This is India Gopi.....

It was a busy evening, I was on my way to home in my office cab. My cab driver is a nice gentleman, he is little close to me, we use to share many of our thoughts during our hour long journey between my home and office.

Anna and me were sharing some ground nuts and having a chat on that day. After finishing the ground nuts, I tried to gather the waste remains and packed them to keep in my pocket.

"what are you doing", anna asked...

"will put in the dustbin in home", I said.

He took no time to pull those packets from my pocket and thrown out of the cab in the main road and said...

"This is India Gopi..... "

Soo what... And why soooo? I got shocked.....

I didn't try explaining him, nor did I offended him. Because, I clearly understand his words "This is India!".

Because! In India, its not only OK to litter, but it is mandatory too....

Bull Shit!!!!!

It is more than a year since our prime minister launched the "Swachh Bharat" campaign....

If we take closer look in the past 1 year... Apart from some people movement, only few were involved in spreading this word of cleanliness... Where others were busy in criticising the ruling government and trolling them for launching this.

"First let them clean their heart and then they can clean India", said Congress.

Wonderful! When someone ask you to clean your home and surroundings, you will reply to them "you first clean your heart! You are religious! You are capitalist! You are this! You are that!", but will never try to think the importance of the message, and will never persuade anyone for cleanliness, since it was launched by a party which we oppose....

Great!

It is this mentality of the cab driver which persuaded him to throw waste on road.

Even before this government, there were many organization in our country tried their level best to spread the word of cleanliness in the country. Organization like "The Ugly Indian", have gone one step further by not only cleaning the dirty places but also in protecting the already cleaned places from further litters.

It doesn't matter who advocates the cause! Its the cause that matter!

In recent days our media and several other parties were claiming that, "Swachh Bharat" campaign is a failure. If it is so, don't we as a whole nation should take the blame of not taking it to a success?

This is a democracy, here every one have their right to speak, write and preach. But no one have the right to litter!

Should I be a BJPian to spread this word?

Isn't it enough, if I just be a Good Indian? I wonder!

Me and my Muslim friends...

We were 8 friends in total, we use to play volley ball together everyday morning. We were doing our +1 at that time, when we never forget to ignore our classes and give priority to play as it was a honeymoon period of +1 after the deadly intense study for SSLC.

Among us were two of my Muslim friends, Mohideen and Sajjad. We use to play everyday, without barring a single day.

After few days of play, it was the month of Ramadan. Mohideen and Sajjad, were on fast.

For initial few days, when they took part in the play, all other friends asked them to play light. And, if the ball goes outside the court, we never allow them to run behind it, instead we ran and took the ball in. Despite that, when we saw them both struggling during the evening time, we stopped our play routine.

I am talking about the days, which was around 13 years back, when we were teenagers getting to know the world. All we know is Mohideen and Sajjad were our friends and we share everything with them, including food. We know their constraints during the month of Ramadan and we respected that.

We allowed them to abide by their religion without interfering in it and without commenting on it.

After 13 years, even now, my friends are still my friends. I demand biriyani for Bakrid with them.

Ours is a multi-religious, multi-ethnic and multi-linguistic nation. In this, if some Hindu beats a Muslim, another Hindu should condemn that act first, and vise versa when it happens for Hindu as well.

But, whats happening now is exactly the opposite.

If there is any crime committed by a Hindu extremist group, instead of the Hindu moderates condemning it, they stay silent. And with the advent of social media, non-Hindu moderates takes very less time not only to condemn but also to de-fame the complete section of people, irrespective of how moderate or extremist they are. This is a dangerous behavior which questions the countries Unity in Diversity.

We Indians have shared our course for more than 700 years. Its not a small time. Its over 15-20 generations. We should understand this.

Religious and Cultural harmony will happen, only when we start respecting each others sentiments and customs. Not by defaming it.

Also Read: My previous blog: Almighty should save

Mighty India: Almighty should save...

I began my conversation with my friend,

"Am not getting proper sleep these days...."

"Why? What happened?” he asked!

"Well! Multiple reasons! After reading this!” I said showing the newspaper...

"Ok, list me your reasons, let me check if I can solve something for you!" he winked...

"You can't", I said and smiled…

He went more curious and asked for listing…

"Russia entering Syrian war - conflicting with America’s strategy, Taliban capturing Kunduz – most formidable victory in 14 years – US air strike on a Kunduz hospital to tackle Taliban, Nepal enacting new constituency – complaining about India in UN, IS militancy isolated incidents in Bangladesh…", I listed...

He in the midst of controlling his laugher said, "All these are reasons for you… not getting sleep?"

"Well! I will tell you one more incident, happened little close to us... near Delhi…” And I explained him the lynching incident in Dadri village...

His reaction was furious!!!

Until then he was in a kiddy mood... Since those were international news... But this one was having a direct impact on his mood...

He became serious and took no time to blame the ruling party for it…

So, it is taking not more than a sec for people who hear about the incident to blame the ruling government...

Incidents like this can easily be brushed aside by the ruling party, giving an isolated incident tag….

But the impact it creates on one’s mind matters a lot…

I sincerely plead... Please don’t destroy the religious harmony in my country....

Consolidating one community is at the cost of preparing them in opposite to other communities... we should understand this....