Leave Me Alone!!!

The excessive attention of the media, authors and film directors towards India has produced a plethora of works which people in the West, including the so-called intellectuals just lap up in a moment’s notice. The opportunistic media has metamorphosed from days of yore – India was then the archetype third world country, a land of snake-charmers – to a rising superpower(pun intended) needed to be tamed to maintain the balance of power in South Asia. It hardly bothers me that journos and authors of Western capitalist countries fill their coffers by projecting filth, squalor,inhumane living conditions,violation of human rights and chinks in the democratic armor of the largest democracy of the world. It also hardly bothers me that books on Asian contexts are sold primarily in the West – the rich countries thereby enjoy a vicarious pleasure and gloat over the deplorable state of affairs in the developing countries. What bothers me is that each one of them state the obvious facts(As if, we are not cognizant of our own sufferings) and do not propose a solution. NY Times columnist and author Thomas Friedman, in his book “World is flat” talks about everything else but the steps South Asian countries should take in order to keep the world flatter,thereafter. Even renowned HBS professor Tarun Khanna in his book “Billions of Entrepreneurs: How China and India Are Reshaping Their Futures and Yours” glosses over the most important aspects of the 21st century and stresses on aspects which only make headlines in the academic case studies.

A simple perusal of the library racks would provide you with enough testament that every Tom, Dick and Harry notwithstanding their journalistic prowess, flair of writing and depth of subject-knowledge have written books on India and China; And they keep on procreating(read producing) the same **** over and over again. Plagiarism is an understatement. In our lifetime we have/will witnessed/witness a glut of movies based on the life of the destitutes and slum dwellers of Mumbai – the latest being “SlumDog Millionaire”. Though its a cinematic marvel,it is overtly palpable that this movie was made keeping in mind the “Golden Globes” and the “Oscars”. Otherwise, how would you explain an uneducated slum native speaking in suave English accent? Simple, the movie was meant for western audience(eye-candies for the jury).If you believe in the-matter-of-fact data, tell me “How many full-length western movies(I am not talking about You-tube uploads) have you seen which portray the aesthetic and powerful vignettes of India”?

Here, worthy of mention is selfless westerner John Wood(http://www.leavingmicrosoftbook.com/author.html) who quit his position as Microsoft’s Director of Business Development for the Greater China Region in order to found Room to Read. I offer my sincere respect to self-denying individuals such as John and not authors, commentators or journalists who write about poverty from their cushy Manhattan apartments.

Leave me alone is the cry of my motherland.

— “One” of the two most colorful ones.