It’s a nation like no other. Innumerable
conquerors trying to lay siege at its boundaries with just as many succeeding
as were thwarted, it’s a nation filled with contrariness. Diversified sects
sub-divided within themselves, people of innumerable races and creed but most
of all; politicians who try and tether these numerous factions by playing up to
these weaknesses and drawbacks.
There’s wariness and there’s respect
cloaked in the wariness. An open fact that everyone knows and understands, it’s
again fear that drives the understanding to be yet again camouflaged within
so-called honour and awe. Such hypocrisy is rampant and provincial, spreading
its tentacles throughout the nation’s far-flung boughs and roots. From at its
highest governing glory to its measly and lowly grass-rooters, the nation’s
people have been well-seeped in the ideology of double-standard and
rough-necked behaviour, in case of their demands not being met.
The nation knows neither right nor wrong.
But its people know the bridges that join these two extremities. Bridges, which
were crafted and evoked by the founding fathers and historians and bridges that
yet again, are mired in disputation because of the founding fathers’ arrogance
and so-called superiority about their knowledge. Frays mark these bridges as
uncountable criss-crossing between the two facets that hold them together
persist; just as countless splitting, between these two extremes, threaten
their very existence. A fraught existence at best, the nation’s populace lives
in superficial harmony blighted by deep-set hatred and communal discord.
Once upon a time though, things were
different. When the land and its people were troubled by an alien source, a
source about whom not many had heard about. There was no peace on the land and
oppression grew, festered by the alien source. Finally when peace was wrought,
with verbal battles overcoming physical brawls, the entire nation rejoiced. For
peace was acquired after centuries and centuries of subservience to a so-called
higher power and as such it became a valued and treasured quality.
And
while the people emerging from the shadows of their shackles were advised to
take up ruling by a majority of their own, the lack of absoluteness of provisos
– as penetrating as the founding fathers made them – made the fundamentals of majority
ruling a farce, a parody of its original conception. Rulers emerging each new
day, each promising the dark side of the sun and the unsuspecting crowd falling
prey to the same old rhetoric as if they were new; the nation’s development
though the ages of new-found peace is a testimony of its ever-glistening
hopefulness and the exploitation that this optimism has brought about.
The nation today, is not seen as an
independent entity but is counted as one of the frontrunners, a pivot in the entire
scheme of management of global affairs. Yet its internal mismanagements
continue and many speculate, shall do so for the next foreseeable future. Yet,
it’s amidst such speculative observations that the optimism still rears its
head as talks emerge of new-age rulers ushering in a bright future. Only to
fail all over again, as enclosed within the ranks of old-gen politicos such
new-age rulers also seem to lose their individuality, leaving behind endlessly
pointless predictions about bequests and bequeathing of political predecessors.
Line of succession, hierarchical
positioning and familial ties bind the nation’s governance today as they did in
the bygone eras. Thirst to inherit and rule, longing for power and desire to
dominate and overthrow have set the tone of real-life incidents and events in
the nation, throughout the passage of time. But even as the nation grows and
develops, instead of widening thoughts and actions, the backdrop of power, dominance
and racially-inspired mottos still grip the nation and its populace; as though
developments were incidental, and not essential, for survival.
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