A letter to my daughter....

Dear Daughter,

It is with immense pleasure that we, your parents, have decided to go back to India for good. USA gave us the best gift ever – YOU. I know you like this place but have sportingly agreed, without any qualms, to move to India – a country you haven’t seen much in your 5 years on this planet. I know in your tender brain doesn’t even have the capacity to take such decision, but still the fact that you have readily agreed, gives us immense happiness. You are excited about being near to the families and relatives of your parents, you are excited about meeting your grandparents, uncles, aunts, cousins etc…the same reason why your parents are wanting to go back to their home country.

But in this excitement there lies a huge amount of uncertainty. The reason being the situation of the country – a corrupt, divisive, selfish, worthless, anti-human government “rules” my motherland. As your parents, I sometimes question myself - are we so selfish to push you into a country that we know is not in great shape today? If things do not get better, should we blame ourselves for that?

The main and the ONLY reason, dear daughter, that we are taking this step despite the uncertainty is the belief, trust, hope and confidence that ONE man espouses – Narendra Modi – whom you fondly call “Naren Modi kaka”. Beta, this guy is not a magician – like other leaders he is a politician probably with similar qualities including vices. But then, he has shown what someone can do with a single minded ambition of working for good of the people. We are lucky to be coming from the state of Gujarat where your “Naren Modi kaka” has served for over a decade yielding amazing results. It is time now that he does the same for the whole country.

Dear daughter, we have told you stories about Lord Krishna, Hanuman Dada, Ganapati (your “Gappi Morya”), Shivaji raje and Maharana Pratap. There are many more known and unsung heroes that have honored our motherland in the thousands of years of her existence. Our country has always been the greatest in the world – she fell prey to some selfish elements a few hundred years ago and since then has been suffering in some way or the other – sometimes at the hands of invaders and sometimes, sadly, at the hands of her own children.

With Narendra Modi, this can change – not completely but a start can be made to be back to the gloriousness that Maa Bharati has always seen. We, your parents, have great trust in him and so does millions around the country. He is not the messiah but surely the Moses who can lead us to greater heights, away from divisive, corrupt and hopeless hearts that we have come down to as a nation.

I am hoping that our decision is right and we are bringing you back to a glorious country with a glorious future under a glorious leader – if all goes well you are going to be a part and witness the biggest revolution in modern India. Your destiny, along with a billion others’, is tied to the same hope. For once, I pray to God, please do not let our confidence break…please do not let our country suffer anymore…please allow our hope to flower…as dear daughter, your future is safe with Naren Modi kaka.

With lots of love and blessings…and hope,
Pappa

Can we keep it simple…..real?

In these days of cynicism, negativism, hopelessness we Indians go the usual route – search for a savior…a divine avatar..a messiah!
And yes, I am one of them – nothing wrong in admitting that we look for divine intervention in times of distress. But..that’s for another day!
These days, most of the youngsters and “right wingers” look towards Narendra Modi as that savior. We see in him something that we probably lack collectively -  a man who has the vision and the shoulders to carry our aspirations and lead the country out of the dark times.

From critics to supporters, all want an answer to the issues from the man – from agriculture to healthcare to industrial output to defence to the brick falling off from my neighbour’s wall! We feel all our answers lie in the head of this Gujarati who people love or loathe! But all this does say 1 thing, and that is that we understand we are in bad shape and need to be dug out. The first step to a solution is to accept that we have a problem at hand. May be not all of us think that we are staring at the darkest times in recent history.
For those who feel we have a problem, seem to have 1 more problem – that this ONE man will come with a magic wand and wish away all the problems and take India to heights that our founding fathers and saints saw our motherland at. Is that possible? Yes and No!
Our man has the ideas, the vision, the attitude and given the numbers would have the numbers to pull us out of the hole. Importantly, he has showcased all this in 1 state with huge results! This state has been unique, yes but then all states are uniquely unique. Gujarat always had a huge entrepreneurial class, but has had challenges in terms of water scarcity, infrastructure woes, polarization etc.

Plus, like it or not, the state has to fight the stigma of 2002 riots. That the state has had many more bloodier riots in past is conveniently forgotten but that is beside the point. But for now let us concentrate on some positives and out of box vision of our man in Gujarat:

1. From a loss making electricity board to a profit making company. 24x7 electricity in all cities, towns, villages across state


2. Vast and improved pucca road network for better maneuverability


3. Realization of the vast potential of the longest coastline of the country


4. Huge steps in promoting tourism – develop and market tourist destinations that existed for decades but were never considered for tourism


5. Realize, accept and address the problem of Sex ratio and malnutrition, on a war footing


6. Innovative ideas to help agriculture sector, help farmers with improved infrastructure and good advise


7. Promote youth activities, stress on sports


8. Huge efforts in the education sector – primary as well as university levels


9. Focus on police reforms – still a long way to go but at least it has begun


10. Vision on what the world wants and needs, focus energies in being proactive and in being ready for that next step/challenge

There are many more but am restricting myself to the above 10. Can these be repeated elsewhere? No. But yes, they can be replicated using the available resources and needs at those places!

Will that be easy? No! Will that be possible? Yes. He would need the numbers, support, luck and the political manipulations to even start working on replication of these ideas!

We are a complicated country with an even more complicated polity. We have a voter base that ranges from extremely gullible to depressingly cynical to menacingly divisive and polarizingly manipulative. How to overcome them, how to win them over is a fight for him and his party. All I know as a citizen is that in an era of cynicism our man talks of endless possibilities and inspires to realise them. In an era of cynicism he talks of hope he talks about what is positive. In an era of cynicism he talks of Hope. That is what makes him unique.
But then he is a human. He is no God who would come, wave his hand and cure all ills and put us ahead of all. As a favor to him and our own sake, let us not burden him with impossible expectations. He at best would be a facilitator to reach that ultimate goal – to dig ourselves out of a hole and progress to enable India lead the world.

We need his ideas and decisive leadership on the long route to greatness. But he doesn’t have a magic wand. He would have to do it the hard way, which would be the ideal way. It is this search for faux Gods in promising leaders that leads us into a mess! Keep it simple..keep it real!
Please let us not make a messiah out of him…messiahs end up on the cross. We need a Moses more than a Christ!