To be or Not to be Mediocre

               To be or not to be Mediocre

                 An honest and refreshingly explicit centre page article ‘The Age of Mediocrity’ (Times of India,25 March,2014) by Ghasala Wahab obliquely reflects the dilemma of the educated class of voters to exercise their choice in the forthcoming elections. She has been ruthlessly honest in her appraisal of political, bureaucratic and professional leadership in the country that has been hijacked by mediocre persons with limited thinking faculties. No need for crystal gazing about what holds for the nation in the future if mediocrity continues to rule the roost.

The Age of Mediocrity brings to mind the prognosis of Giambattista Vico, the 18^th century Italian political philosopher in his magnum opus, the Scienza Nuova where he had stated that civilization develops in a recurring cycle of three Ages- the divine, the heroic and the human. These three ages correspond to the Theocratic, the Aristocratic and the Democratic phases of civilization. The last mentioned- the Democratic age -according to Vico will morph into an age of Chaos as a result of the anarchic tyranny of individual freedom and liberty, the founding pillars that hoist democracy. Since human civilization is cyclic, Vico had prophesied the emergence of a new Theocratic age at the end of the Chaotic age. This corresponds to the Hindu cosmology of cyclic classification  of Krita or Satya Yuga, Treta Yuga, Dwapara Yuga and Kali Yuga. A complete Yuga cycle from a high Golden Age, called the Satya Yuga to a Dark Age, Kali Yuga and back again is described in Hindu philosophy. Hindu texts refer to successive ages (yuga), designated respectively as golden, silver, copper and iron. Satya Age or the golden age followed the path of Dharma (law, duty and truth) when people were pious but during the age when Dharma gradually declined, it was restored through divine intervention. With each successive age, there has been a steady decline of Dharma and the present age is known as the Kali Yuga( the Dark age) marked by cruelty, falsity, lawlessness, hypocrisy, materialism and so on. Kali Yuga started soon after the end of Dwapara Yuga, 5130 years ago. Hindu philosophy of the ancient times (i.e., before 2000BCE) well in advance of Western civilization of the classical antiquity (i.e., before 500 AD) had affirmed the cyclical recurrence of civilization that is contrary to the current widespread, linear view that humans are inevitably progressing.

 It is not a rocket science to discover that we are now in an age of mediocrity. While Ghazala’s article is specific to India, the Age of Mediocrity is a global phenomenon. In the West, the current age is defined as the post-Idea age as the present times do not throw up new ideas and worse, it has no time even to think them out. The micro percentage of thinkers does all the thinking for the vast majority. The early 20^th century slogan of making everything new –in art and architecture, literature and sculpture, music and dance had brought out revolutionary and far-reaching transformations in creative expressions. But the invention of electronic computers in the second half of the 20^th century has given rise to the Age of Internet to make the availability of information instant and in superabundance. In fact, we now have an overload of information that bombards us all through our waking hours and leaves us no time to sift it through. Information has erroneously become synonymous with erudition, knowledge and scholarship. The present age, set on accumulating information is not able to distinguish between access to information and the acquirement of knowledge. Since information is available at the touch of a key, there is hardly any time to interpret information and turn it into knowledge. This process requires mental training in analysis, evaluation, judgement and clear understanding of the facts that are easily available and that too in plenty. Today’s world has thus acquired the sobriquet ‘the post-Idea world’ in which thought provoking ideas do not emerge. In the past information had to be painstakingly collected and that was converted into ideas. Neal Gabler writes : ‘ If information was once grist to ideas, it has now become competition for them. We prefer knowing to thinking. It keeps us in the loop, keeps us connected to our friends but few talk ideas.’  All the popular websites such as Facebook, Twitter and E-mails function as information exchanges and these are hardly the kind of information to generate ideas. To quote Neal Gabler again, ‘What the future portends is more and more information. Everests of it. There won’t be anything that we won’t know. But there will be no one thinking about it.’

That is why all the debates on our media channels do not exchange ideas and at the end of watching them we hardly get any new idea or message. Professor Krishna Kumar laments about Indian voters that they ‘get used to the idea that they are dealing with faces and gestures, not ideas and issues.’

