Climate Crisis is entangled with every aspect of our lifestyle. The Climate Transparency Report is a comprehensive annual review of the state of climate performance of the G20 nations. Its assessment includes 100 indicators for climate adaptation, risks, protection, and finance. The G20 countries coming under this are Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the United States, and the European Union.
The report shows a comparative analysis of the climate actions taken by these nations to achieve a net zero emissions economy. It is a global partnership with a shared mission. It is a concise report developed by experts from 16 partner organizations from the G20 nations. The 2022 report theme is ‘G20 response to the energy crisis: Critical for 1.5°C.’ It bridges climate emergency to the energy crisis.
According to the 2022 report, climate change has had a massive impact across G20 countries with wildfires, heatwaves, tropical storms, and rising global emissions. Exploiting our environment for development at an unsustainable pace left us blind and deaf to the wailing cries and consequences of the ecosystem, and now the tables have turned. It is not Mother Nature who is pleading, it is us. We don’t have a choice, but to act, immediately. In this time of crisis, there are going to be no more excuses, and there are going to be no next times.
The report shows that the prices of fossil fuels rose exponentially in the second half of 2021 mainly as a repercussion of the Russia-Ukraine war. China, Indonesia, and the United Kingdom have the highest total fossil fuel consumption and production subsidies. Energy emissions were found to have rebounded across the G20 countries by 5.9 percent last year, returning to the pre-pandemic levels. In 2021, emissions in the power and real-estate sector were higher than pre-pandemic levels. The per capita emissions in these sectors in China and Turkey are currently higher than in 2019 levels. However, the share of renewables in the power generation mix has seen an increase in all the G20 countries between 2016 and 2021. Countries with the highest increase in renewable energy share are the United Kingdom (67 percent), Japan (48 percent), and Mexico (40 percent), and the lowest increase are Russia (16 percent) and Italy (14 percent).
India has suffered the highest heat-related labour capacity reduction, nearly 167 billion labour hours, resulting in a financially crippling loss of about 5.4% in the GDP, equivalent to $159B. India even witnessed reduced wheat crop yield due to record heat waves. It is estimated that around 142 million people or 10 percent of the population of the country may be exposed to summer heatwaves at 1.5°C. India stands third among the G20 nations with high methane emissions, with a soaring 10.5%.
Climate Action Tracker statistics have rated India’s overall climate action efforts as highly insufficient. For instance, the average temperature experienced in the summer of 2017-2021 has been recorded to be 0.4°C higher than the 1985-2005 global mean temperature increase. About 33% of the country is drought-prone, and approximately 50% of this area faces chronic droughts. This, right here, is the Code Red for Humanity. But there’s still so much we can do, together. This is why we need to be out there, making our voices heard as one, louder, and stronger than ever before.
Real change will happen when the concerns of all the vulnerable groups have been addressed and every possible action has been taken to protect our ecosystem. This is the need of the hour. Let’s join hands and be a part of this. Let’s strike to make them listen to us. Let’s strike to make them act. Let’s strike because now the time has come, when we shall redeem our pledge, not wholly or fully in measure, but very substantially. The real change is coming. All we have to do is be in this fight for what is just, and we shall triumph.
“The Earth has enough resources for our need but not for our greed.”
This most often quoted phrase by Mathma Gandhi depicts his concern for nature and the environment, which initially gives a warm idea of how he envisioned the future generations to tend Mother Nature. Through the eyes of a man whose primary focus is development, it is condescending to believe he would even consider the existence of nature, wildlife, or anything that disturbs or is an obstacle to his developing habitat.
By: Gaurpriya Singh Roy
“The Earth has enough resources for our need but not for our greed.”
This most often quoted phrase by Mathma Gandhi depicts his concern for nature and the environment, which initially gives a warm idea of how he envisioned the future generations to tend Mother Nature. Through the eyes of a man whose primary focus is development, it is condescending to believe he would even consider the existence of nature, wildlife, or anything that disturbs or is an obstacle to his developing habitat.
Let’s talk politically.
In 1991, in his budget speech, finance minister Manmohan Singh declared: “We cannot deforest our way to prosperity, and we cannot pollute our way to prosperity”. These were his prescient words. While India had strong environmental legislation even in the pre-1991 era – the Wildlife (Protection) Act of 1972, Water Act of 1974, Forest (Conservation) Act of 1980, Air Act of 1981, and the Environment (Protection) Act of 1986 – this ‘Environment vs Growth’ debate has become much more salient in post-reform India.
For instance, problems, and thus environmental issues, have entered the mainstream. As the pressure on the environment has increased with development, environmentalism has evolved from an ‘elite’ issue discussed in seminars and conferences to a real issue affecting people’s daily lives, health, and livelihoods. Consider the water table declines and extended droughts in Vidarbha and Bundelkhand.
