My Dear India,
I know I don’t say this often, I also know that it goes without saying and that I don’t need to underscore it but guess, sometimes you just need to let it all out. I love you. I love you unconditionally. They say behind every successful man there is a woman, I say behind every successful citizen there is a country. A country that accepts its citizens regardless of their religious affiliations, their ideological baggage, their castes, their colors, their genders, their educational qualifications, their physical strength, their mental stability, their dreams, ambitions and aspirations. Dear India, you have been an all-encompassing binding force that ties every single one of us in your tricolor twines.
I know there are many who have got an acceptance in the world using you as their prime distinctiveness but have continued to disintegrate you from within. There are many who incessantly plot against you and I am not ready to accept as true that you don’t know about them. I am sure you do. Dear India, you have accepted them, tolerated them yet they paint you as an intolerant nation. They accuse you of being unfair, they accuse you of being prejudiced, dear India they even accuse you of being a tyrant. I feel aghast when they do that. I am not a well-traveled person, nor am I well informed or well-read for that matter but I do go to my workplace every day, stay in a residential society, drive on roads, visit public places. Never have I seen you throwing someone out of a queue or an office cubicle or roads for belonging to a less preferred creed or caste, I am using the word less preferred because that’s what they allege.
Dear India, they lionize terrorists. The ones who plot against the very existence of you. They brought democracy to a standstill. They invited the judiciary in the dead of a night and when you slew a terror monster, they wailed. They accused you of being unfair. Dear India, how do you tolerate them? Had I been you, I would have killed them too. But guess what that makes you what you are. But understand one thing, they’ll never take your civility as a virtue. They’ll keep calling you an oppressor.
Dear India, I see people yelling for their rights, while being oblivious of their duties. The duties say that a citizen must respect your ideals and institutions, your flag, your anthem and your song. Still the elites call democracy, the very essence of your ideals and institutions a big joke. I see them beating people for teaching national anthem. I see them walking out while the national song is being played. Your duties say that your sovereignty, unity and integrity must be respected and they go to enemy nations and hatch plans to disintegrate you. Your duties say harmony and the spirit of common brotherhood must be upheld yet they term assault on an individual as the crackdown on a religious minority. While the duties lay emphasis on developing a scientific temper, humanism and the spirit of inquiry and reform, some of them still believe in a rotten educational system. Dear India, my head hangs in shame when I hear such things.
There is a set of politicians Dear India, who pursue politics over dead bodies. They fan communal embers while using dead body as the kindling. There are educational institutions that promote communal hatred and put activism before education. There are godmen that play on people’s emotions. There are philosophers who misinterpret your old and ancient tradition. There are actors who play nationalists on screens and talk against your interest on global podiums. There are students Dear India, who are getting high on the drugs of misinformation and malice. Things look downhill from here.
But guess what not everything is lost. For every anti-national in this nation, there are at least a 100 nationalists. For every fake elite, there are at least a 100 original thinkers. For every malicious propaganda Dear India, there are a thousand dissenti
ng voices. For every ten voices that paint you as intolerant, there are a million factual rebuttals.
Not all is lost Dear India, you have seen worse and have managed to sail through. This muck of manufactured malice can’t slow your pace down. In the 67th year of your democracy dear India, you are the fastest growing major democracy in the world. This single fact should their mouths, but you know they won’t stop blabbering. So let them shout.
Dear India, congratulations on your 67th year of being a republic. You have made it big. I know I don’t say this often, I also know that it goes without saying and that I don’t need to underscore it but guess, sometimes you just need to let it all out. I love you. I love you unconditionally.
Yours,
<Insert the name of any citizen in love with his Nation>