Is there a way out of the Age of mediocrity? Can this age throw up leaders with ideas and vision? All the political manifestoes are words and words. In Samuel Beckett’s view, words are all we have. ’Every word is like an unnecessary stain on silence and nothingness’. None of these manifestoes tells us how the ideas are to be implemented. It is easy for every political party to pledge to anti-corruption but how - a question that has no answers from any quarter. Corruption is endemic to human beings. Every arms deal taking place in any part of the world has middle men who siphon off large sums. This is not true only of India. Wherever there is a big deal, corruption is proportionate to the sum involved in the purchase. Corruption starts at the nascent stage of admitting a child to a school. It spirals along with the child’s growth encompassing his/her entry into college, job, and all personal benefits. Has any political outfit come up with solutions to root out corruption? To talk of jailing corrupt people or any other rigorous punitive measure will only lead to greater degree of corruption. Corruption and punishment is not such a simple equation. The fertile human brain will find many loops in the juxtaposition of the two. The Age of mediocrity has shut all inventive ideas for the progress and development of human civilization and we are not blind to the rapid descent into an age of Chaos.

Is there a way out of this mess without waiting for the deluge to put an end to the Chaotic Age with the slender hope of returning  to a new theocratic age- or in our Hindu cosmology to a new  Satya age where Dharma will be in force through adherence to law, truth and humaneness? There is still one possible course open to us. It is education that can save humanity- not the education that perpetuates the fraud of substituting information for knowledge. Today the introduction of RTE has been shown as an enabling measure to educate large numbers of children. But does it contend with the Right to purposeful and humanitarian education? Where are the teachers to teach and how well are they educated and trained to impart knowledge? Can they be the catalysts to transform information into ideas? Considering the diverse population and diverse regions in the country, how can we ensure uniform education to help young minds to connect learning to everyday life lived in consonance with law, duty and truth? We have urban schools that cater to the rich and we are witness to the political chicanery of enforcing compulsory intake of 20% from the economically weaker sections. This has only increased the rich-poor divide. Even in colleges, students who come under the reservation quota huddle together while the rest from affluent background hog the college life to the full. Disparity cannot be eradicated by mandatory imposition of equality and equity.

The simple suggestion that is offered here may sound naïve, if not utopian though it is not so. All schools- both old and the new ones that should be set up in large numbers (to implement the RTE) should be made residential schools where students from all backgrounds come together, live together, eat together and learn together. Those who belong to the EWS category should be provided with school uniforms and all children should have uniform wear outside of the school. In fact the current trend in schools when children sport new dress and offer sweets and chocolates on their birthdays should be given up because those who are not from affluent homes despair when such expenditure becomes unaffordable for them. Let us not shed tears that children of 5+ will be deprived of parental love and care. The lesson of sharing and caring that children will imbibe in these residential schools and the joy of living together with their peer group will be a rich compensation (I do not say ‘substitution’) for missing out on parental dotage. It is from the beginning that children should be taught to accept and not discriminate one against the other, based on his/her economic and social background. All the money allotted to education should now be utilized only for residential schools where admission is open to all. Human values cannot be taught. They have to be lived through and schools alone can educate the young minds to cultivate humanity. The opportunity given to all children will provide them with equal   intellectual and moral growth and they will not need further reservations in the future to enter colleges or seek employment. Navodaya schools are classic examples of bringing together children from different backgrounds and helping them cultivate discipline and a sense of togetherness. If schools follow the concept of egalitarianism and discipline from early childhood as was practiced in the Gurukuls, the hope of affirming and promoting  equal political, economic, social, and civil rights for all people will not be a fantasy or an idle dream.( Gurukul  was  a type of school in ancient India, residential in nature where shishyas  lived together as equals irrespective of their social standing,  learnt from the guru and helped the guru in his day-to-day life, including the carrying out of mundane chores. While living in a Gurukul the students had to be away from their house and family completely.)Parents should not feel anxious about sending their wards to residential schools if the end product is to bring up a well educated human being trained to care for an extended family of fellow human beings. It is a Tamil proverb that says what does not grow in five years will nto grow even after fifty years. Children coming out of school, well disciplined in mind and conduct, will have the value system embedded within. When they move to colleges and universities, their outlook, attitude and understanding of people and society will get further enhanced by higher intellectual pursuits.

