How “India” Works?

Traveling has been my passion……… I have traveled across the length of the country. Born in the beautiful valley of Kashmir, and traveled all the way down south to Kanayakumari. It’s brilliant to see the extreme ends of this country “India”. Diversity is at its best here, the best example being that on one hand we have reached the moon with “Chandrayaan” but still we use bulls for ploughing in the fields like the ancient times. Can you believe it? My favorite type of traveling is train esp. a long route train. As you can see how cultures, eating habits, languages change. Every station where the train stops has different story, all the famous and best items from that place you will find the hawkers selling it. And they sell it to everyone, no matter whether he is a Hindu, Muslim, Sikh or Christian…. All they care about is earning their bread. Paramount thing is when people come and sing popular songs from Bollywood movies with their “instruments” (usually a pair of flat stones), and it’s amazing how they do it. Once I asked a female (her voice was exceptionally melodious) “do you know what the song means”, she smiled and said I don’t know but I can earn some money. It’s brilliant “how this country works”. Every one you meet from the pantry boy, hawkers, cleaners, beggars to the people sitting next to you always have interesting stories about how they came here, some true and some manipulated just to gain sympathy. No one is ever contented with what they have; I guess it’s in the human nature. Even if God showers all the happiness he has on you, you will still find ways to be upset about many things that didn’t work.
In the same country you have places like Mumbai, Pune, Bangalore, Hyderabad, etc. so advanced and ahead of time, but there are also some backward places like Bihar, UP, Rajasthan, etc. The diversity is not only in the form of language, culture but also education, male female ratio, female infanticide, etc. No matter how much this country excels, these things will never change. No matter if we have 33% women reservation and special cells for gender equality it doesn’t happen here. The age old legacy of “male chauvinism” is still being followed here. No matter how much fathers love their daughters but still she is considered a burden. Moreover, most popular T.V. serials are all on the torturous lives of women (it’s a vicious circle). I am not a big T.V. fan, but I have seen people going crazy with such serials. People adjust their daily routine so that they don’t miss an episode. “This is a country where kissing is a crime but pissing is a holy act” – says Osho in one of his books. Sad but it’s so very true. Our country is funny in that sense. Many times they will fight for equal rights and at the same time questions will be raised if you are not following the so called “society”. It still bedazzles me how can “society” be important than some one’s life, happiness, grief, celebration…. But this is how India works. Do you remember how political leaders reacted when IPL introduced cheer leaders? They all united and formed a gang saying “this is against our ethics, culture, morals” huhhhhhhh and the same so called “politicians” went all the way to South Africa to be there for the final IPL ceremony and enjoyed the cheer leaders. What ethics are they talking about? Are these the rules only for the local people? I can think of so many incidents like “Pink chaddi” campaign against “Ram Sena” regarding the ban of females in the pubs. Come on man, we are supposed to be “democratic and free”, for your information plus we have some fundamental rights somewhere in our constitution.