This article gives some flashes of brilliance of those countries that are in the vortex of massive evolution both in the rationale as well as the society.
How to be modern in countries like India, Pakistan and other Middle East countries???
Or rather how do we portray ourselves as an integral part of the modernized society??
Sometime in the 1950’s or so, the word “modern” was fraught with a different meaning. But today it has taken a new shape. Our fore bearers would define “modern” in analogy with the thinking or thoughts that arises in his/her mind. This was because the country was just experiencing the convivial of independence. Indians would have had some glimpses of royalty and modernization from the English. But the former attributed it as sign of haughtiness they flaunted it in front them. The Indian society fulminated many British practices such as the abandon of the Sati and so on.
But the British rule was not a fiasco. They had sowed some evolutionary ideas in the august minds of some qualified Indians. This had led to some rudimentary changes in the system. However in the due course of time there was gargantuan change.
The word “modern” started taking a new shape. It was not ambit to thoughts and rationalism but extended to ethnicity, way and style of life. Indians started to emulate the British culture. But our elders showed contempt in this regard. There is always what we colloquially call as “Generation Gap”. However the exuberant youngsters of that era (Currently our parents) evinced and welcomed this radical change. The exemplary would be comparing a 1950’s film where Madubala dressed conventionally in a saree for the most romantic scene in the film. Contrarily in the 70’s there was the birth of a new concept of “Item Number” in the movies normally enacted by some one like Helen – the golden girl.
But the current era 2006 is really hard to articulate in a few words. The only word that comes across my mind is “Ultra Modern”. May be something superlative to it which I don’t know. The youth of today are emancipated from every aspect of society. With novel advancements in science and technology people have changed their lifestyle.
Even in a country like Pakistan where there are hard core fundamentalists, this transformation has taken place. The women in Muslim countries earlier never uncovered their face from the burkhas. But these days you hardly find anyone wearing it. Slowly people are becoming anglophiles.
Where this finally leads to is question in hand???
The crux of the situation is whether this significant advancement detrimental to the society???
There are multifarious answers from many social thinkers expressing the pros and cons of it.
I personally feel that there is an enormous influence in India, of its rich culture and heritage. It’s ostensible that it is on the verge of extinction. The population is in a state of dereliction from all their social and moral responsibilities.
We need to embrace the western culture but not to extent that we deride our own culture. I would like to quote an incident in this regard.
I had been to a local hospital to visit my uncle who had suffered a serious accident.
He met with an accident when he was getting off the bus. The front wheel of the bus had run over his left feet. His foot was almost crushed. He was severely diabetic and doctors had to amputate his leg. He was shifted to the ward after he was operated. There was a sexagenarian right next to my uncle bed. I had a casual talk with him. He had been lamenting about his woes everyday to the nurse who used to come to my uncle. He had 3 children, who are very well settled, a daughter and a son working for some top MNC’s in India and another daughter in US. But no one just bothered to care for this old man. His situation was so precarious that he didn’t even have sufficient money to pay for his hospital charges. This is something analogous to the western culture where children just don’t bother to take care of their parents in their senescence. This is a gaffe.
If this is definition of “being modern” then it’s really disheartening. The children are eschewing themselves from their moral responsibilities. A day is not far when parents loose the faith they have rooted in their off springs. An aphorism from a well known English poet goes this way…
“So long as the body is affected through the mind, no audacious device, even of the most manifestly dishonest character, can fail of producing occasional good to those who yield it an implicit or even a partial faith”.
Indians are slowly loosing the sense of beholden in them. We have a Diaspora of Indians in the western nations, who still are proud to be an Indian. The deference they show towards our custom and culture is much more than any Indian resident.
We need to be dispassionate irrespective of the place we inhabit. May be some years down the lane I would be elated to see the aforementioned change in India. Its good to be modern in our way of thinking and attitude but its better not show too much modernization in our ethnicity and lifestyle.
I presume that this harangue is not futile and hope it can enlighten some of our noble souls.
Signing Off –
I also personally feel indians have over the past decade become enormously materialistic and have totally lost their morality..
not to say all of us, but a majority of us… we just find ways to exploit other people and make money or hurt sentiments…
article truly reflective of the prevailing situation in our society
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