There have to be colleges of excellence where young men and women  with merit irrespective of caste and class and economic division get wholesome training  to generate ideas that would serve well their society. These are the institutions that should provide leadership training where young graduate students  learn to think out of the box and think inclusively. All that we bleat about corruption is because present day education at higher levels turn young persons to be competitive race horses and to relentlessly pursue personal, selfish interests, often compromising ethical values.

We need intellectual leaders who have ideas that are implementable and have far reaching benefits to a large majority. We need leaders who can implement those ideas causing the least distress to others. We need leaders who can think with their hearts and feel with their minds. We need leaders whose ideas are not empty words but practically feasible, who have a unique acceptance of the diverse humanity they live with and provide for the greatest happiness to the largest number. We need leaders who can above everything else stem the age of Mediocrity from sinking into an age of Chaos.

Let us not hasten the cosmological prophecy of the age of Chaos to set in as a prelude to the emergence of a new Theocratic age. As Shakespeare says ‘the fault… is not in our stars/ But in ourselves that we are underlings’. The civilizational revolution is inevitable, but we can choose to arrest it or to slow down its movement. There is no need to despair.  We have to draw strength from the very despair into which the age of Mediocrity has pushed us into. One has to be courageous with an awareness that this   ‘courage is not the absence of despair, rather the capacity to move ahead in spite of despair. ‘(Rollo May, the American existential psychologist). In this effort we should enlist educational providers in schools, colleges and universities to provide a new thrust. A seed cannot be allowed to remain a seed forever. It has to sprout, grow and become a tree before it starts yielding flowers and fruits. A seed carries all possibilities if it is allowed to sprout. It is time for our teachers to nurture the seed and teach young people early on that there is diversity among the seeds , and that diversity has to be accommodated  with compassion and care because in that diversity lies the strength of humanity.

Do we need a theatre of violence or a theatre of civility?

                Do we need a theatre of violence or a theatre of civility?

I was once an aficionado of Edward Bond, the leading pioneer of British political theatre who believed in exposing contemporary social evils and finding solutions to remedy them. In Bond’s view, one of the striking phenomena of contemporary reality is violence and Bond felt impelled to present violence on stage that would have a cathartic effect on the audience and purge them of violent emotions. Bond’s theory on violence reminded me of a Tamil proverb that a thorn can be removed only by a thorn. In an article to The Critic, in 1968, Bond made a startling observation:  ‘Critics have been forced on to the theatre by the peculiarities of modern social living, and the danger is that they will damage the theatre by clinging to their old, informed, cultured, civilized,  balanced standards. These standards and the whole culture that gave them meaning died forty years ago.’ Hence Bond’s initial attempt was to write problem plays that reflected the problems of the seamy side of the society. He followed this with his answer plays to provide clear and practical solutions. His final objective was to create a ‘socialist society’ with an optimistic slogan ‘the future is pleasurable’. Contrary to Bond’s criticism of civilized norms  and culture as of no relevance in modern times, the events that have followed have only generated heinous violence not only on ideological opposition but also in society that has promoted gun culture.

I was in UK in the ‘70s when Bond came up with his plays. His predecessors were Samuel Beckett who pioneered the Theatre of the Absurd and Harold Pinter who along with along with a few British playwrights brought a new dramatic genre –the Comedy of Menace, which are basically plays of domination and submission where people defended themselves against a powerful force, an unknown menace or intrusion and subjected themselves to a controlled or monitored existence. The Theatre of the Absurd on the other hand dealt with man’s reaction to a world apparently without meaning, logic or reason, where he is compelled to exist almost as a puppet controlled or menaced by invisible outside forces that is best designated as The Absurd(because these forces are beyond human understanding). It was at the same time there came the emergence of the Angry Young Man in John Osborne’s writings and the rise of the Kitchen sink school of drama. I had the opportunity to  experience the British cultural churning  that was evident in the Kitchen sink realism in theatre, art, novels, film and television plays, of the 1950s and 1960s, which under the garb of social realism  depicted the domestic situations of working-class Britons living in cramped rented accommodation and spending their off-hours drinking in grimy pubs, to explore social issues and political controversies.  The language of the new theatre was free of all middle class inhibitions, crude, cheeky, vulgar and often took recourse to tabooed four letter words.

