Let’s start over for peace & harmony

Ritu Kamra Kumar

Ritu Kamra Kumar

Looking at a crowd protesting on the road, raising slogans, holding placards and flags, my friend’s small daughter asked her, ‘Mom, what are we? Are we Punjabis or Haryanvis or what?’ My friend replied assertively, ‘We are Indians,’ and hugged her daughter. The child’s query made me think where we are heading for. The year 2019 saw intolerant Indians in more than one way. We became bigots; harmony was lost.

Every New Year gives us the blank space to fill it up with hope and happiness. It comes with the possibility and promise of beginning afresh without grudges and protests. We Indians should come together as one strong social, economic and political entity that can touch the greatest heights of happiness and harmony. Let us become an amalgamation of the ancient, the old and the contemporary living structure, where every human has the right to live freely.

Given the march of exclusivist nationalism all over the country in recent years, one can conclude that a secular, inclusive nationalism has few takers now. What is needed the most today is a vision of inclusive nationalism and secularism that takes forward not only our intelligence and material life, but one which instills in us dominant values of sympathy and serenity, tolerance and togetherness, patience and peace, brotherhood and bliss. Gandhi wrote in one of his letters, ‘All our prayers and observances are empty nothing so long as we don’t feel a live kinship with all life.’ Brotherhood accompanied by empathy leads to peace and justice, which is a perfect prescription for harmony.

Can we make patience and peace our mantra for 2020? It is possible with judicious thinking, rational actions and commitment to achieve them. Some of our greatest inspirational icons — Buddha, Kabir, Guru Nanak, Tagore — were beacons of peace and positivity. We need to revive the ‘concept of India’ in which brotherhood was our cultural ethos and sympathy for all was inculcated in our psyche.

The girl asking her mother, ‘What are we?’ manifests the need to clarify and create a blueprint for the legacy we wish to build and set the trajectory for coming generations. The decisions we make today are for our children, a future we should create for them. Are we building an inclusive and secular world for them? We have it in our hands to shape the winds of change to propel our collective destinies forward.

It’s time to revamp our thoughts and actions. TS Eliot aptly writes, ‘For last year’s words belong to last year’s language/And next year’s words await another voice/And to make an end is to make a beginning.’