Monday, October 27, 2008

Awake, Arise and march forward

In the first meeting I attended for the JaagoRe campaign, I asked a question in the QA session. The question was – What is the motivation factor? Why should I care for all this shit? Why should I not just run away to a place which is much better than this, say US or UK, and live my life happily?

 To answer my question, the coordinator of the program asked me a few more questions. It went on like this –

 “Where are you from?” He asked.

 “Uttar Pradesh.” I replied.

 “Why did you come to Mumbai? What are you doing here?”

 “I came here for my higher studies and am working with TCS Ltd.”

 “Why? Don’t you have good colleges there?”

 “Well they might be having some, but I wanted to get into this particular college and so…”

 “So you believed that this particular college was better than any other college in your state?”

 “Yaa, may be.”

 “So tell me, why did you not return to your state after you finished your education?”

 “Because we don’t have such job opportunities there as we have them here.”

 “And why?”

 “I guess… I don’t know.”

 “Try to answer this and you will get to know – What is the motivation factor.”

  

Since then, I have questioned myself a lot on these lines and am still searching for answers.

 Why TCS has only two branches in UP, the largest state of India (Population-wise), where as it has around twenty centers in Mumbai city alone? Why Lucknow still has to fight for electricity but Mumbai has 24 hours availability? Why despite having TAJ, one of the Seven Wonders of the World, in the state, UP still can’t boost their tourism but smaller states like Kerala and Goa are successful in cashing on it?

 No answers. I can’t attribute it to bad governance. Is the government not equally corrupt in other states? Is it not all the same? But then why is the difference in the conditions?

  

Ruben, a friend and the city coordinator for the JaagoRe campaign in Mumbai, once asked me, “Tell me, why you participate in CSR activities?” he was referring to my participation in a school education program initiated by my organization where I go every Sunday to help students from Dharavi learn English language; they being from a Hindi medium school. The aim of the program is to make them confident, responsible and motivated citizens of the country.

 “Well, because I think that’s my responsibility towards society. To contribute to make things better. And that’s the least I can do.” I replied

 “So how many students you think you can impact on each year.”

 “We had around 150 students last year and the number has increased by 100 this year.”

 “And may be it will increase by a 100 more by next year, right? But tell me Rohit, with all due respect to your efforts and to all such NGOs which engage in these kinds of programs; is it really your job? Your responsibility? Or is it the lack of someone else’s responsibility?”

 “I didn’t get you?”

 “You work as a software engineer and you primary responsibility is to produce good quality software. And your responsibility is to pay taxes. That’s all and you do both, I suppose. It’s not your responsibility to educate children. You do it because you think it’s important but not being done. It’s the responsibility of the government whom you pay taxes to take care of the improvisation of the education system through the various departments of ministry.” He stopped for a second and then continued, “Your contribution to this can only affect the lives of a few. But if the government education system is corrected, it will affect the lives of millions. But how the government system be corrected?”

 By the time I realized that he asked me a question and tried to find out an answer, he answered himself, “By political reforms… And that’s what our vision is. We are here to ask them to correct their system if they can else to get out and we will walk in. A system, Rohit, is there to help people to do good and complicate the work of people who want to do bad. But our current system does just opposite. So how far will it go?”

 I had no answer. He continued, “Tell me what you do when you find some problem in the software system you are working on? You ignore it because it’s not affecting you? Or you fix it because it’s your system? I hope, the responsibility of a good software engineer is to fix the problem and I also hope you do the same.”

 “Yeah…” I muttered.

 “So whose problem is the bad governance of this country?” he asked me and I got my answer – This is the motivation factor because it’s my problem.

 People from UP run to Mumbai and Mumbaikars to the US. Where shall the people from US run to? If my house is dirty I don’t go and sleep in my neighbor’s house. Rather I clean my own house to sleep. Then why do I run away when my country, my state is dirty, stinking and in a pathetic state? Why do I not stand up with a broom to clean it up?

 Ruben told me two cases of two different places. The first one was about the Corporator’s elections in Mumbai, a few years back. His team, frustrated of all the political candidates, decided to fight the elections and promoted their own representative. Other parties had money to buy votes and they did where as this team had only hope. They went around, talked to people, and at the end they did win, though with a very slight margin. Remember the Hindi movie Yuva by Mani Ratnam? Bollywood has inspired many a lives, and this one was for good if it did.

 The second case was of the recent Panchayat elections in Bihar, a state severely marred by bad governance. The state is famous for vote buyouts, booth capturing and such malicious election practices. And the youth of Bihar, like any other state in India, always stayed away from the process of voting. They never wanted to waste their time and effort. But this time, they did. A major youth population came out and voted in certain areas of the state. And the result was beyond the calculations of any election pundit. Some new candidates won. They didn’t know if these candidates would do any good, but they knew they had dared to challenge the system.

 And that’s what is needed, I suppose - The courage to challenge the system. They need to be told that if they do not perform they will be replaced. They can not monopolize the government. And this is the fear which will work. Does it not work in our offices - The fear of being replaced? And we perform; so will they.

 It all appears to be a sweet dream. And I want to live this dream. I want to clean my house. I want to hold my government responsible. And for that I need to contribute to the formation of government. I need to vote. And to vote I need to be registered as a voter. I recently did. Thanks to www.JaagoRe.com which has simplified the process of registration and has brought it to my desk, just a few clicks away.

 This festive season, lets initiate the process of clean up not only in our homes but the whole country. Happy Diwali!!

 

3 comments:

Sourav Kundu said...

What a post!!! Too good, just too good... the flow, the way the idea was expressed.... fantastic...

That was about the way it was being done... now about the content..

There are some places where I guess NGOs do a better job.. take for example preservation of the environment... there are very few people working towards that... We need a two faced approach... one towards the society and the other towards the environment...

Just my two cents of thoughts.

Rohit Kumar said...

Hey Sourav, thank a lot you for your appreciative comments.

You are right when you say NGO's do an amazing job working towards the preservation of the environment... but as I mentioned in the blog, there's also a government department created for Forrest and Environment conservation. A huge amount of funds are allocated each year to this department towards this. But like all other major govt functions it too sucks.

So the point is, if we have some NGOs which are doing good job towards it, then can we at least help the proper flow and channelization those funds? Why to have a govt department when it doesn't function? may be we can better disband it or stand up to make it work... what say?

Anonymous said...

too good rohit...