For example, water logging in Punjab’s Malwa region has harmed the livelihoods of over 2 lakh farmers, or the pollution caused by unrestricted mining and thermal power generation using low-quality coal in Chandrapur, Maharashtra which causes 10,000 people to become ill with respiratory conditions each year. Also, considering the pollution of the Ganga, where effluent and sewage treatment capacity cannot treat even half of the flow.
Second, there has been a surge in organized environmental advocacy. The Rio Convention (1992), the Kyoto Protocol (1997), and the subsequent ritual of annual climate change summits culminating in the Paris Agreement (2015) have elevated the environment’s global profile. In India, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have used Public Interest Litigation (PILs) and Right to Information (RTI) as practical effective tools for mobilizing action. As a result, no self-respecting government can now be accused of being soft or insensitive to environmental issues, at least in rhetoric.
Third, judicial activism has gained traction. The Supreme Court established a quasi-judicial body called the “Central Empowered Committee” (CEC) in 2002 to “monitor the implementation of the Hon’ble Court’s orders and place reports of non-compliance before the Court” concerning forestry issues, giving the committee broad powers. Since then, CEC has been an active watchdog on forestry issues, working quietly and efficiently. In popular perception, it was judicial action that forced the government to convert the entire fleet of buses in Delhi to CNG in 2001. A series of impromptu interventions by the court culminated in establishing a National Green Tribunal in 2011 as a professional empowered judicial body to adjudicate environmental and forestry-related cases.
As a result of these developments, the latest fad is “balancing” growth and environmental protection. This is a breath of fresh air in vocabulary. But have we discovered the proper mechanisms for striking such a balance?
Not yet: Environmental issues are hotly debated, from the Sardar Sarovar Dam to the Jaitapur Nuclear Power Plant to Kanpur’s polluting tanneries. Over the last few years, the National Green Tribunal has heard over 1,600 cases, which is only the tip of the iceberg.
Thus, at what cost do we proceed with our buildout?
Toward a brighter future for the upcoming generations to look at should be our prime focus rather than handing them a world full of concrete and rust, we should keep our center of attention towards providing them with a new and nourishing environment where their minds and body thrive with health and joy rather than forcing them into a world where they know no humble but only brutal growth.
One of the most common issues people around me have raised is –
“Why do we have to treat them special in the month of June? What even is the purpose of pride month? Isn’t it just another way for corporations and clubs to increase their profits/appeal?”
Okay, so first- pride month is celebrated to commemorate the Stonewall riots, which took place in the June of 1969.
Second, yes! It sure is a way for corporations to appear more ‘woke’ and youth-friendly.
Now, the most important question-
“Why do we have to treat them special in the month of June?”
Well, pride isn’t about treating the people from the community in a special manner. It is more about treating them with respect (like we would treat other humans with), acknowledging their struggle and making them feel part of society instead of an outcast.
In this piece we shall look at how it would be if every month were to be pride month.
Now, with every month being pride month, the significance of pride month would obviously reduce.
“Ohh, how angry it would have all the gays with the spotlight off them for good.”
Ironically, this would instead make the community even happier as it would make more people aware and sympathetic of their struggle.
It would also normalize their existence in the society.
What would this mean?
People would stare less at them, make them feel less uncomfortable. Companies and organizations would stop using them as a prop like they do in the month of June just to be discarded once the month is over.
Violence and crime against them would reduce in numbers, the members of the community would feel more empowered which would lead to them being more accepted in society, having better healthcare which would cater to their needs.
Occasionally, when I lay down and closed my eyes, I used to feel like a skatefish in pisciculture. Bleak lifelessness around me – a world drained of joy. They only saw in black and white, do you realize?
The funny thing is, I swam around. I floated around like a little plastic toy, discarded into the vast ocean by some rich spoilt kid. As light, weightless, and wasted. I felt my fins and tail as I traversed the water, the strong current against them.
My teachers had always told my parents that I was a queer child and that I daydreamed too often. Maybe they did get some part of it right, but I never dared to make the pun evident. Who are dreamers but lost souls, right?
My room used to be no different from my terror of a thought loop. It was almost like a black hole, everything sucked you in, and you lost your nature. You know, like the universe is no longer to be governed by the Laws of Senses. If absurdism gets narrowed down, the only thing defined in it would be human hypocrisy. They ask you to love and then say you are not supposed to. They preach to you to be true to yourself but accept only sugar-coated lies. I know.
