New Delhi: Annus Horribillis would perhaps be too mild a term to recall how the dreadful year panned out in terms of everything we loathe. It started with protests against Kundakulam Plant in Feb, when there was apprehension of over one million people in danger in case of a leak. The response: Tear Gas and Baton charge.
In June, Mumbai's kids went on a Peace march against creaky, dumb laws against moral policing of night life. Result: Police registered cases against the protesters, but mercifully no violence took place.
In July, the outrageous act of a 21 year old woman publicly stripped and molested - in full view of people and TV cameras - by at least 15 goons. Result: Eleven were identified and served with 2 year Jail sentences.
In August, Assam riots to protest against the killing of Muslims in Assam and Myanmar. There were at least 2 deaths and over 50 injured. Result: 64 arrests ... and so on and so forth. There was also the absurd Mumbai Facebook arrest of two young girls posting their personal observations about a Bandh which caused countrywide protests forcing the cops to drop the case. The latest, the brutal, heinous and inhuman rape of a 23 year old in a bus in Delhi on Dec 16 was easily, the last straw on the camel's back.
This sexual assault catapulted into a youth movement of unprecedented dimension, resonating spontaneously across several cities, instantly. Shock, anger, hurt, disgust erupted in youngistan, galvanizing a movement that served notice to the lame and ineffective powers-that-are, that enough was enough and they needed to answer and be accountable for every injustice done to women.
They reminded them that since it was the people who voted them into power, it was We, the people they had to deliver to. As India Today's Editor-in-Chief Arun Puri wrote in his insightful editorial, "Politicians seem to have not understood the new India. Fifty percent of India's population is under 25. These are children of liberalization who have known only the market economy of plenty; who with the internet are well connected with the world, watch news in real time and react to it with the same alacrity; who have a social conscience; who are not restricted by hierarchies and above all are impatient because they want instant action. Contrast this with creaky colonial superstructures that are supposed to deliver governances, a choked judiciary that delivers justice in driblets and a police force that treats its citizens with contempt. The clashes between the two are inevitable."
Adds journo S. Prasannarajan with purpose and passion, "when a collective cry overcomes fear and acquires the force of spontaneity, it shatters the make-believe of the powerful and scares the remorseless."
Is that why nobody from the Political frat, even none - so sadly - from the young M.P. brigade, came forward to raise their hand and be counted as a constituency who listened, empathised, consoled and promised to take action ASAP? Where was the youth icon, Rahul Gandhi? What a pity that they goofed, big time, exactly when they should have turned up to demonstrate solidarity. In the process, they let go a terrific opportunity to be the change they constantly pontificate about and walk the talk.
Journo Swapan Dasgupta, however, is quite clear why Rahul and gang got cold feet. "It's a different scene. An overwhelming majority of India's young MP's today are inheritors who have long been accustomed to the aam admi looking up to the netas with forlorn eyes and the leaders, in turn, responding with a show of noblesse oblige. This new lot wasn't pleading before dynastic icons with folded hands. They were self confident, angry and exasperated. They represented a new, assertive, even insolent India. Their expectation couldn't be met by discretionary hand-outs or cash transfers. Their demands are a key element of modern politics: the expectation that the state will be both responsive and efficient. The chalta hai fatalism of an earlier age has been replaced by a voluble rejection of a meek theek hai. The people are changing. The political class isn't and the mismatch will not be unending."
Social commentator Santosh Desai comes to the party with his spin. He believes that frustrated by political marginalization, the youth and middle class found - and leveraged - a potent venting machine that forever keeps a vigil on all matters Indian and can be described as democracy's direct pipeline to the people who matter - Social Media. "The sense of having an opinion that counts, of being able to reach out to the void beyond and find an echo in a kindred spirit, to galvanize and in turn be galvanized, creates a new feeling of significance and belonging. This is the new watchdog in town and this one does much more than merely watch. It can bite."
Finally, it is savage irony that the 21st century was touted as the Women's century. All the talk of liberation is mockery only chillingly re-emphasizing the reality of Virginia Wolfe's warning "The eyes of others are our prison, their thoughts, our cages."
The utter shame and disgust, grief and anguish reflected in the mass movement indicates one seminal truth: while we look back in anger, we need to look forward with new energy, passion and resolve to snatch the pen away from the phoney authors of our future and script a new narrative where dignity of the human spirit is upheld with the sanctity it deserves. Where young women can rightfully 're-claim the night' and never ever lament that Independence Day was strictly meant for Men only.
Nothing less can celebrate the inspirational spirit of Delhi braveheart, who in her death, ignited new life into an entire nation giving it a new reason and opportunity to redeem the atrocities of the past.
Into 2013 with new hope, prayers and confidence.
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