.
Thus the culture of violence that started in childhood has grown into adulthood to become a social menace. There is indeed a great need for a serious debate on the issue.
All over India, the print media readers are privy to stories of violence of different kind and different degrees only leading to degeneration on a societal scale, of human values that lead to suffering in solitude or in a state of helplessness. Then one day like a breaking of a great dam that burst open and comes out gushing, the power of latent pain of suffering in silence, an equally violent response.
Take the story of some 300 families of Kasturba Nagar slum in Nagpur, Central India. They suffered at the hands of one Akku Yadav and his gang for over a decade, with police not only being quite witness but a supportive party to the atrocities of the gang. Of course the phenomena of action and consequent reaction being an ongoing process, it had to happen someday. One day the women of the slum decided to hit back. Hit back, they did, right in the Nagpur Court premises. Protective police were accompanying this Akku Yadav to the court and the nonchalant way of the criminal, primarily due to over-confidence of police support, done him in. A barb, and the altercation that followed, between the criminal Akku and a woman of the slum was the opportune moment for the women of Kasturba Nagar. They attacked this Yadav from all sides with vegetable knife, chilli powder and stones. Escorting police ran away, and Akku dropped dead on the shining marble floor of the court. This is the story of how a peace loving community had to violently hit back to protect themselves and their growing children at the utter degradation of the police, who are supposed to protect the weak and vulnerable but sided with criminals for their own selfish corrupt aggrandisement by the crumbs thrown by the criminal and their gangs.
Another day, another time, memory raced back to Mumbai. Enemies of humanity struck at an unsuspecting nation. Hatred tried to incite hatred, as a response to perceived hatred. On 13th July or 13/7, as a lexicon that will remain etched in the violent history, of recent times, of the city of Mumbai, in the latest series of explosions in Central Mumbai, some 18 died on the spot, and some more succumbed later to grievous injuries.
Back to the lexicon 27/11, compared to the events of those 3 days of Nov.2008, this 13/7 was small. But innocents, totally unconnected to any reprisals, died unsung like debris of a falling building. Lunacy won the day. Yes, if 27/11 was a kind of war on the Indian state, this was a reminder that we are still a nation of poor learners and therefore an eternal sitting duck. The attacker would come, attack and go. Public will groan and moan, would go back to work the next day and the life is ‘back to normal’. The 24x7 TV channels and Union Home Minster would pay tribute to the ‘resilience of Mumbaikar’, forgetting that there is little choice for most Indians, including Mumbaikars, to get going with life.
After the attack in Dadar, Opera House and Zaveri Bazar in Mumbai, Prime Minister, Home Minister and UPA Chairperson, all came calling and mouthed inanimate clichés, that all sound so familiar that we heard them so many times in the past.
Reportedly, the last, almost a decade, witnessed some 13 terrorist attacks on different places in Maharashtra, where Mumbai is the capital city, the financial nerve centre of the country. Over 500 have paid with their supreme sacrifice at the alter of hatred. Who is the cause of it, is a moot point. But what caused these ruptures that resulted in these horrendous loss of life and property worth thousands of crores of precious wealth of the nation, is a question that defied ready made answers for all these years. The reasons are as complex as this country of over 1200 million people with kaleidoscopic variety of cultures, languages, faiths and a mind boggling diversity that the nation is home to.
Long years ago, I remember to have read some thinking Indian’s, an extremely gratifying hyperbole. “Millions of Indians can co-exist peacefully in one state, A STATE OF HARMONY. Millions of Indians fought for independence in one language, THE LANGUAGE OF FREEDOM. Millions of Indians can worship to-gether with one belief, A BELIEF IN MANKIND”.
They are beautiful sentences with deep meaning and a reverberating message. But where are we now?