My school was no better. It was not like my friends were any kinder. Their images flickered in and out of my daily life like a television channel on a poor signal. Despite being left with all these people around me, I was permitted only to use one bland, broken communication device. Will they ever know me for who I truly am? And then I’m in the pond again, my form obscuring my vision. Would it have changed who I am? Would I have forgotten who I was? I am glad you were there through all this.
At times I used to feel like this life was a conspiracy. But then you told me about the other colorful, joyous worlds I could spiral into when I was lost. Maybe all everyone in such a wicked world as mine needs is an ally. Things did not seem as hard. I finally had the courage to stand up for myself. You were not right by my side physically, true. But you were with me, in your heart. That is more than anything I wanted or needed. All this suffocation of shutting myself inside is finally off my shoulder, and I just wanted to say thank you.”
People are often just scared to speak up for themselves. They have to realize that what makes them unique is everything about them- their age, gender, identity, sexuality, interests, and whatnot. The pride community is not for today’s relief or tomorrow’s comfort. It is a movement for as long as it takes. And it is home. To love is human, and to love is divine.
Ahmedabad or Amdavad is a city in the western state of Gujarat and the only city in India to be listed on world heritage sites. It is also called the Manchester of the East, but funnily Kanpur is also called the same however Ahmedabad lost a lot of its mills to competition from other places due to which many had to shut down rendering around 40-50,000 people jobless.
I went to Ahmedabad for a few days some time ago and I just can’t shut up about it. The old city of Amdavad lies on the eastern bank of Amdavad and is a walled city with around 12 gates which don’t serve much of a purpose other than being landmarks and a few looking absolutely magnificent.
The eastern side is congested and cramped with small roads, with shops everywhere. It wouldn’t be wrong to say that everything one could buy with money could be bought in this part of the city. Clothes, pipes, toys, bicycles, diamonds- Old Ahmedabad has it all.
There is a certain legend about the most bustling that a few centuries ago a woman was leaving the city in a hurry. When stopped at the gate by a guard and asked why she was leaving, she said “I’m leaving your king’s kingdom. I cannot stay here anymore.” The guard a little confused, asked her to promise to him that she’ll stay where she is as he has to go and ask the king about what had to be done. The lady promises.
And the guard never comes back. He kills himself. That lady was Goddess Lakshmi and she never left the city.
It is said if you have anything to sell and set up a stall or a shop, it would be sold within a day. Even if the thing is completely useless or devoid of value.
Teen Darwaza and the market around it. It stretches for a kilometre
The old city has the railway station at the heart of it, and various religious places sprinkled generously around it. Hindu and Jain temples and mosques all co-exist peacefully within a few 100 metres of each other.
Hatheesing Temple
Swaminarayan Mandir
Jama Masjid
The city is incredibly religious and it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that probably every street has its own temple or mosque.
This begs the question – why did this city experience such violent communal riots in 2002?
The answer isn’t so simple. And the riots in 2002 weren’t the only ones it had seen in its history. The old city has been seeing communal violence for the past 300 years. Yes, even before coming under British rule the city which boasts of having the Sabarmati Ashram has experienced communal riots and has seen almost 100 riots since independence and this city has had the most deaths in such violence across the entire nation.
This leads to people of the different communities having distrust towards one another and also led to segregation. Segregation led to people becoming self-sufficient in themselves and finding it difficult to mix with people from other communities which leads to the mistrust between them deepening. This also leads to development of stereotypes for all sorts of people. And this makes it easier for more such communal violence to take place.
The green represents the density of Muslim population in Ahmedabad
And even in the Hindu areas, people prefer to live with people who belong to the same profession or caste. Such neighbourhoods are called pols. These neighbourhoods have usually 2 entrances/exits and some secret exits to be used in case of emergency or violence.
Around 40% of Ahmedabad comes under the Disturbed Areas Act which is very controversial. According to this law, a person cannot sell their house to a person from some other community without the approval of the district collector to ensure ‘the property has been sold on their free will and at a fair market price’.
Even though the intent behind the law sounds good, it has been misused by some miscreants.
And what makes things worse is when the Chief Minister of Gujarat says “A Hindu selling property to a Muslim is not okay. Muslims selling property to Hindus are also not okay.” He added, “We have set this rule in areas where there have been riots to tell them (Muslims) that they must buy property in their own areas.”
Fortunately, the city hasn’t been through such violence for 20 years. But with the polarised and communalised environment, one can just pray for the best. Khushwant Singh writes in his 2003 novel ‘the end of India’- “…Gujarat’s capital, Ahmedabad, was built by a Muslim ruler in the middle ages. I noticed that milestones on the main highway leading to the city had dropped Ahmed from its name and made it into Amdavad.”
It is our duty to prevent this increasing communalisation that happens for political wins.
