If any person ever managed to secure the attention and adulation of a billion people for managing to sell them a dummy, it has to be the President of the United States - Mr. Barack Obama. Touted to be the most successful visit to India by an American President ever in history, Obama’s visit to India has defied all precedents – the media attention, the itinerary, the agenda and the eventual outcome – no American President has ever managed what this Afro-Asian Harvard Law Graduate has.
All through his 3 day visit, the President focused on striking a chord with a billion Indians and even the most miserly man in praise cannot refute the fact that Obama has managed to win hearts of a majority of Indians. Be it his graceful speech in the Parliament or the interaction with the students or his visit to Mani Bhavan or a impromptu jig with the children – Obama has endeared himself to the ever-so naïve and gullible India people who are accustomed to being hoodwinked with alarmingly frequency.
What our people, mesmerized by some unparalleled oratory skills failed to catch the America-centered propaganda and endorsement of unilateral interests! All the hue and cry about the bi-partisan co-operation between two humongous democracies, one financially, the other demographically is a well concocted masquerade, behind which was hidden and stealthily executed agenda that’s advanced America’s interests. Not for a moment did the President manifest a modicum of concern or interest for the core issues grappling India. We don’t want the American President to be a panacea for our problems. We are not freebooters. There are no two ways to the fact that it is the attest duty of our elected representatives to steady our ship, which for now, seems a merely academic. What we legitimately want is a fair give and take, both sides equally weighted. When one talks of strategic partnership, there ought to be perceivable and tangible exchange and not just prejudiced hoarding.
In addition to the immaculately worded flattery, cautious jibes at some neighbors and some symbolic visits, there is nothing tangible has accrued to India from this hyped visit. It seems a tad bit far fetched to subscribe to Obama’s advertisement of India being a employment generator for America. If $ 800 billion of Quantitative Easing (a euphemism for controlled inflationary pressures to be directed to emerging countries so as to catalyze exports) and $ 750 billion of T.A.R.P. (the aggregate of which can account for India’s Budget for a couple of decades) could not create adequate employment, it is not easy to understand how can business deals aggregating to a paltry $ 50 billion, estimated to create some 40,000 odd jobs help a country where 70 million citizens are registered unemployed and habituated to unemployment cheques being delivered to their house. In the background of the political drubbing the Democrats are facing back home, this ‘made-to-be achievement’ is perhaps a thread for the Obama administration to hang on to and even claw its way back into the Senate, whose control it has lost.
As a matter of fact, it takes no great story telling to mislead America. A populace that could elect George Bush to the White House on two occasions is way too credulous to not be conned by the mantra of ‘change’. Had the President been less stone-walled than he is, he’s perhaps see that America is gearing up to change the President. Playing the loyal complement, the Indian government has made no small of the President’s assurance to support India’s claim for a permanent seat on the UNSC. It seems very ill-conceived to be so amused to be part of an organization, whose terms are dictated by a country who, which on its laurels of a war won a few decades ago, pampers its ego by frequent reminiscences of the extermination of a populace. What the Indian government has not yet understood is the tacit military commitments that shall accompany the seat as a non-negotiable rider. Where out armed forces seem far too under-equipped, ill-trained, unmotivated and unorganized to counter internal Maoist rebellion, it makes neither strategic nor common sense to consign to the sacrificial altar, lived on underpaid soldiers. It is no picnic to walk into countries bombed to stone-age, struggling with civil unrest and fanatic groups ambushing armed forces. On one hand, there is lure of war-planes can that are faster than the speed of sound, the other hand, more realistic, screams of our inability to fly them for want of simulation training.
An Indian government, desperately clinging on to power because of a weak opposition would serve itself better to train its energies on the core issues intimidating the stability and progress of the country. In a game of ‘scam-a-day – have you made it large?’ it makes more sense for our enforcement agencies to mitigate the consequences of ubiquitous and institutionalized corruption, whose extent can be conceived by fantasy.
The speech addressing the specially convened joint session of Parliament was perhaps the most ‘Indian’ speech after ‘the tryst with destiny’ recited by Nehru. Surely Obama’s poise and choice of words gave a surge of patriotic adrenaline to all those who listened to it. The point still remains, amidst all the symbolism, rational sensibilities have been imploring for a semblance of substance. A promise to support claim to the UNSC ‘as and when the time and circumstances so justify it’ does not qualify to be substantial by even the most generous interpretation. I beg to differ with those who think otherwise.
The youth of our country seem to be bowled over by the interactive session in the most prestigious college in the city. What my fellow friends have failed to pick up is the gray matter. The overly cautious use of words on jihad, a ‘beating around the bush’ answer on Pakistan should not have gone down too well with them. Accepted that you cannot crucify a person for an unofficial statement, you also have got to accept the fact that there cannot be a diametric difference in a person’s mindset in an official and unofficial. The US President’s idea of India being the captain to steady Pakistan’s rollicking ship seems t be a consequence of intoxication. In a country where terror is the biggest employer, illiteracy is the most common qualification, brain-washed youth the most freely found commodity and military rule the only solace to prevent capitulation under a people-elected spineless government, it makes neither strategic nor diplomatic nor economic nor common sense for us to meddle in their affairs.
As Nehru said, the time has come for us to redeem our pledge, lest we be too naïve, our pledge cannto be self-immolation!
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