God knows I don’t believe in God! How many people who claim that they do not believe in God, nevertheless exclaim “Oh, God,” or “My God.” Evidently there is something in this Creature or, should I say, Creator, who cannot just be wiped out from one’s consciousness, or should I say conscience. I fancy that even those who are rationalists or who believe that “religion is the opium of the people” cannot restrain themselves from swearing by God when confronted by misgiving and anxious bewilderment. No wonder then as the philosopher Voltaire said, “If God did not exist it would have been necessary to invent him.” When we see the lowly microbe or lofty man, the mind-blowing expanse of the Universe, seemingly eternal and timeless, can we say it is just a fickle chance or is there a divinity that shapes our ends? The great scientist, Einstein, could not help realising that even in chaos there was an order with determinate laws which only a Creator or God could have organised in its countless details.
But the best rationale for God, a compassionate and understanding God, comes from Gandhiji. He says “God is the hardest taskmaster I have known on this earth and he tries you through and through. And when you find that your faith is failing or your body is failing you, and you are sinking, he comes to your assistance somehow or other and proves to you that you must not lose your faith and that he is always at your beck and call, but on his terms and not your terms. So I have found. I cannot recall a single instance when, at the eleventh hour, he has forsaken me.”
Even the most skeptical atheist (or one who does not believe in the existence of God) or the agnostic (or one who believes that nothing can be proved about the existence of God) can deny that in the moment of darkest despair, he can escape the thought of God, and ask for deliverance.
For who is He, but the one who says in an old miracle play by an unknown author, in unforgettable terms:
“Everyman, I will go with thee, and be thy guide,
In thy most need to be by thy side.”
Can assurance and love be greater than this?
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“To be or not to be: that is the question” as Hamlet said in Shakespeare’s time. But in our times the question is “to be or not to be the Prime Minister.” The question has become crucial if not crucifying. Now that Manmohan Singh has been declared (never mind by whom) to be the weakest Indian Prime Minister, we need one who is not “like a weasel” but “very like a whale”. But who should this whale be? There are many who openly believe they are the “consummation devoutly to be wished” but are coy about expressing their desire. Atalji is one such. He speaks in riddles and enigmas. But Advaniji, the shadow Prime Minister does not believe in waiting in the shadows. Narendra Modi hotly denies he wants to be the Prime but cooly hints that if he is called upon, who is he to deny the nation’s wishes. And Rajnath Singh? Oooh! oooh!
In fact, the nation’s wishes are all that all of them want to respect. These wishes cannot be clearly defined – elections are of no use, they are ill-defined, subject to the whims of the moment. But divine revelations reveal the answer. Sushma Swaraj has convinced herself that she is it, or maybe she is she. Mayawati has made no bones about her suitability. Jayalalithaa may not say it but her silence is eloquent. Mamata is least silent and most eloquent.
On the Congress side, after Soniaji magnanimously stepped aside, all feminine hearts beat faster but in vain, even Renuka Chaudhury could only end up with a hearty laugh. It was “love’s labour lost.”
As far as the Left is concerned, everyone knows that, as usual, a “classic blunder” was made when Jyoti Basu was not allowed to become the Prime Minister. But now not even Brinda Karat can dream to be one. “Aye, there’s the rub.”
In essence then, the whole situation about impending elections and a Prime Minister is “much ado about nothing.” On “measure for measure,” it is “a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
So is it all a “Tempest” or just a “Midsummer Night’s Dream” and will it be “All Well that Ends Well”? Take it “As You Like It.”
Good old Shakespeare, he has an answer to everything!
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Like they say, “Many roads leads to the same God,” one could also say, “Many paths lead to the same Marxism.” But as we know from bitter experience the many roads lead through blood and terror to reach the same God who or whatever he may be. Likewise, we know from experience that the many paths lead through blood and terror to reach that elusive thing called Marxism or socialism or whatever. Except for one difference that socialism has taken finally a path which few will recognise what it is and what it was.