One way this is done is through re-writing history, exaggerating specific facts and situations to make the community they are trying to appease, look wronged.
While new ideas emerge with time leading to us viewing the history through a different perspective, however, this cannot be equated with the kind of re-writing fascist groups do nowadays. This shall lead to cultures losing their identity and uniqueness. People brought up in such an environment develop a closed mind and shall not be open to new experiences, people and things.
Such loss of cultural heritage will also lead to monotony which is something that is not synonymous with our country at all.
And at this moment, M.K Gandhi’s quote stands more relevant than ever.
‘No culture can live if it attempts to be exclusive.’
The feeling of love is one of the most beautiful feelings in the world. It’s a powerful emotion that can make us feel both happy and sad at the same time. The term “love” refers to an overwhelming emotion of heartfelt affection. But does it exactly define the true essence of Love?
I was about 15 or 16 years old at the time, and I was trying to figure out a lot of things in life. I was running late, especially for an Indian kid from a middle-class family who was expected to have figured out their life by this point. It was difficult for me to find significance in many things, but one day I came across something that made perfect sense to me. It was probably insignificant to most others, but it meant everything to me at the time. My life was turned upside down, and everything that didn’t make sense before began to make sense. I met a girl. She wasn’t perfect, but she seemed to be able to complete me.
My friends thought I was crazy and that I wasn’t making any sense, but at the time, their opinions didn’t matter to me. This girl was all that mattered to me. She was in my class, so I made it a point to speak with her daily and get to know her. She was incredibly sweet to me, and I always felt “PERFECT” when I was in her company. I was so delighted that I used to look forward to going to school, and when school finished, I was upset, but the anticipation of seeing her again kept me awake all night. I was genuinely happy and everything was just “PERFECT”, but I suppose nothing is supposed to be perfect in this universe.
I went up to the girl and confessed my feelings for her with a lot of courage. Her smile had vanished, and I couldn’t think of anything else at the time. I’d exhausted all other options and was simply hoping to God that she’d say yes. But it appears that the universe had other plans for me. She said “no”, and I didn’t know how to react to it. Everything just went blank for a moment and I didn’t have anything to say.
Everything that previously made sense to me began to disintegrate, and nothing appeared to make sense to me. Going to school was a burden, sitting in class was excruciating, and seeing the same beautiful face every day was depressing. I had blamed everyone up until this moment, and then I started blaming myself. Was it, however, entirely my fault? I’d only done one thing: I’d fallen in love. I had no idea how to communicate my feelings, and all I could think about was being rejected. My sorrow had turned to rage, and I couldn’t seem to settle down. The tension and restlessness were unbearable.
At this moment, all I could think about was blaming the girl, and my rage seemed to know no bounds. I simply wanted to express my rage, and I had painted her as the villain in this situation. I couldn’t accept the fact that she had rejected me, and seeing her made me feel horrible. Was she, however, the “terrible” person I painted her to be? She made a decision that she had every right to make.
At this point, I realised the issue was with myself and with society, which believes that if a person makes a decision for their own good, we label them as “bad” people if their choices do not coincide with our own. Every individual has the right to make their own choices, and we, as individuals in society, must respect those choices and learn to accept differing viewpoints. I felt it convenient to blame the girl because I had to learn it the hard way. “Consent” is something that transcends people’s and society’s opinions, so maybe I was supposed to be blamed at this point?
“Time is the finest healer,” as someone once said. I believe in my case, I just analyzed the situation and realised that sometimes not everything is in my control. That’s when I realised that not everything is supposed to make sense and that some things just “happen.” I believe that at this moment, I had made peace with all of my sadness, anger, and restlessness and that this helped me to escape from the situation.
Patriotism is the most sublime feeling and India breathes patriotism. But a vast majority of patriots don’t even know what they stand for. What drives this feeling? Since time immemorial, India has always taken pride in its cultural heritage and diversity, and yet, we are ready to trade it off. In fact, we are diluting it for reasons that we never ponder upon. With great honor, we celebrate Republic Day and Independence Day, but are we really independent?
The Constitution of India has always stood as the hallowed shrine of Democracy and yet we barely read anything beyond the preamble. My article from here on, though very easy to misrepresent, raises 2 major concerns- 1. Recognizing the colonial gaze.
2. Decolonialising India on an individual as well as community level.
So, the next set of questions that pops up is –
How do we recognize the loss of cultural heritage if we don’t even recognize its existence?
How do we research the ways we are still colonial?
The answer is simple but subjective. We tap into our own experience. People resonate with the country, and experiences resonate with society at large.
