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CONCRETE REALITIES Anand Patwardhan: ‘Our priorities are determined by amoral seekers of profit who occupy high office in both government and corporations’

I was 21 years old studying in America on a scholarship. The anti-Vietnam War movement consumed my fellow students and me. The ethos of the 60’s have, in a sense, impacted my thinking forever.

The film was made before the demolition of Babri Masjid. If it had been shown on Doordarshan to a mass audience it may have had some effect on the popular thinking of people. Communalisation back in those days hadn’t reached the peak it has today. Even the Kar-sevaks themselves may have realised that those propagating the ideology of hate are primarily power-hungry and corrupt and have nothing much to do with religion.

In a way yes, at least one must oppose the jingoism that normally passes for nationalism and patriotism because it’s bad for the planet. The world has enough arms to destroy this planet 50 times over. The world has no idea what to do with the enormous nuclear waste it’s producing. You cannot destroy your home like that. And you cannot spend millions on this destruction. In fact, anybody who loves his or her nation should, especially in the sub-continent, be sane enough to use these same funds for the poorest of the poor.

For example the cost of one nuclear missile production facility can provide drinking water for more than 37,000 villages; one nuclear submarine costs 30 times the annual national budget for primary education!

Ordinary people are capable of seeing through this immorality. They take an anti-nuclear stand when the truth of what an atom bomb can do is explained to them.

It’s the elite who rant about “national security”. They are the real anti-nationals for their idea of security is to sacrifice the future of a vast majority of this nation.

It symbolizes what is happening to our country. Mass murder takes place in front of our eyes and we look the other way as if nothing has happened.

That is what we did in Delhi in 1984, in Bombay in 1993 and in Gujarat in 2002. There’s a clear distinction in people’s minds of ‘them’ and ‘us’. What you get in the end is an indifference to suffering.

Our free market economists argue that even non-essential, wasteful industrial growth generates employment and brings about prosperity.

But what is a true indicator of development and prosperity? Somebody sneezes in New York; the market tumbles globally.

Does the market reflect whether the crops or the monsoons were good this year?

Does it represent in the slightest the concrete realities of our people? Our priorities are determined by amoral seekers of profit who occupy high office in both government and corporations. And we have an urban youth unwilling to come out of the cosy niche of blogs and malls they have created for themselves. An alternative model of development is the need of the hour, before social unrest of an unprecedented kind erupts in this country. The signs are already here.

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