h, and having Mcdonalised our diet doesn’t eat away our indiannesss.
Macdonald or not, when it comes to idli-dosa, chicken tanduri or dal-bati we are most enthusiastic. You must understand that Mcdonalisation is part of being hep in the crowd. Even while we may be living in a foreign land, working on foreign shores and earning in foreign currency, our traditions are practiced with same fervor, if not more. In whatever foreign land we maybe in, our earnings are sent back to India, to help our families and also help the Indian economy grow with this added Forex capital. Youth isn’t selfish, though it may be portrayed so.
We may be more ‘me driven’ but we also invert the ‘m’ often enough to become ‘we driven’. On some planes we’re a force that is hard to beat. Had we not been a collective bunch, Jessica Lal, Matoo and such other cases including the quota debate would not have become a mini uprising. On some other, we can outwardly look selfish and overtly driven by success, though it isn’t so in reality. We would prefer to be indianised in competition, treating others as peers, but the globalization of Indian economy forces us to be excessively competitive; if I may say, competitiveness is forced on us.
Rather than critcising us, one should sympathise with us because we are the victims of circumstances. We youth don’t claim to be saints. We do go wayward on certain counts, but the older generation has always been there to steer us away from them. Without the elders we youth would be like a ‘rudderless’ boat, just swaying in turbulent waters. What makes us killers of a sort is the fact that we’re brought up the right way, as balanced individuals. Add to it the fact that no matter how low we may fall; our families would always support us and help us rise, which is typically an Indian phenomenon.
The security of Indian ‘family’ system gives us the courage to move ahead and realize our individual dreams and our dreams for Indiabecause we fully well understand that we have a fall back option – our family. The youth also has modern ways of celebrating Indian achievements. We take pride in cheering for India in every sports event with tricolour painted on our faces. We feel exhilaration in watching Aamir Khan in Rang De, and we feel the shivers while watching Ajay Devgan in Bhagat Singh. We feel overwhelmed when any Indian does genius feats.
Our pulse races when we hear the National Anthem. We’re filled with energy when the song ‘suno gaur se duniya walon-buri nazar na hum pe dalo-chahe jitna zor lagalo-sabse aagey hongey Hindustani…’is played. We keenly track our industry and stock markets. We do this and so much more. We are patriotic, just that our ways of expressing it are different (read modern, perhaps even whacky). We try to do things differently, we try to innovate, and we try to show our love in our own ways. We wish to ask, what more we can do to prove our patriotism?
Do we scream our lungs out, or do we go out chanting patriotic songs in ‘Prabhat Pheries’ (morning marches), tell us what we can do to get out of our stereotype portrayal of being ‘not patriotic’? We’ve conquered the air, water and land, but we’re yet to conquer every elderly Indian’s heart. We don’t want to be known as a bunch of selfish people, who’re money-minded and just looking for some fun, but as individuals who’re dedicated to the nation with the same affection that the generations before us were.
Our methods and ways to make India the shining star (that it was in the past) may be different, but we share the same cherished goal and the vision for modern India with our elders. We know we’re making progress, but sincere efforts always pay off and the speed of progress shall become a typhoon in times to come. In the end ‘Hum Honge Kamyab’ (we shall succeed) in this race to balanced progress, and young Indians are here to make India a winner as much our elders did in their times.
And India shall be a winner, if you, our elders, put faith in us, support us in this endeavor and appreciate the efforts that are being done with due understanding that we conv