To explain this, let’s assume that every society has a core and it is fashioned in the form of concentric causation- with every fringe that moves away from the epicenter, the quality of commitment to the tradition deteriorates. The outermost fringe of society- which does not practice the tradition at all, does not live the experience in any way, is hoping to impose a system of the universal standard on the core practitioners owing to their inability to practice the discipline and experience themselves, thereby diluting the very foundation itself, as opposed to it being the other way round. This is cultural fascism and essentially what colonialism does.
In an idealistic scenario, assuming that it is theoretically possible to adopt a uniform and universal standard- it is important to take everyone’s input into account. There’s a certain degree of compromise that all of us are bound to make and a certain degree of retention that all of us are entitled to, and that’s how we realize what is core- what is important and what is not. This is, unfortunately, being muddled as moral relativism. That’s not how a system is imposed. Discussion and deliberation are important. When Colonialisation peaked in the 17th and 18th centuries, did anyone take into consideration the origins of other cultures? When you approach other cultures with a sense of benevolent condescension and try to fix them or with a sense of superiority- you infantilize other cultures. Universal standards do not translate into the universalization of one particular standard. At the very least, it means basic participation by the major cultures across the world.
It is amusing to think that a civilization that has lived far more than any other civilization wouldn’t have encountered this problem. And this is why, I am sure that we can emerge immensely powerful, provided we believe in our culture and learn from our heritage.
There’s a saying- “history distorts those who distort history”. And unfortunately in India, we’ve been robbed of accessing our history, our experiences, and what makes us a society. We do not talk about the massive psychological damage, dehumanization, disruption of society’s structure, and undermining of social traditions and of cultural heritage- all in colonial interest and many of the problems today including the persistence in some cases the creation of racial and ethnic and religious tensions that were a direct consequence of our colonial experience. It is rather rhetoric that our history books promote the fallacies of Aryan Invasion Theory and India as the world’s oldest civilization is barely talked about. If this isn’t colonialism, then what is?
Unaware of our own laws and customs and the diverse ethos, we haven’t been able to get rid of the “fixing” or “civilizing the natives” narrative. This ‘colonial gaze’ is so well internalized, that even after several decades of being “independent”, we still employ it in our ethics, rights, science, polity, and policies. We look at our own culture and social problems with this borrowed colonial apparatus.
In fact, India is in fundamental conflict with the idea of “Bharat” or the Indian civilization and it is evident everywhere: deeming Coloniality and modernity inseparable, the linguistic apartheid promoted by the state, the Collegium System of an Elitist Judiciary, and intrinsic corruption in every government body.
The sacrosanct foundational stone of this conflict is the Indian Constitution.
The British India Act of 1935 was the longest Act ever passed by the British parliament. It was a 4000 pages long binding document solely aimed at governing India with a sense of racial and intellectual superiority. According to Pt. Nehru, it was a charter of slavery. History suggests that the courts promulgated a new constitution and we became a republic in 1950 after it was accepted. But what we are unaware of is that ironically, the constituent assembly with no representation of the people of free India, used the same act as a template to formulate the constitution of the Indian Republic.
Contrary to popular belief, Sir Benegal Rao was really the framer or the writer of the constitution and not Dr. Ambedkar who was the chairperson of the drafting committee. While the committee only made suggestions, Sir BN Rao, ICS and the companion of the order of the Indian Empire, knighted in 1938 for his loyalty towards the British Empire, constitutional adviser to the constituent assembly 1946, travelled to various countries and presented the initial draft in 1948.
Even the constituent assembly was itself a colonial institution. There was no separate ratification body. Unlike countries like Brazil- there wasn’t even a referendum to consider the votes of citizens. The colonized elite who were subservient to the British Empire imposed this structure on the masses who were simply the passive recipients of the ordinance. How did we even arrive at “ We the people of India”? Most importantly- where is free India?
This can be easily understood in the following manner:
People’s representatives- Non-Colonial State/ Free State
Fix the people or teach discipline or moralize them- Colonial State
Now, the USA is considered a superpower and has one of the most efficient institutional systems in the world. It also has the world’s oldest written constitution. It’s a 4500 words essay in plain English ( 7700 words with amendments). The motto is that the constitution protects the citizen from the tyranny of a govt. It is the sovereign, not omnipotent. The father of this same US Constitution- James Madison believed in simpler language and natural rights. When we draw a parallel, we realize that not only is it against the basic principles, the most odious and disturbing feature of the Indian constitution is that the Indian Constitution is 150000 words written in legalese- the legacy of the British to subjugate India. What good is the law if the people can’t even understand it?
We got Independence in 1947 but if we look at the institution of the state- it is exactly the same as it was pre-independence. The Constitution is held as the ‘Law of the Land’ and yet has no roots in our land and no history of jurisprudence in our land.
