“
India's hopes reside in its youth”, might be a cliché needing revision, especially after the events which unfolded in the past few weeks.
The hoodlumism on display in Ujjain took the life of a professor who was opposing holding student body elections. The intimidation and eventual assault on the professors was covered by the media and one got to see first hand the ugly side of student politics.
The furious hysterical faces of ABVP activists threatening to wipe the floor with their teachers, wagging fingers and spewing abuse was captured in full close up by television cameras. A policeman standing next to the students shockingly failed to realize that criminal intimidation is a punishable offence and simply looked on.
In another part of India, in Chandigarh, irate young women demanded an apology from and suspension of a teacher who punished a girl for speaking on her mobile phone in class. And in Meerut, girls from a local college vandalized the vice chancellor's home and damaged his vehicle simply because he failed to give them an appointment.
The anti-reservation stir this year was no doubt an example of a powerful youth movement where concerns about the future were certainly legitimate and many sincere young people participated in the debates. Yet alas, here too there seemed to be a sort of tunnel vision on the part of the protestors, a refusal to engage with the realities of social justice, to understand what caste discrimination really means. Instead there was an almost hysterical obsession about "oh god-what’s-going-to-happen-to-me; I'm-going-to-America."
Rang De Basanti is a cult film for today's youth. A film that preaches disrespect, hedonism, and historical forgetfulness and valorizes murder is seen as the great protest film of our time. Glance at any workplace today and you'll find the majority of the workforce made up of feverishly ambitious mercenary young people myopically focused on upward mobility, with empty minds that are also as narrow as their trousers.
Our great hope is that sixty five per cent of our population is under the age of 35, but has India's youth inherited the worst traits of their elders and tossed out the best? Is the Rang De Basanti generation manically reciting the bizarre mantra "the system sucks" by repeatedly demonstrating its contempt for the law?
Scan the blogosphere and you'll find several vicious armchair twentysomethings vomiting out defamatory and bloodthirsty sentiments about strangers who they would, ostensibly like to murder.
India's youth may be our greatest resource, but parts of the youth are, alas, sunk in such awful decadence and aggressive normlessness that they make the Naxalites of the sixties look like nawabi intellectuals.
Organizations like the Youth Congress, NSUI or the ABVP are in decline and comprise mainly of lumpenproletariat jostling for petty local fiefdoms. Lumpen and rogue elements are taking over campuses and turning youth politics into factories creating even larger numbers of villains. The national parties are using student politics as laboratories to extend their influence and also delve into a young vote bank for electoral gains. They have also in the process inculcated the sterling qualities of politicians – voter intimidation, violent confrontations, booth capturing, and horse trading and of course corruption and the use money power.
A case in point is the Delhi University elections, which have been reduced to a farce with candidates each year proclaiming to do the exact same thing in their manifestos year after year. While many may argue that the one year tenure is too little to achieve anything concrete, the question arises that all these years could the student leaders not concentrate on this single issue and get a more workable time frame rather than fight over petty issues? Also, would it not be better if students raised issues on say the right to access the Internet or introducing newer courses etc. rather than indulge in arm-twisting and false promises?
The utter degradation of student politics was not exactly a hidden truth, but recent farcical election campaigns and violence has given it the necessary scrutiny. Student bodies are meant to represent student’s rights; at least that is what they claim. But when issues of student welfare and the very future of students is in question, all student parties are found wanting. During the recent reservation demonstrations, not one student political outfit came out in open support of the movement. It was left for umbrella groups to raise the concerns and demonstrate their angst.
Despite the fact that one may be critical of student bodies one cannot deny their role in a democracy and especially in a democracy involving young people. So one can also argue that the politics of today is now being reflected in the student version of the same as well. What student leaders see on television screens, with mud slinging and chair throwing, they feel that is what politics stands for!! So in an ironical sense the student leader’s behavior is a creation of the politicians themselves.
One would be happy to see mature and reason based student politics but at the same time it is the job of the ‘big’ politicians to show them the way. Surely, one cannot be critical of students and not of the politicians who are pumping money and absurd notions about politics into these leaders. But with the tragic death of Prof. Sabbarwal there is a clarion call for reforming student politics, who does this – the government, the students, or college administration is debatable, but the time has come to rid ourselves of manufacturing goons and criminals in the name of student empowerment.
This is a generation that outwardly looks more modern than their parents but whose thinking is much more backward. In short they believe in caste, patriarchal family values, do not support women's rights and are overwhelmingly concerned with money and success. When the desire to hit the arc lights outstrips all sense of morality, decency and values then India’s future it seems is not really in very safe hands.