As I look back on these theatre movements that shook the English (and European) stage, my admiration for and fascination with Bond’s plays have evaporated. For one thing, the result has been disastrous for the King’s(the Queen’s) English as the writings of this period displayed( and continue to display) a total lack of civility in dialogue and  a free use of porn that had no literary or artistic value other than to promote sexual desire. Language in the earlier times from the Classical period  to the Victorian age enclosed within the boundaries of rational and logical discourse the orderliness of the society and the essentials of human experience that enhanced the supremacy of the word. But the present retreat from the ideal concepts of beauty and truth in art and literature into the ‘ugly realities of contemporary life that sympathized with working-class people, particularly the poor’ has resulted not only in the corruption of language but along with it the corruption of human behaviour and conduct. It is a fact that we in India follow the West even if our borrowed effort is late by half a century. The ugliness of stage actions, the violence like stoning a baby to death by hooligans in Bond’s play Saved and the use of language lacking in culture, decency, delicacy and manners-in short the dehumanization of art and culture of the 1960s in Britain has found an echo on our Indian stage. I was a little disconcerted to read a news item on recent women’s theatre where women have taken to staging actions of women’s attempt at depilation and shaving off hair, exhibition of the physical act and agony of giving birth, their self indulgence in physical touch of the body and then trying out dresses that encourage male gaze-actions that are basically for private and not for public viewing. This is done in the name of stark realism to provide the catharsis for voyeuristic pleasures of the opposite sex.  It is not prudery that makes me comment on such theatre presentation but it is my anxiety and concern for the crass tendency to abandon the elevation of all the energies of mind and to reduce everything to the lowest possible bathos. The Spanish writer Jose Ortega Y Gasset in his book The Dehumanization of Art discusses this trend in presenting realism on several counts saying(1) it tends to dehumanize art (2) it is essentially meant to be ironical (3) it seeks to regard art as a thing of no transcending consequence (4) it cautions us to beware of sham and hence to aspire to scrupulous realism. The question arises as to which among many diverse realities is the real and authentic one- the romantic reality of beauty or the classic reality of order, harmony skill and completeness or the contemporary reality of the numerous marginalized crowd at the fringe of society, who ‘think too little and talk too much’?  No conception of reality is absolute and at best the writer or the artist should aspire to something that is practical and normative. The reality that an artist presents has to be a ‘lived’ reality and it should be human to enable us to be human. Ortega concludes ‘among the realities that constitute the world are ideas. We use our ideas in a ‘human’ way when we employ them for thinking… The idea, instead of functioning as the means to think an object with, is itself made the object and the aim of thinking.’

                             Scrupulous realism has in some way compromised with acceptable standard of living, propriety, modesty and morality (I hear echoes of rumblings as to who sets the standards and my answer is standards that exalt our thinking, imagination and conduct). Realism that is in display in contemporary art, theatre and literature tends to provide the viewers/audience with ‘observed’ rather than ‘lived‘ reality. The artist/writer does not live the reality and what is portrayed is the reality s/he has observed. When ideas are employed in an inhuman way it dehumanizes society and people.  There has to be a magnificent impulse in art and literature that propels us to see life in all its splendour. Those who argue that it is an illusion to think of life in all its grandeur, it is to be pointed out that the removal of majesty, nobility, dignity, loftiness and sublimity in our talk and action will deny us  the quality of elevation of mind and exaltation of character, ideals  and conduct. What we see today is the attenuation of elegance, lustre, solemnity and stateliness and the glorification of squalor, meanness, poverty, ordinariness and tawdriness. We have taken realism down to its lowest ebb and all that we see, hear and experience has brought forth dehumanization.

It is almost 50 years today after the establishment of the Kitchen Sink school of realism in Britain that we see its repeat on our political stage. In action, gestures, mannerisms and language, in the context of meticulous attention to squalid realism that has come to be associated with aam admi, there is a similar descent to abysmal depths in the use of language, gestures and action by political leaders of all stripes. The political leaders have become crafty expounders of chicanery using sly and evasive language, false reasoning and artful subterfuge of impractical promises to deceive people. Charges and counter charges fly thick and fast against all opponents with no shred of evidence to support them.

