Slumdog controversy

When India used to be a land of plenty, culturally we genuinely belived in living a simple life, and as a rule, the soceity was against aggrandizement and overt wealth building. This was at a time when India was one of the world's wealthiest countries, centuries ago ( remember all the invasions by the Mughals, Ghazni and Alendar to plunder the wealth of the country?) Slowly this gave way to a select few within the society accumulating all the wealth through dubious " principles" , the others resorting to " what I have is enough" more out of frustration that they were unable to have an opportunity to get to the riches, than pure renunciation. Over the last 70 years, courtesy a socialist-minded Central Goverment, it was almost criminal to think that everyone was entitled for everything. The poor were made to be deliberately poor, and the rich were getting richer through dubious means. As time passed by, the information age caught up fast through permeation of media and the internet. Even the humble farmer is able to see what he is missing out in life, but alas, given the disappearance of any solid principles on integrity, and the rapid disintegration of joint families leading to absence of good influence of the elders, the common man has put money right on top of the priority heap, and will now do anything to get more money. This episode is an unfortunate reflection of this degeneration of values in the society over time. And I think this is only bound to get worse. A few thoughts on this whole "Slumdog" nonsense. 1. At the end of the day, it is only a movie and not targeted at any individual in particular. I wonder why people are getting worked up so much over the portrayal of poverty in the movie. After all, it is only the creative expression of the movie team, and if one does not subscribe to it, one should simply stay away from such movies, but the movie makers have all the right to make a movie as per their creative abilities, as long as they don't hurt anyone's sensibilities. And I don't think they have hurt anyone's sensibilities. 2. The whole intelligentsia of the country seems to be on a mission of " why do you want to make money trying to portray my poverty?" This, to me, is nothing but paranoid thinking. How many of these so-called intelligentsia have used this occasion to really question ourselves on HOW we can do away with poverty, slums and make ourselves a better country? Why get worked up when someone criticizes us or picks on our weakness? 3. One has to remember common human tendency - when someone is on the ascendancy, the others, more out of jealousy or out of other negative feelings, will constantly be on the lookout for weakspots, and blow them up. Look at the kind of criticism of China on many front - human rights, lack of freedom for labour, lack of democracy etc etc etc... every time the West wants to pick on them... their response? IGNORE. And move on with what they believe in. 4. Why can't we do the same? Why not take this as a recognition that the world is now noticing India for it's "growth story" and in many ways, sometimes even gets alarmed... and so it is only natural that the Strong would pick on our weak spots and magnify them. Instead of genuinely working towards mitigating those weaknesses, why go on a self-denial mode or sneer at people who point them to us? Take critism positively, and if, as a nation, we want to stand up and be counted amongst the best, and I believe that as a nation, we certainly want to be one, then we should NOT ignore such weak points or criticisms, but rather work on them seriously. But alas, I do not see any of that happening. The last news I heard was that the same Dharavi slum, which was to be redeveloped into a proper settlement colony, with commercial interest, is now going to continue to languish, because Unitech or DLF has pulled out of the project... if this is really true, then shame on us... this will then smack of an attitude such as " we will continue to have all the filth, and wont make any meaningful efforts to get rid of them, but others have no right to point it out".

Reminds me of the Ostrich burying it's head in the desert sand!! I know many of us won't like my above criticism, but I genuinely feel it is high time that we as a nation started to recognize our own problems and earnestly work on them, and not shoo away any criticism just because it comes from outside. We have this dirty habit of harping on our old glorious past and simply resting on those laurels, even as the present rots away. When I see countries like Japan, Korea, Singapoore, Hongkong and even Malaysia making progress over the last 100 years, I would like to ask ourselves - how much potential we really had over the last century to make ourselves a more prosperous society, and how much opportunities have we missed? I don't have to answer this - we all know the answer, dont' we? Cheers. Dilip