साहिल पर जितने आब गज़ीदा थे सब के सब
दरिया का रुख बदला तो तैराक बन गए
We have come a long way since India became independent on 15th August 1947. But it is ironical that the present generation of India does not even know how many young people and freedom fighters laid down their lives for the sake of the country. Even more ironical is the fact that not even five percent population of this huge nation actually remembers those who died during the freedom struggle.
How ironical it is that in every nook and corner of our cities, the statues and memorials of sundry politicians are erected, annual functions too are held with huge fanfare in their memory and remembrance but the people who made the supreme sacrifice for the nation have been confined to the memory of their equally neglected heir!
How ironical it is that even artists and film stars, who have enacted the roles of these real-life heroes on the silver screen, should find their way into parliament through nominated seats while the heroes have been wiped out from the nation’s memory!
But then India has always remained a country of peculiar paradoxes and catastrophic contradictions. I don’t wish to hurl or inflict a speech on those but then, it is important to bring forth a few points for your kind consideration and soul searching
India is being touted as the faster merging Superpower with the size of its economy touching over $3 trillion and yet it ranks 119 among 169 countries in human development index at per UN report of 2010 and is much lower to China which stands at 89th place.
The latest World Bank data indicates that every fourth person in India lives below poverty line and earns less than a Dollar a day. In other words, approximately 42 per cent population of rural India lives below poverty line. !
Three persons out of every hundred in India go hungry and India has the highest number of undernourished people in the whole world.
Our progress in higher education and science and technology has been stupendous and yet, half of the world’s illiterates live in India. In other worlds, we have 307 million illiterates.
India sends the largest number of students to USA, UK, Canada and even Australia for various kinds of specialized field and university education and yet more than 1.7 crore children in rural areas don’t have access to schools.
Worst still, 630 million people do not have access to acceptable sanitation facilities and children and women still defecate at public places.
It is nice to see world class super markets, food chains and malls where our urban youngsters gloat over the choice of toppings on their pizzas, ice cream and macaroni and spaghetti. Yet, 51 percent children in the age group of 5 to10 years remain undernourished.
When it comes to media, India has the distinction of having more than 66,875 publications in various languages, it has more than 76 24X7 new channels dishing out all kinds of news and information. India can boast of 598 Fm radio stations in 175 cities and it would reach 800 marks in another 2 years.
Yet journalism in India is being accused of fast becoming a joke and the media houses are being accused of behaving like a gang of mercenaries. The fact is that if Media is being accused of turning even a trivia into titanic every now and then the politicians should also take the blame for continuous biting and bullying though the camera...........contd (From Preface of the Book)
We have come a long way since India became independent on 15th August 1947. But it is ironical that the present generation of India does not even know how many young people and freedom fighters laid down their lives for the sake of the country. Even more ironical is the fact that not even five percent population of this huge nation actually remembers those who died during the freedom struggle.
How ironical it is that in every nook and corner of our cities, the statues and memorials of sundry politicians are erected, annual functions too are held with huge fanfare in their memory and remembrance but the people who made the supreme sacrifice for the nation have been confined to the memory of their equally neglected heir!
How ironical it is that even artists and film stars, who have enacted the roles of these real-life heroes on the silver screen, should find their way into parliament through nominated seats while the heroes have been wiped out from the nation’s memory!
But then India has always remained a country of peculiar paradoxes and catastrophic contradictions. I don’t wish to hurl or inflict a speech on those but then, it is important to bring forth a few points for your kind consideration and soul searching
India is being touted as the faster merging Superpower with the size of its economy touching over $3 trillion and yet it ranks 119 among 169 countries in human development index at per UN report of 2010 and is much lower to China which stands at 89th place.
The latest World Bank data indicates that every fourth person in India lives below poverty line and earns less than a Dollar a day. In other words, approximately 42 per cent population of rural India lives below poverty line. !
Three persons out of every hundred in India go hungry and India has the highest number of undernourished people in the whole world.
Our progress in higher education and science and technology has been stupendous and yet, half of the world’s illiterates live in India. In other worlds, we have 307 million illiterates.
India sends the largest number of students to USA, UK, Canada and even Australia for various kinds of specialized field and university education and yet more than 1.7 crore children in rural areas don’t have access to schools.
Worst still, 630 million people do not have access to acceptable sanitation facilities and children and women still defecate at public places.
It is nice to see world class super markets, food chains and malls where our urban youngsters gloat over the choice of toppings on their pizzas, ice cream and macaroni and spaghetti. Yet, 51 percent children in the age group of 5 to10 years remain undernourished.
When it comes to media, India has the distinction of having more than 66,875 publications in various languages, it has more than 76 24X7 new channels dishing out all kinds of news and information. India can boast of 598 Fm radio stations in 175 cities and it would reach 800 marks in another 2 years.
Yet journalism in India is being accused of fast becoming a joke and the media houses are being accused of behaving like a gang of mercenaries. The fact is that if Media is being accused of turning even a trivia into titanic every now and then the politicians should also take the blame for continuous biting and bullying though the camera...........contd (From Preface of the Book)
आभार आपका
जवाब देंहटाएं