But to name the current political theatre as the theatre of the Absurd betrays a woeful lack of understanding of that genre. The Absurd signifies meaninglessness of existence and the pitiful effort of human beings to extract meaning from a meaningless existence. In other words, the theatre of the Absurd delineates our quest for order, logic and meaning of existence that is in itself disorderly, illogical and meaningless.  But the political theatre in the country does just the reverse. It seeks to extract disorder, illogic and meaninglessness from a Democratic Constitution that is founded upon fundamental political principles of orderly, lawful and just governance. It is also not a Comedy of Menace as domination and subjugation are tried by all the political combatants and there is hardly any invisible menace they have to fight against.

But the political theatre in India has adopted the Kitchen Sink school of realism. AAP’s advocacy of commonplaceness and ordinariness, BJP’s hectoring mockery of all its opponents and its manipulative communication are classic examples in demagoguery. Nonica Datta, an academic writes that BJP’s language has been instrumental in sanctioning the practice of violence and development. She quotes Hannah Arendt that ‘the practice of violence, like all action, changes the world, but the most probable change is to a more violent world.’ Rahul Gandhi looks more restrained though his occasional jibe at BJP’s Prime Ministerial opponent as Hitler or the unsavoury language used by some of his partymen betray the use of  abusive language. What the 2014 polls till now has shown is the charges and accusations are personal attacks and all the speeches are bereft of any vision or policy for the future. Politics in India seem to be personality clashes and not intellectual debates on issues vital to the stability, growth and development of the nation.  The dehumanization of art and literature is now reflected in the dehumanization of politics and governance.

A time has come when society from art and literature to politics and governance must organize itself from low passion to higher order of seriousness and bring back civility, cordiality and courteousness to our political discourse. Ortega’s quote from the Evangelist: “Nolite fiery, sicut equus et mulus quibus non est intellectus (do not act like horses and mules that lack understanding) is the most appropriate counsel for us at this hour. Is anyone listening?

An Open Letter to Indian Voters

                                                                     An Open Letter to Indian Voters

The next few weeks, approximately ten weeks from now, there will be hardly any news on the media except for news related to who is who in the lists released by different parties, who will emerge as the modern David crushing the modern Goliath, who  said what and who missed out what should have been said, who had broken  the umbilical cord with his party and joined its rival party etc . Media will thrive on acrimony, innuendo and allegations aired by the different contenders as they canvass for a seat in the Parliament. It is difficult to gauge media’s own agenda except for its adoption of a holier than thou attitude towards the political aspirants and for assuming the three-in-one role of prosecutor, judge and executioner. Media is the only one to indulge in high pitched caterwauling that deafens the meek and submissive replies of the hounded political class which otherwise roars from public platforms and election campaigns. Media enjoys its self -acquired right to quiz, to interrogate and to cavil at anyone and everyone (because it claims to be the watchdog of the society) without the corresponding duty to  offer responsible and informed opinions to its audience.

What are the issues that matter to the voters? It is odd that in our democracy voters don’t say what they want, but the political leaders say what the voters want and which they claim they alone can give. The political leaders pride themselves as clairvoyants who can read the people’s minds and their future and act accordingly. What a utopian ideal of democracy!  So we have election speeches devoted to people’s wants as perceived by politicians, euphemistically defined as grassroots reality. The three main issues in this election are corruption, price-rise and secularism.  Development, economy, employment welfare measures and higher standard of living have become subsidiary if not issues of any  consequence.

