Dirt on our faces

There was an article in the newspaper that the present BJP-controlled Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF) was threatening to withdraw small perks being provided to Dr. Kurien (Verghese Kurien, the milkman of India and the giant of the milk revolution in the country). This, after he stopped accepting any salary ever since he turned 58 and performed honorary services for the GCMMF for the next 28 years, and to the NDDB for the next 24 years till he quit both offices.

In many blogs and responses to newspaper reports on this issue, I saw comments which referred to the dangerous precedent that conferring privileges on a retired person would bring. I guess, the point was not about the privileges, but about how we treat people who have given their lives in building institutions which has continued to serve the country decades after they were formed. In almost all the rural areas I have worked in or visited (from Rajasthan to Gujarat to Maharashtra to Karnataka), I have seen the magic of the milk co-operatives being repeated endlessly, and also thriving. It guaranteed employment for so many rural households much before a Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme was even dreamt about. It made affordable nutrition possible for homes across India, by ensuring that one of the most perishable goods could reach people in an effective and affordable manner, by creating the large network of producers, collectors, processors, distributors, retailers and consumers.

After all these achievements, Dr. Kurien has still not stopped. He is still 'a man with a mission'. The way Dr. Kurien is treated is just another example of the way we treat our visionaries and luminaries (including freedom fighters). Another snub to the 88-year old man may not mean much to someone who has weathered so much in his life. But disrespecting him is like shovelling dirt on our own faces - on those who do it, and those of us who stand by watching it being done!

A Christmas Wish

I normally write a short reflection during Christmas. My reflection this year is on Christmas in the aftermath of the Orissa violence…

A Christmas Wish

- dedicated to all the people of Kandhamal, Orissa, especially to the 8000+ people still living in relief camps, and to all those who live under the shadow of violence, anywhere in the world.

It was almost 12 at night
I tiptoed to where my children lay
Christmas was here, here at last, it was just a few moments away.
The Christmas star was burning bright
and it showed me the way, as I slowly tiptoed, very slowly tiptoed
to where my children lay.

Last year we had a blast,
Christmas had been a merry day
This year we are on a fast, on this beautiful Christmas day

By then I had reached the spot
the spot where they lay,
my children’s grave was bathed in light, in the silvery whey.
The Christmas star looked so bright
as it did that early Christmas morn,
much like the time in Bethlehem, when the little baby Jesus was born.

As in those days, Herod had said,
no baby boy should be alive, kill them all, show no mercy,
all I want is their head.

So it happened 2000 years later, in our very land,
in the land we call our home, they came,
and desecrated it with a sleight of hand
They burnt our places of worship
and set our fields on fire.
Next they came to our home with lathis and burning tyres.

As they looked at my sleeping children, I pleaded
and fell at their bloodied feet. Spare them, my brothers, and take my life, I cried.
but it fell on stone deaf ears.

2008 has been an eventful year for us.
driven out of home, plundered and murdered, were we
but Christmas this year has become, has become very real!
The baby who was born
on that cold Christmas night, grew up to show
that God’s love is for all, yea for all, irrespective of who we were.

Give it, spread it, never withhold it, He said,
more for those who hate you, than for a friend.
As a witness of this love, you I send.

As I knelt down at my children’s graves
I shed a silent tear. Yes, for my little children,
but also for those who shed their innocent blood.
With hearts cold with hatred, and eyes filled with fury,
no rest, no peace they knew
for as they killed my children, they killed a piece of themselves too.

With these thoughts raging in my head,
I wondered, if peace I would ever know,
Must be the same, I thought, for those, who had struck the fatal blow.

As I closed my eye in prayer, His Spirit did I feel
urging me to love them,
for they too needed to heal.
Filled with His Spirit, I shouted into the night,
Lord I have a Christmas wish. Help me to love as you did,
so much, that for us you even died!

- Naveen I. Thomas
Dec 24, 2008

Countering terror

The decision by the Vice Chancellor (VC) of Jamia Millia University to offer legal aid to its students accused of indulging in terrorist acts in laudable. Governments are under pressure to show quick results, and any suspect is presumed to be guilty if the case pertains to so-called 'terror'. In this atmosphere, every care must be taken to ensure that the accused get a chance of proper defence and fair trial. The BJP's protest against the VC's action is only to be expected. They have a history of supporting and implementing laws, at the centre and in states ruled by them, which rides roughshod over principles of natural justice. It is for this very reason that laws like POTA and Chhattisgarh Special Public Security Act, which becomes an instrument in the hands of rulers to terrorise anybody must be opposed.

(A shortened version of this was published in Letters to the Editor, in The Hindu, Sep 26, 2008)