Former Prime Minister, Late Indira Gandhi, in her monumental work of brilliance – ETERNAL INDIA – writes “The secret of India’s greatness and resilience is the acceptance of life in all its fullness, the good and the evil, and at the same time, trying to rise above it all. In all the ups and downs of its long and chequered history Indian customs, mores and traditions have been continuously evolving. It has not hesitated to adopt, adapt and absorb new and fresh ideas and issues. And inspite of various foreign influences of over thousand years, the roots of Indianness has remained strong and healthy. The Christianity came to India from outside, so was Islam. Parsees driven away from their homeland, found refuge in India. All of them made India their home and flourished. While others only spoke of secularism, India truly practiced secularism and sustained our scriptured sense of tolerance and compassion”.
But Indira Gandhi, herself became victim of violence, shot and killed by her own body guards who were men. The reason to kill was their sense of ‘deep hurt’, that she ordered the military intervention at their holy shrine, the Golden Temple at Amritsar, which had become a haven for violent separatist elements, who were even called terrorists. So, truly speaking she didn’t do it for her personal benefits. She did it to save the ‘Idea of India’, and had to pay the supreme sacrifice. She was only attending to a law and order problem, when terrorists were holed up in the Golden Temple. Unfortunately these terrorists were being actively supported across the western border, so also from U.K. and from Canada, with huge funding to destroy the ‘Idea of India’ to create a separate country. The western neighbour saw this as an opportunity to pay back, what India did in creating Bangladesh. Again unfortunately even Bangladesh was the product of huge bloodshed. So its bloodshed and violence everywhere. So what is the way out to live in peace without any armed intervention. Why has armed conflict become a necessary exercise ostensibly to secure peace? Is peace possible with violence and bloodshed?
In the current global violent scenario, Jehadi groups like Al-Qaeda, Lashkar-e-Toiba, Taliban are accused of perpetrating violence in different parts of the world. These acts of violence are variously described were ostensibly because of Palestinians’ unresolved nationhood, U.S. invasion of Iraq or its intervention in Afghanistan, uncertainties in Kashmir, or the ire of Muslim Pakistan which helped create Indian Mujahedeen against Hindu majority India, because of their perceived persecution of Indian Muslims, or Indian terror groups, with Hindu background, wanting to settle score with their attackers. There are many factors, real and imaginary, which have contributed to the violence worldwide.
It is true that every action has reaction some time less than equal, some time for more than equal. Human civilisation is really a history of unremitting violence. Who started it, after all, may be a question of futile exercise. It is the human avarice for power and fortune. That led to violence and more violence, which slowly and surely led to creation of nation states. The identity politics became the order of the day. The theological evolution made the scene more murky and difficult. The organised religions, which were the products of this theological evolution, created more and more walls of suspicion and distrust, among members of human civilisation. The acrimonious debate, as to which of the religious faiths better than the other, became intense.
World is slowly inching towards a time bomb waiting to explode. When will that happen and how will it happen is a question staring at all of us.
Is there an escape, or a reprieve. Yes probably! The question here, who is responsible for the state of world affairs, besides the nature’s autonomous dynamics? It is we humans and humans alone. Without getting into rhetorics, it is as simple as changing one’s mindset! Human knowledge is aware and realise that there are any number of complex issues which have lost its complexity due to some very simple interventions! Theosophist Ruby Lilaowala says “In order to bring change in the society, it is important that you change your thought pattern first.” So if all people in the world had peaceful thoughts then we would have peace in the world.
At a recent Theosophical Conference, a well known speaker tried to explain how consciousness is made up of the assembly of people’s individual and separate thoughts and how each one of us is part of collective human consciousness.
Thus, if your idea is to create world-peace, create peace with your spouse, children, family, friends and even strangers. This is sure to have ripple effect on society when everyone tries to live peacefully. “But for this to happen, you need to achieve peace and inner harmony within your own self” informs Ruby Lilaowala, and asks the question and answers herself “How? By being responsible for the thoughts you have”. Yes like the Mahatma had said long ago “If you want change in the world, be the change, yourself first, before you ask the world to change”. Every long journey has its very first step. To get to anywhere is to start from where you are. So get going looking at the pole star. PEACE IS ONLY AS FAR AS THAT.
J.Shriyan
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