AAP’s rise in politics has been strictly on the issue of corruption and on free and unsubstantiated charges against the major national party leaders.  AAP attributes the miseries of the aam admi to corruption of leaders at the highest level without ever pausing to think that the aam admi does not have to deal with the top echelons of the political class but with their own class of people in government offices who are the arbiters of their daily life.  AAP knows that the freewheeling charges levelled against political leaders will strike a chord with the aam admis as though the bribes they offer to the little man in the government desk are at the behest of the political bosses. It is unfortunate that we talk of corruption only in terms of money given and money taken. There are many other forms of corruption- corruption of language, corruption of mind, corruption of values, corruption of religion and ideology  to name a few. The election speeches of some of the leaders have reached abysmal levels of indecency and demagoguery.  Some of them feel that the best way to appeal to the illiterate masses is to avoid cultured and sophisticated vocabulary and  descend to that level that festers the  raw and unformed emotions in them.  As voters we have a great responsibility-to sift the language of intellect from the language of raw emotions before we exercise our democratic franchise. Corruption of the mind is the intolerance and bigotry that have become the weapons of our political discourse today.  The pulping of Wendy Doniger’s book on The Hindus: An Alternative History by Penguin publishers is an instance of the corruption of mind that refuses to tolerate anything that it does not like. Writing does not mean that everyone who reads it ( or does not read it) should like it. There may be some who may like it and others who may not. A democratic society has to factor in the differing views among the readers.   Penguin’s hasty action of pulping its own publication is a servile capitulation before aggressive chauvinism and fanaticism. Corruption of the mind is far too dangerous for the polity than corruption through bribery.  As voters we have to vote for those who encourage liberal democracy, protecting the rights of minorities and, especially, the individual by allowing free and fair right to expression and opinion.

Corruption of values is a by -product of corruption of the mind as the values of tolerance and acceptance of divergent viewpoints become the casualty. The bankruptcy of values is seen in the rise in crimes in our society, the ubiquitous gun culture to snip off life at the slightest provocation, the rising atrocities against women and the lawlessness and indiscipline we see on the roads. It is often said that cleanliness is next to godliness. The total lack of cleanliness in our cities and towns is indicative of the absence of godliness that is associated with order, beauty, peace  and harmony. Corruption of religion, of ideas and ideology has resulted in the dehumanization of modern life corroding individuality, compassion, and civility. As voters we should vote for those who stand for decency, probity and orderliness  both in their public and private life.

 The issue of price rise is a felt reality. It pinches one and all except the traders and the rich classes. It is one thing to echo people’s cry against price rise, it is another thing to spell out how it could be blocked. No point in shedding crocodile tears when onions bring genuine tears to the housewives. But no political party has said what it will do to stop inflation when there is a global recession, when  economy all over the world is on a downslide. Has any political party shown its magic wand to do away with inflation? As voters we should vote for those who clearly spell out the cause of inflation and seek people’s support to curb inflation through volunteering simple sacrifices. If onions are expensive to reach our dining tables, we should forego onions and bring the hoarders onto their knees. Gandhi’s satyagraha is not the bogus satyagraha practiced today from public platforms when energy drinks can be a substitute for not eating meals, but the spirit of satyagraha  is to renounce that which becomes a luxury.  

Secularism is a non-issue. The fact that 20% of non -Hindu population lives reasonably peacefully with 80% of the Hindu majority speaks for secularism in India. The 1984 anti- sikh riots and the 2002 Godhra riots are a blot on our secular democracy. If finger-pointing exercise is resorted to in respect of these two riots, we erect the ghost of communalism where there is none. Politicians who inflame innocent people on communal lines citing the past are doing disservice to the cause of unity and integrity of the nation. Let us vote in those who have strong faith that India has and will survive as a secular nation.

The major issues like development, welfare measures, higher standard of living, creation of jobs have all been given lip service by today’s politicians because they have no clue to achieving them.  These issues have thus been relegated to subsidiary issues. The growth rate in all these aspects  has not been spectacular over the last decade, but it has not been that low to negate the work of a reputed economist PM and his cabinet of fairly well educated decent ministers. In today’s world, no nation can remain in isolation and therefore it is essential to elect those who have a global understanding of economy, education and employment and work out solutions in keeping with the world order.

As voters we have the onerous task of electing those with a clean image, who value decency and probity in life, who are well educated and well informed and who can resist the temptation of turning to demagoguery for the sake of power. It is time that we have a government of decent, honest and dynamic individuals who have the interest of the nation more than personal and party interest. Can Indian democracy show the way for such a collection of individuals to take charge of the nation? Yes it can if only we remember that the original Indian Congress had leaders like Gandhi, Nehru, Patel, Rajaji etc who had different views on steering the nation through difficult times, but united by the single resolve of preserving the unity and integrity of the nation.  Ours is an enviable task. Let us grab the opportunity  to showcase to the world our true democratic spirit.