Antsy and pan(t)sy

"Some people are in such

darkness that they will burn

you just to see a light. Try

not to take it personally"

– Kamand Kajouri

Today's column is about tangential thoughts, one being that we should celebrate India's incredible win in the T20 World Cup over Pakistan last Sunday, and the other that we should eulogize and commemorate Rishi Sunak's ascendancy as the new British Prime Minister. I also take this opportunity to applaud Virat Kohli, especially so as his incredible achievement came late in the night on Sunday, just as my last Monday's column was under print.

I also applaud Rishi Sunak while making a frenzied amend on behalf of my countrymen—perhaps in a grander light—especially due to the boisterousness of my fellowmen who embraced him as the 'first Indian-origin' Prime Minister of the brighter land. But hello, Sunak is not Indian, and he never was. Sure, Sunak is a Hindu and his paternal grandfather Ramdas Sunak left undivided India in 1935 from Gujranwala, well before India's independence, working first in Nairobi.

Ramdas-ji's wife, Suhag Rani Sunak, moved to Delhi from Gujranwala along with her mother-in-law and travelled to Kenya in 1937 to join her husband, three sons and daughters alongside her. This historical fact is meant in no way to demean anyone in any which way, for Rishi Sunak's achievements are staggering. I only affirm that he is not Indian, and that's the simple truth. Yet, India's mental vagabonds are claiming victory, almost as much as when Virat sent all missiles from Pakistani bowlers scampering over the ropes.

Let's not be animals

We are a very selfish and vicious species, oft-behaving like stone-cold animals. But we are antsy and pan(t)sy now to prove that we are not. The moment Virat Kohli doesn't score at his normal prolific rate, he is branded 'unfit for the team' and as soon as he stands up for team-mate Mohammad Shami when he was being pilloried on social media for giving away runs in one match, Kohli was called 'anti-national'. Mohammad Azharuddin, Ajay Jadeja and countless other cricketers, including Sachin Tendulkar, have faced the see-saw of near God-ism and absolute nadirs throughout their careers.

Moving on to new British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, one moment he was being extolled as the new best thing to have happened to India, but as soon as his faithful 'fellowmen' in India learnt that he supports the beef industry in the UK, their tweets and mountains of praise dwindled into near nothing. And the moment the Guardian quoted Britain's opposition Labour Party as claiming that the Sunak potentially avoided paying tens of millions of pounds in taxes through the premier's wife's 'non-dom' status while he was Chancellor and imposed tax rises on the public, praise for the new 'premier from India' went into negative territory—what a fall from grace and popularity! For me, there is but one outstanding thing about Rishi Sunak's ascendancy; that it turns on its head the infamous quote from Winston Churchill, who had the gall to say: "(Indian leaders) are rogues, freebooters and men of low calibre… They will fight amongst themselves for power and India will be lost in political squabbles." Indeed.

As a nation, we are becoming more and more flippant, way beyond reason and comparison. While we carry on our shoulders those who achieve any level of success or even notoriety, we throw the same people on the ground and stomp on them when they fall from the pedestal. I am not talking of the likes of Nirav Modi, Lalit Modi, Vijay Mallya, Mehul Choksi and Jatin Mehta, or many others who chose to live on foreign soil when their empires fell apart. I am speaking of sportspersons, politicians and others, whose stay on the throne is oft-interspersed with black ink being smeared on the face.

Much rave and rant

On a tangential note, our people have learnt the not-so-subtle art of raving and ranting for political gain and eyeballs. Who can forget for years the outburst of the otherwise controlled Princess Hend al-Qassimi of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) as she expressed her strong dissatisfaction over the rising Islamophobia in India? "I miss the peaceful India," she tweeted, as she highlighted a tweet from an Indian living in the UAE as "openly racist and discriminatory", reminding one and all that the punishment for hate speech in her nation could be a fine or even expulsion.

These statements have followed worldwide concern over the treatment being meted out to Muslims in India, including from the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), which has urged India to take immediate steps to protect the rights of the minority community. The criticism has been damning, especially as India has actively worked for decades to repair its problematic ties with OIC and had finally managed to be invited as 'Guest of Honour' at the annual OIC meeting in Abu Dhabi in 2019.

There is a reason I have switched from mindless worship of the successful to the raving and ranting of some leaders—the skyrocketing rise of verbal vomit, hate speeches and divisive statements being mouthed across the nation. Words are cheap, it would appear; and the noted response of the authorities is tenuous and wondrous, if I may use kind words to describe the all-round spiel. While innocuous and innocent statements draw immediate action and even detention, the most inflammatory proclamations many a time fail to evoke any censure whatsoever.

The world is watching

This is cause for concern because our standing worldwide is taking a global be(r)ating. I once read an article which said quite beautifully that there are many ways to judge any nation's role in the world. Outcomes are one, including economic exchanges, political decisions and military cooperation. Resources, be they economic, military, diplomatic, or cultural, are another. But it is the public perception that is the most potent—it should be watched, monitored and moulded with utmost care.

Sadly and scarily, we don't seem to care much anymore for what our nation is being perceived as by the rest of the world. The instances of us being pilloried around the globe are increasing—some say we are divisive, insensitive to the plight of the underprivileged and the minorities, even downright discordant and disruptive in our treatment of these classes. What happened to farmers who agitated on the Capital's borders for nearly a year is being smirked over worldwide. What is happening almost every other day in Kashmir is frightening. What is being done about the skirmishes on our borders is unnerving. What is happening to the dollar and economy is being felt by every Indian. The time to (red)act is now.

It is not just the world watching us, and that is even more disconcerting, as this quote from Robert Fulghum suggests, for it as much a stark reality as it is a wake-up call for all public-speakers. "Don't worry that children never listen to you; worry that they are always watching you." And watching and listening, they are also learning, imbibing and inculcating. That's another scary thought.

The writer is a veteran journalist and communications specialist. He can be reached on narayanrajeev2006@gmail.com. Views expressed are personal