According to the Government of India Act, the federal courts were set up, and “his majesty” decided his bench for law enforcement. The qualification criteria being: the person has to be 5 years judge of HC in British India or Federated state or a barrister of England or Northern Ireland of 10 years standing or a member of the faculty of advocates in Scotland of at least 10 years standing. I won’t be exaggerating if I say that exchanging “Federal” with “Supreme” and making a few tweaks gave us the idea of the Supreme Court of independent India which not only is inherently elitist but has a collegium system for the appointment of judges.
The Legislature continues to exist as Assembly and Council and the police as the Executive continues to thrive on the power of Lathi Charge. Linguistic Apartheid of the SC compels the usage of the English language. In contemporary India, owing to its colonial history, linguistic discrimination that is pushed by the State is the most severe and ordinary form of discrimination that people experience in everyday life- jobs, army, academia, social hierarchy, Supreme Court, etc. What justice will be served if 90% of people cannot even speak the language? Even the emergency proclaimed in 1975 used exactly the same act. All these reasons constitute the argument why this is not constitutional Morality but British Colonialism.
With corruption at its peak, the basic flaw in our institutional system is that the system is not based on the state servicing the needs of the people, but on imposing requirements. To bring more people into the formal economy- we need to dismantle the colonial idea of extortion first. Where getting a company registered is a Herculean task, an English-only IT-enabled GST cannot bring people into the formal economy. This is why the informal economy seems a good escape from colonial methods.
Power tends to corrupt. State tends to destroy. The state has no business to be in business. Limiting the state power by separating the power to legislate, tax, and spend and vesting them in distinct bodies is the key to a free market and economic freedom. Radical decentralization of the state is important. Longer the accountability loop, the more the potential for corruption, and the lesser efficiency is the delivery. Corruption is not the attribute of the morality of Indian people- it’s an attribute of the colonial system which is why privatization yields better results.
We also need to understand that Justice and Judgement are different. Free and Freedom are different.
Colonialisation did not just mean recession, poverty, hunger, and famines. It also meant the loss of our heritage. Our intellectual humility and the inferiority complex bolstered by colonialization have led to us disrespecting and dismissing Indian knowledge systems. We have been conditioned to believe that science has also emanated from the West and there’s only one way to look at it. Practitioners of our sciences, rich traditions and jurisprudence have either become passive or are so abysmally low that we try to justify the ancient sciences using modern science which by the way is minuscule in comparison to ancient science. We ridicule Ayurveda and term our menstrual practices as orthodox without proper scientific articulation. For ex: In the Sabrimala issue- despite the protests, the ruling was decreed upon.
As a historically knowledge-driven society, it is extremely important for us to take back the agency as to how we perceive knowledge and thereby get rid of the colonial apparatus.
With my article, I do not mean to justify the shortcomings of India as a society nor do I wish to bring every ancient practice into the present, but we must reassess the needs of our society. Delve for solutions within our culture before outsourcing them. The colonial state wanted to fix society but let’s not forget that society is our strength. Decolonization translates into the need to recognize and realize the true power of India as a civilization, and for that, we must acknowledge its existence.
It’s the acknowledgement that matters that reparations are owed and not how much or to whom it should be paid. ~Shashi Tharoor
Take pride in our motherland, celebrate the true spirit of being Bharatiya.
“Hey bud, pass me the popper!” says Bug when he points towards an orange hard drive with a semi worn-out plastic film. They call it a “popper” because it has digital blueprints of the security network, sitting between the mesh of wires at one corner of the table in that one tiny basement at his uncle’s old suburban homestead, which wasn’t very well ventilated or well lit in particular but served the purpose for Michael and Bug as their secret hideout. Michael stretches his arm to the end, untangling the wires and fetching the drive while bug keeps a check on the timer and the network link. They find a link that would connect them directly to the Pentagon’s server. Michael turns towards him passing the drive and looks at him and asks, “Are you sure our parents won’t find out?” and Bug smiles while sticking his eyes to the screen saying “Oh shit! Things just got exciting!”. 25 mins later and 3 firewalls into the system before they can access the nuke codes to the mobile launcher which siloed the16 PAC-3 missiles that were kept at the military station outside San Francisco, the alarm went off and the officials found out about the hack and both Bug and Michael were arrested. Michael took the entire blame on himself because he was still 11 and could get away with the hack by spending time under juvenile detention while bug would have been prosecuted for the same.
