How Mature is My Society?

Scene 1: A local city bus is waiting to leave in a rather dirty bus stand, in any city or small town in India. As the driver revs up the engine, people rush to get in. In the midst of the melee, an old lady with stained teeth and wrinkled face puts her head through the window and spits a huge glob of chewed paan on to the pavement.

Scene 2: Krishna and Sita are travelling in an auto. They will be married in a few days' time and are obviously in love with each other. Krishna moves closer to Sita and puts his arm around her shoulder and nothing more. The auto-wallah peeks into the mirror and widens his lips in a lusty leer.

Scene 3: Rohan and Ketaki have been classmates and best friends for ten years. One day, they realise they are in love and go on to date each other for two years. Then Rohan goes to Ketaki's house and asks for her hand in marriage. They flatly refuse because he is not from her caste. Rohan turns to Ketaki, but she wrinkles her nose and says she cannot go against her father.

India finds itself at a crossroads. The urban centres have witnessed phenomenal economic growth for the last decade. Disposable incomes among urban youth are at an all-time high, property prices continue to skyrocket and many "international brands" are available off the counter in swanky, futuristic malls. However, the big question remains - how mature is the Indian society? Have we as a society kept pace with the economic growth? Has exposure to the more liberal, capitalistic western world put an end to dogmas, supertistions and rigidity of thought?

My answer in all frankness is a resounding no. Any of the three scenes described above are extremely commonplace and could have happened to any of us or to people known to us. The key to the maturity of a society lies in the maturity of the individuals who constitute the society. If we are immature enough to believe that the footpath does not "belong" to us and hence we have a right to spit on it, then we can never expect our society to be mature enough to respect public property and preserve cleanliness of public spaces.

I'm not for a minute arguing that public spaces in the western world are sparkling clean. I have seen obscene graffiti on subway walls in Paris and lewd scrawls on the seats of the Madrid metro. Yet you will not find a Parisian dumping a cigarette butt anywhere except in the dustbins placed on the footpath. When a pedestrian approaches an intersection and looks like he is about to cross the street, cars come to a halt to let him cross, even though they may miss the green signal. Respect for the law follows respect for the integrity of public spaces. Sadly, while Indians jealously guard their personal property, they treat public property with utter disdain, to the point of being hell-bent on destroying the same.

As regards the second incident, there are two kinds of people in India, neither of whom are exactly pleasant company. When a couple very obviously in love publicly expresses their affection for each other in even the most innocuous manner (such as holding hands or putting an arm around the shoulder), there are those who lech at the couple, their eyes betraying all the voyeuristic thoughts that run in their heads (like the auto-wallah in the example); and then there are those who turn up their noses and have nothing but contempt for the couple. Most of us want to live in a world of denial where we want to believe that physical urges between a man and a woman are unnatural and must be restricted to the absolute privacy of the marital bed. This self-denial is so strong in many of us that we detest anything remotely romantic. I agree it is very hard to get over the "one partner for life" mindset, but true maturity lies in mixing experimentation with stability.

The third scenario is something all of us feel strongly about, but when we find ourselves neck-deep in the situation, a vast majority of us takes the path of least resistance and sticks to unsubstantiated, unsupported, unproven and vague "values". Hypocracy is the first symptom of immaturity, and that's what most of us are - hypocrites. I'm quite sure Ketaki's parents must have known Rohan for many years, entertained him at home for lunch or dinner, met his parents at social functions on numerous occasions and yes, known that their daughter was in love with him. Yet when the time came to make a commitment, the old immaturities struck and they took refuge in that rogue's paradise - moral values. There is nothing as immoral as morality, for it is what leads us down the path of hypocarcy and hence, immaturity.

The answer to the big question isn't difficult, but changing the scenario will take many more decades of economic progress and mental maturing to achieve. I do not blame the generation gap, because many people from my generation are just blind adherants to their parents' views and practices. I am not advocating an open rebellion or a total rejection of their experiences and judgement, but what I do advocate is a more open-minded, consistent and unbiased evaluation of every situation. Learning to respect others and their views may be a very good starting point. India is on an unswerving, unrelenting path towards a fully capitalisitic society, but unless we internalise the concepts of individual and social liberty that go hand-in-glove with market capitalism, we may be a society lagging behind the economy and the world.