Digestable People

I am grateful to Mr. Rajiv Malhotra whose many talks and books and the occasional email have awoken and inspired not only me but numerous  other people.


One can possess things but not people. 

Yet Husbands try to possess their wives and vice versa, together they try to possess their children. Employers seek to own their employees etc. Marketeers want to entrap their customers, and governments want to possess their citizens. Everyone is trying to literally possess, control and exploit  everyone else. 

Not only do they try to possess, they wish to eat and digest them completely. Most people make it easy by blindly, meekly and senselessly submitting to the expectations of powerful and dominating people making themselves easily digestible.


Powers that be, colonialists and rulers have always used this very effectively as do school teachers, military, political, religious, and community leaders. 

Get conformance from people, digest, get conformance, digest, chomp, chomp, chomp, burp!

       

 

This is why people who do not conform by thinking and behaving as per the wishes of the powerful, have to be destroyed if they cannot be possessed. To set an example and to deter non believers who might have thoughts of their own non conformists are ridiculed, isolated, locked up, expelled, and better destroyed. 





Not merely killed the non conforming individuals and groups will be crucified, burnt at the stake, quartered, and tortured in myriad ways and that too in grand public displays. 

Gandhi ji appeared to have little regard for the things the British valued greatly, personal liberty, is a case in point.

The British threatened him with imprisonment, and violence, and smilingly not only Gandhi ji but numerous of his followers marched into prison and did not flinch or recant when Police and soldiers rained blows on them.

The language also changed. When he was asked by the British, what do you want, he replied "Swaraj". How do you hope to get it? "By Satyagraha" Gandhiji replied.

The British were flummoxed, they were now hearing new words, they were encountering radical thoughts and philosophies, unrecognisable patterns of behaviour. Gandhi ji was impossible to digest.


Gandhi ji was a peoples leader, he appeared to live in simplicity, and want nothing but freedom for his country and her people.. Gandhi ji had the backing of the Indian political set up, the businessmen and even the policemen and soldiers. He was also the officially nominated leader of the Indian National Congress.

Though they wanted to be rid of this irritatingly complex mind in a simple fragile body. The British had no choice but to deal with Gandhi ji because he had the popular mandate. He was invited to come to Britain for talks and also to meet King George.

The Britishers banged their heads against the walls in exasperation at this strange and stubborn Indian, physically so frail but spiritually so Himalayan. While Gandhi ji maintained and respected all social protocols, he insisted on wearing the traditional farmers 'dhoti' and thick homespun cotton shawl and sandals. He also took along his white goat whose milk formed a staple part of his diet.

He was indigestible, refusing to be overpowered or awed by British royalty and made his point bluntly but politely that it was high time the British left India to Indians.

Britain however refused to accept Indian demands to leave India. Had Gandhi ji prevailed and had remained the leader of the Congress, India would have been free much earlier and still one people rather than the gruesome outcome of partition that took place. Unfortunately Nehru and Jinnah were both too eager to be the leaders and were easily manipulated and managed by the British.

The war against tyranny by the British for which they got global support could not provide either moral justification or legitimacy to continue with an immoral colonial policy. Eventually India got her freedom because India become unmanageable by the weakened and chastised British, and it was also the moral thing for the British to do.

The lessons are many but some are significant for all people in all lands.

1. Do not be a digestible person, group or even country.

2. India needs Indian solutions based on Indian aspirations to tackle uniquely Indian challenges. 

3. Inappropriate solutions imported at great cost and implemented by people with little or no understanding of Indian needs has always been counterproductive, wasted enormous resources and stunted Indian development. 

4. Understand oneself, the strengths and weaknesses one possesses and then take the right steps to meet the genuine aspirations of the people.

My fellow countrymen and women, awaken, realise, arise and build a greater and noble India, and a better, kinder, wealthier world. Cherish and honour the freedom you have been gifted by the efforts and sacrifice of so many named and unnamed individuals.

I congratulate all Indians on this Republic day.