NRIs can be broadly classified into two categories - The Never Return to India & The Next Year will surely Return to India. NOBODY loves India like the Indian who actually does not live here anymore. So it was hardly surprising when by 7:00 PM(IST) there was ticker roll on the local news channels that said Modison Square garden sold out completely ahead of our prime ministers speech. Quoting Manu,no not the revered guy who wrote a treatise handbook for society but a lesser known author&Journalist who became popular ever since he was fired from the Open Magazine, Manu Jospeh believes When most of these NRIs were in India, they just had to step out from the comfort of their house, go onto the road, and the whole nation would assemble itself into an unambiguous pyramid of social hierarchy with them somewhere at the top Their only problem which arose in 1989,partly because of the Mandal commission was the fact that it would be necessary for them to spend a lot more on their education by going to private colleges paying donation since due to reservation not all were lucky enough to get a professional undergraduate education subsidized by the government. Respect in India is essentially a result of Genetic fortuity it comes with the raffle of birth.But in the First World of Europe and USA, it is not so easy. This, and the natural built in love for home, make the expatriate so patriotic that it is almost embarrassing especially for the Indians who dont have their second homes in the USA,UK,Dubai or Australia. But as an Indian, I just cant neglect the fact of a PM who on almost every occasion rubs his faith in his audiences face. Modi cant address the CEOs over breakfast without referencing the navaratras and the importance of fasting during the Navaratiri. A message to NRIs in America starts with a meditation on the importance of Navaratiri, followed by remarks on the cliched fact of how we are becoming the back office of the world(essentially IT is also a Religion)other references to Hindu worship of Mother Nature, and then an example of the Maha Kumbh on the banks of the Ganga which shows Indias potential for achievement (which is slowly but steadily being replaced by the now famed Frugal Engineering victory in the form of Nano Mangalyan Mission). My disgust gets amplified since obviously religion is not a contractual arrangement, either public or private. It has nothing to do with the social structure or its management. Religious authority wants to continue its hold on the people, but religion is entirely an individual affair. All our political systems have come out of that religious thinking, whether of the East or of the West. In the light of these facts, how can one have any faith in religion? What is the good of reviving the whole past, the useless past? Is it because your present has no meaning to you that you dwell on the past. Or even worse hope for the future!Buying into this rhetoric would actually mean that you are not even drifting.You have no direction at all; you are just like getting on to the harbour line on Mumbais suburban train at Masjid.!With the crowd .Afterall as Manu says,Common sense mixed with a bit of sagacious perusal has never appealed to anybody as much as farce has on a mob. Forget Mr. Modi’s Chai seller background and education or the fact that many NRIs were happy seeing themselves on the large screen and most could not follow his emotion rousing speech in Hindi, a growing number of Indians who have settled in the United States see him as someone who could fulfill their dream of India becoming a country they would have stayed in.Some of the Never Return Indians are even threatening to return. Not very long ago, the “Nonresident Indian” was revered in India through the esteemed abridgment NRI. As there is a hierarchical pyramid in everything that Indians consider sacred and important, the American NRI was the most revered of all NRIs. In the late 1980s, there was always a commotion when an NRI visited his family in Madras.Bangalore,Pune or Ahmedadabad especially.The visitor would appear to have a glow of the good life, with a fragrance of something affluent and distant. From large, top-quality suitcases would emerge extraordinary objects with famous Western name Brands.Post 1991.As some of India became richer and its economy opened up to the conspicuous consumption of the most famous global brands, and as Indians began to travel to the West, the NRI became somewhat diminished but still respectable. In the past decade, though, there has been a change in what NRIs represent in India. They have gone from being considered part of the academic elite to being seen as amusing dichotomous conservatives.They are among the great droves on the social media where it is almost the moral imperative to flout frivolous comments and pass on irresponsible invectives.The political leaning of the majority of these NRIs in the United States is liberal and Democratic,but what is indeed bizzare is that many of these same gumbal favor Mr. Modi. So while they are Democrats in the United States, they are also the hardcore right wingies in India. As Manu adds,He is acquainted with the word ‘generalise’ as something other people should not do. He is fundamentally a good person by almost all the definitions of that human condition—he is against genocide, burning people alive, including Muslims, and stabbing children, including Muslim children. And he loves Narendra Modi. ‘And’ not ‘but’, for ‘but’ will mean that he has considered all the facts and has made a moral decision. He loves Modi for honourable reasons. He loves the idea of a smart, tough and proud Hindu. He loves him because he loves Mother India.Mind you he was not always so traditional and patriotic.He will give many reasons why he is so now, he will give abstract reasons. He will say love is abstract, love is inevitable. It is not, in reality. Love is calculated, always. In America’s caste system, he is nowhere at the top. In fact, at times he feels he is at the bottom. There are moments,especially when he is picked randomly on airport lines he knows that it is indeed not random,he knows since invariably he understands probability distribution much much better than most in the line that he is standing. He knows Brown is the new Black. Back home he was something by virtue of his birth, his lineage and education, which was clear to all in plain sight. And the riffraff, which knew its place, readily granted him his, unlike in the United States. That is why he loves India.That is why he thinks that Investing in Ganga Bonds that would approximately get him a 300 basis points profit even by borrowing from a local payday loan company is something that he has to do for the love of the nation,so that the all the dirt and poverty around Ganga can just be carpeted away.That is why the Third World middle class and the rich who live in the West are deeply in love with their homelands. Nations that are filled with the poor are feudal in nature, and make excellent homes for the middle class. Hence India forever will probably remain the best!
Posted on: Mon, 29 Sep 2014 17:36:39 +0000
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