5 years later, when Michael finally got out, his father was there to receive him while his mother wasn’t very happy with his return so she took his sister to the market. He gets admitted to an all-boys school this time which is 10 miles away from his place. Even though going to school was a real struggle, Michael was still happy because he had 2 things to look forward to – he was subject to early dysphoria. His parents would call him out every time he tried wearing any of his sister’s outfits and not let him be friends with the 3 girls who lived next door as they were a strong feminine influence on him. As a result, Michael grew up to hate his parents, but now he could spend more time outside their watch. The second reason was that he always wanted to swim and this new school had an Olympic size pool which was a dream come true for him. A few days after he got into school, mike went for his first P.E class, looking at the pool from the door through the corridor he couldn’t contain himself with all the excitement and rush he felt while imagining his body completely free in the middle of the pool away from all the hatred and judgements, just feeling the bliss of his existence which he was craving for the past 5 years in the detention house. One thing that was bothering him was that he didn’t know how things function in a locker room because during the 5 years he spent in prison, he never got to experience conventional schooling. He was worried that this could somehow get him in trouble and it did, he was subjected to one of the first and the deepest traumas of his life.
He walks into the locker room and sees everyone changing clothes and taking showers completely naked, and that’s where his body-conscious state kicks in. He tries to cross the swarm with his towel wrapped around his body but the kids stop him and start calling him out for covering his body. He tries to push them away which makes them even more aggressive and the two of them pull his towel off while the others burn his body with hot water to teach him a lesson and make him abide by the rules of the locker room. This one incident got him so terrified of people that post this, he never took swimming lessons again, he only stayed under shadows at school and couldn’t even dare to step out of his class during breaks and would rush to the bus stand as soon as he would hear the bell. Michael had faced similar cases of social unacceptance before but none of them bothered him as much cause he always had Bug, this time though, he didn’t have anyone to share his woe with, he was forced to stay away from Bug for his parents found him a negative influence.
Growing up, he still had a thing for computers and spent all his time either on the internet learning how to hack or about the pride community that his sister introduced him to and where he would always feel accepted. He got to learn all about the government’s policies while trying to know his rights as a person who was born transgender. He was pressurised to grow up as a boy, but felt comfortable in the body of a woman and identified as a lesbian. He eventually took his hormonal therapy and had surgeries to change the body’s anatomy. Michael has grown up to become an ethical hacker, while also maintaining a public activist blog. He has officially changed his name to Nomi and chooses to identify as a woman. Nomi found the one ‘friend’ she always needed in the form of her life partner amanita. She still has all the ups and downs in her life, some even bigger than hacking the Pentagon, but now she finally has family in that one person and knows that whatever might happen, they’ll always have each other’s backs. She continues to advocate for change and lives her life unapologetically.
When I was ten years old, my mother had a student in twelfth grade who liked to wear a lot of makeup. He came to school with his eyes lined with star white eyeliner and lashes done up to touch his forehead. He drew out his words and talked in a sing-song way; his lean hands accentuated his lithe physique when he walked – sashayed, towards his class. I remember my mother telling my father about how the girls in the class complained about the boy getting a free pass to wear makeup, and how they were shut down by the principal because he is “like that”, “he’s not a normal kid”.
On one hand, the school indirectly provided him with the freedom and expression he must have terribly needed at that fragile teenage point, to be able to be able to express himself to the fullest, in a place where he might have been – and probably was – heavily judged. The young guy must have had his breath of relief only during school hours where he could have been anyone he wanted, unapologetically.
Or maybe not. Looking back, maybe he was under the pressure of those unwanted stares, the bouts of laughter, and a snarl behind his back. Maybe he had a constant, underlying fear of being bullied and ridiculed, for the better part of his formative years. Maybe the makeup was an act of rebellion, an act of fiercely owning up to his identity, or maybe it was forced, an armour of shamelessly wearing his skin for everyone to see, bravado screaming “Come at me! This is me! This is who I am! Do your best!”
His Facebook page says he is in a happy relationship with a guy with highlighted curls, working in a multinational company, and living his best life. I wonder if he thinks about the blatant stereotypes that were identified with him, about how wearing white eyeliner automatically labelled him as gay and not manly enough. I wonder if he remembers that he was treated like an extra-terrestrial creature because of his makeup and then-probable sexuality, that the only reason the principal of the school let him be an exception was that no one wanted to deal with a maybe non-heterosexual person, and they found it easier to just let him have his way.
I wonder if he thinks about it because I do. Every time I read a comment under an Instagram post of a troll using the queer community as an insult, hurling slurs at anyone who decides to break through the gender norms, I wonder if that is what they were taught in school. I wonder if the hate that was taught to them, comes from a place of education, a place meant to be teaching acceptance.
Indian high schools and teachers are notoriously famous for verbally, sometimes physically, abusing their students for their alleged or confirmed sexuality. Homophobia and the complicity of school authorities to take any steps against it is a largely unaddressed matter. The students suffer silently, under the impression of their “inherent wrongness and the biological imbalance that goes against nature.”
