Getting Religious

These days I am becoming little religious overcoming my label of atheist and started doing pranams at our house altar, where my mother spend hours everyday to offer puja, two or three photographs  of deities in our flat after  taking morning bath. One of this photograph happens to be of mine alongwith my wife standing outside the Kamakhya temple, placed in my bed room. Photograph of the temple dome itself is enough reason to give a holy pranam every morning!

One morning, while doing series of pranam, I suddenly realised the photograph of Kamakhya temple missing and I am unconsciously doing pranam to the blank wall! In fact the photograph was removed by my wife following some routine chores of domestic war. Incidentally there were minor problems in my works during that time and I inferred that the missing photo has something to do with it. Although the domestic war was over, my wife somehow forgot to put back the photograph.

As problem continued in my work, I finally thought it would be wise to ask my wife to reinstate the photograph, citing the tension in my works. For normally, I share all tensions with her. She took it by surprise, but decided not to hurt my faith. Surprisingly enough, things got better within a couple of days. My firm belief of non-existence of God was again shattered!

Previously, I did not require such prayers because I had confidence in myself of whatever I decide to do. With the passage of time, with increased responsibility of family, with increased complicacy of life, am I getting defensive?

Any wrong decision costs a lot for both myself as well as my family members and also my well-wishers. Realities of life often challenges our confidence and gradually we tend to weak ourselves, needing some additional support like praying to God.

Doing pranam at the blank wall was adding my confidence until I realized its absence! If we analyse our prayers, we build up our strength within ourselves by taking help of some deities, or idols or photographs! If you have blind faith you gain immense mental strength by taking support of an external force, and we face and handle situations to the best level.

I wonder, if we can keep faith & confidence within ourselves we can do miracles! No external supports are required. Nothing else, at all. But probably we don’t want to take chances……..

The photograph is still on the cupboard!

Holiday on Independence Day

Since childhood 15^th August has been a Red Letter Day for me. Ignorant mind developed a deep rooted feeling for this day and the Tri-colour flag took the place of pride in my heart as everyone of this country has. The flying flag takes us amongst the clouds which is a symbol of pinnacle of independence!

My mother used to tell me the importance of this day as this was a hard earned prize for all Indians. She used to tell about lesser known freedom fighters who sacrificed their life, who suffered the pain of inhuman torture by the Britishers in the jails. Thousands of youth just came forward to sacrifice their life not to mention about their career and family. Their only dream and aim was to liberate our Motherland from foreign hands.  They must have thought for us, our liberty, our comfort and welfare.

Now that we have grown up, 15^th August still comes every year but with lesser significance and importance and now its merely a holiday! For me it has become a painful reminder of achievement of our independence. When most of us feel life has become smoother, comfortable and we have the largest democracy, I have a different feeling altogether. There are enough reasons to develop negative feelings and we cannot simply ignore our own performances.

The Arjun Sengupta Report states that 77% of Indian lives on less than Rs.20 a day (about US $ 0.50 per day).

Oxford Poverty & Human Development Initiative using a Multi-Dimensional Poverty Index (MPI) found that there were 650 million people (53.7% of the population) living in poverty, of which 340 million people (28.6% of the population) were living in severe poverty, and that a further 198 million people (16.4% of the population) were vulnerable to poverty.

421 million of the poor in India are concentrated in eight North Indian & East Indian states. This number is higher than the 410 million poor people living in the 26 poorest African nations.

The 2011 Global Hunger Index (GHI) Report places India amongst the three countries where GHI between 1996 and 2011 went up from 22.9 to 23.7.

Average annual income in 1947 for India was $ 619, for China was $ 439, for South Korea was $ 770 and Taiwan was $ 936. In the year 1999 these figures were $ 1818, $ 3259, $ 13317 and $ 15720 respectively. (Based on 1990 International Maddison dollars)

Now, lets see the State of World’s Children 2009 – UNICEF Report

Avoidable complications during child birth are killing 78,000 women in India every year. One woman dies from complications related to pregnancy and childbirth every seven minutes.

One million children born in India are dying every year even before they become 28 days old.

Maternal mortality rate of India stands at 301 per 100,000 births. It is highest in UP at 517 and lowest in Kerala 110. For Bihar it is 371.

60% of pregnant women still deliver their babies at home.

These are not all…… it will take pages to put such notes. But a little more insight……

Over 32000 murders, 19000 rapes, 7500 dowry deaths and 36500 molestation cases are the violent crimes reported in India in 2006 against women. (Report released by National Crime Records Bureau)

Rape is the fastest growing crime in the country today and as many as 18 women are assaulted in some form or other every hour across India.

Reuters Thompson Foundation revealed by a poll survey that India is the fourth most dangerous place for women in the world!

No, no more of it. These are enough stuff to make us sleepless, to rethink about our state of affair, about the society we are giving shape. Are we moving in right direction? Is this what our freedom fighters dreamt for? Have we done justice to thousands of young lives who have sacrificed themselves for our wellbeing?

I think Independence Day is a reminder to ourselves about our achievements, about our commitments toward our own society. Its a reminder to our duties towards the Nation as a whole and our society in particular. Till we achieve our own goal, till we shape a safer society by raising awareness, till we uplift our neighbor our Independence will remain a vogue!