After the October Revolution in Russia, the utopian concept of a socialist state was hijacked from the dreamer Lenin by a man called Stalin who made mincemeat of socialism with his gulags and mass displacement of peoples and ruthless control of country and party which became a puppet bunch of Gopak dancers, as Khrushchev revealed after Stalin safely had died. Till Gorbachev overturned the system and made “non-persons” of Marx, Lenin and all the stalwarts of the old regime. If any vestige of socialism remains in the old USSR it may be found only with a needle in a haystack now called Russia.
The other great home of socialism and communism was, of course, China with Mao-ze-dong as its beloved leader. Mao, Chairman Mao, decreed, “Let a thousand flowers bloom and a thousand thoughts contend.” Except in practice, the thousand flowers lost not only their petals, but also stem and roots, and the thousand thoughts remained strangely silent. Till after Mao, Deng Xiao Ping said, “It does not matter what the colour of the cat is, so long as it catches mice.” Beautifully, as always, phrased as only the Chinese can do. Leading that country into an unrecognisable path of national resurgence based on pragmatism, realism, unconfused with flatulent ideological prattle.
Therefore, one does not know if one should laugh or weep at the genuflecting kow-towing of our communists praising today’s China for ushering in socialist modernisation and its recent initiatives facilitating further growth and consolidation of socialism in China! The CPI (M) has some brilliant leaders whose ideas may take some discredited terms and terminologies but their sincerity cannot be questioned. Great is the pity that they have misunderstood hopelessly the colour of the Chinese cat today and its ability to catch the most purposeful mice. Purposeful for China alone.
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The Communist movement in India is a strange animal which defies description. Made of uncountable parts each claiming adherence to various leaders of the movement from Marx, Lenin, Stalin, Mao-Tse-Tung, Trotsky – you name them and you’ll find some adherents. In the ideological cacophony it is doubtful if any sane person would be able to make any sense of what is going on. But one thing has distinguished the Indian Communist movement – it has had the impressive ability to snatch defeat out of victory. And yet the Communists, if one can call them that, have had amongst them some of the finest leaders and intellectuals, the most dedicated of workers, selfless to the last – but all wasted or banished.
Today, the Communists, ununderstandably called the Left have shown themselves to be a motley, confused lot, unable to articulate what they want. All they appear to be is to be willing to wound but afraid to strike. Therefore in the process the country could be heading towards a helpless drift into a farcical situation, and therefore a dangerous situation.
It is in this context we have to note Congress President Sonia Gandhi’s forthright, unambiguous statement but without any threat. Actually, it is not only about the India-USA Nuclear Deal which in its tortuous way has confused everyone with its technicalities and political legalities but various other aspects of our political, social, economic, security, defence and inter-related factors, which deal with development, prosperity and peace, which have been brought sharply into focus at this critical moment in our history. In this process the sheer opportunism of the elements which constitute our national life have also regrettably been exposed. No surprise then that not only Sonia Gandhi but the Prime Minister and many others known for their mildness have been provoked into unsuspected belligerent plain talk.
If the format and matrix of our national and political life has to be re-aligned in a free democratic way, in short, through elections, then let it be so. But the present farce cannot go on.
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If everyone in our political, social and spiritual establishments had been serious about the bridge linking India and Sri Lanka and seen the Sethu project in its true and proper practical perspective any doubts and misgivings would have been overcome and erased in a sensible way to the satisfaction of all – and to the profit of our country. But it was not to be. Incredible as it may seem to an objective mind, all kinds of extraneous issues were raised, nit-picking in intricate details ensued and passions stoked to white heat. A confrontation, entirely of an irresponsible and unfair nature, was raised to fracture the South and North of our country, as though they were alien to each other. We thought we had got rid of such fantasies and had remarkably welded our nation into one indissoluble whole with the vision of our leaders of old. But this, too, was not to be.
What we witness today is the remarkable abdication of purpose and the pursuit of an uninhibited power struggle with no holds barred. What is astonishing is that no pretence is made that the Sethu project has become a cynical political objective of gaining lost power or consolidating power already held. The great tragedy is that most unfairly a fault line in our civil society has been created where there was none before. If there were any fault lines remaining they had successfully been sealed and healed. Through the Sethu project we may have unwittingly aroused a hidden dragon ready to perish us. Already other instruments of governance are being perforce drawn escalating the situation.
This dubious battle must be called off, and we must return to our senses.
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