In April 2018, a young queer girl from Chennai, was verbally abused by her teachers and asked to go “kill herself” by the principal because of her sexuality that was leaked by her classmates on the internet, who were are built of the same fabric as the homophobic school authorities. The matter led to a suicide and years of prolonged mental trauma.
All over the country, this trend is followed in schools where the students are pulled up by the littlest things from their mannerisms, to their clothing style or body language, to anything that dares to disagree with the conformational gender stereotype.
What do we do when teachers and authorities who are the building blocks of the nation, who are responsible for framing the minds of everyone in this world, discriminate against someone because they cannot unlearn the hate they were taught, and instead project it onto impressionable minds, creating a vicious cycle that continues throughout the years, not just within the school boundaries but also on the roads, in the cyberspace, at food courts – everywhere.
The stories are uncountable throughout geographies, but the hate for the students are bound by the same thread of prejudice, gender stereotypes, and discrimination that prevail in these institutions. The blatant need for sex education, a certified therapist, and strong actions against bullying are rising over the edge. It is not difficult to imagine where the hate and discrimination comes from, considering our country’s past to make sexuality and physical intimacy a taboo.
We need to make sure that the cycle ends with us not just in the four walls of schools and colleges but every conglomeration the queer people are a part of. We need to unlearn the hate that is taught to us under the pretense of morality and Indian culture. When all a tradition does is spread hate against people for being themselves, it’s time to let go of it.
5 men sat in a bar, discussing their lives after a long day of work when one of them noticed a glass of water on a table nearby. This piqued the interest of one of the men and he asked the group what they saw in the glass. The man, let’s call him John said the glass was half full. The rest however disagreed with each giving their own opinions on what they saw in the glass. One of them said that the glass was half empty, one said it was a glass of water and that it didn’t matter how much water it had. A third said it was just a bunch of water and gas molecules, while the final member of the group of 5 said that it was both half full and half empty at the same time.
This sparked an argument among the five men, each trying to defend their stance while trying to debunk the points the others presented. Their argument was stopped halfway, however, when John noticed that the Glass of Water had disappeared.
The group starts to scan the environment for the object that caused the argument and saw the glass in the hands of a man, who simply sat in front of a canvas and dipped a brush into the glass, and began to paint. This caused the group to laugh as they realized that they were arguing over a simple glass of water.
As you can see there were multiple views for the same glass of water. John, the optimist of the group saw the better parts of life; hence to him, the glass is half-full. His friend, the pessimist, saw the worse things in life, hence to him the glass was half empty.
The third member, the realist would simply see things as they were, hence it didn’t matter to him how much water the glass had, it was more important that the glass had water. The fourth member, the scientist of the group, true to his title described the composition of the contents of the glass.
The final member, the relativist, changed his views based on his viewpoint for the glass, hence the glass was half-full and half-empty at the same time. And finally, the artist, who doesn’t care about how much water is in the glass because to him that glass is the means to an end, it is the means for him to continue painting.
This example with the glass of water might seem harmless, however, super-impose this premise on daily life, replacing the glass of water with people or things around us and this is where we see issues being created and blown out of proportion.
We meet so many people daily and it is natural for one to form opinions based on what we see and what we hear. This is a subconscious process and is by no means wrong. The real issue is when these perceptions and opinions are voiced in public. Like the small group of men from the story earlier did. There was no issue till they kept their opinions to themselves, but as soon as they shared their opinions, they started to argue.
We never know what people around us go through daily and thus, voicing our opinions about them, in any sort of public forum, often leads to an unnecessary spread of negativity which, in turn, makes people vulnerable and insecure about themselves. It also creates a lot of issues with regards to mental health for these people as they either have a hard time accepting themselves or craving for social acceptance, ultimately, making them feel like outcasts. It also creates and promotes unnecessary stereotypes about the people and can lead to unrest in worst-case scenarios.
It is always important to give people the benefit of the doubt, and keep our perceptions either to ourselves or word them in such a way that it does not hurt the sentiments of others. To put this in an example, if a musician hits or plays the wrong notes, instead of telling them that they hit the wrong note, you can tell them that they had amazing microtones in the song.
While it is true that being polite is a good thing, it is important to not lie to them or give someone the wrong feedback about things. It’s important for our criticism to be presented such that we get our point across while making sure that we don’t hurt the other person’s feelings in any way.
In conclusion, it’s not wrong to have an opinion or a perception of things around us. The issue arises when these opinions are either forced onto the people around us or compel a certain narrative or cause chaos.
Fifth Pillar - VIT 