Unable to defend himself from a Singaporean hotelier’s comments, Swaroop seeks out answers at Churumuri. Illustrating with real examples, he rakes up enormous dirt on a gamut of issues.
Education. Immigration. Public Safety. Harassment. Rowdyism and brawn. Health services. Bribery. Brain drain.
He concludes his comparison of India to Singapore (unthinkable by size, but still) with an interesting analogy to claims which say Singapore makes a puppet out of its citizens.
Linked by Viky. Join Blogbharti facebook group.We need a class teacher to maintain discipline (law and order) so that the classes can proceed and progress can be made, otherwise there will be just noise and only people who somehow learn to not get affected by the noise and study on their own (businessmen who succeed). It’s not like there is no freedom, you can always raise your hands and talk to the class teacher (citizens representation to the government) or at least approach the teacher after class hours (write to them)….
Irrespective of the type of government (democracy or autocracy or whatever), maintaining discipline should be the primary responsibility of the government, which is what is lacking in India today. For example, why is it that the same Indians who go to places like Singapore suddenly start following the rules? Because they know they’ll be fined otherwise. And once people start respecting each other, keep the premises clean, and maintain civic behavior, things automatically start looking better.
On the other hand, on Bangalore roads, I face road rage everyday. That’s why I prefer to listen to songs on my iPod, so that I can tune out all these unruly people.
Sigh.
I really want to go back to that hotel and argue with the owner. But I have nothing. Nothing.
I don’t agree with this analogy. A people deserve the government they get. While we can always point to examples of Indian’s not behaving themselves in our own land even though we behave wonderfully in foreign lands, why do we ignore the Americans or other free people who keep their country clean of their own free will?
These people don’t have to be governed by carrots and sticks. Why do we the people not take the responsibility of the nation into our own hands? Methinks a large part of the problem is the sheer complexity of India and our past. For instance, we have been under attack for the last 5000 years and have been ruled for many years by rulers who came from foreign lands. During these years, it was natural for us to resist authority and to abuse the land that we did not rule ourselves.
Freedom is a relatively new thing for us. It will take us time to get accustomed to it. But when we are ready, there is no looking back.