Uncovering the Veil of Ignorance -part II

Unveiling the Cover of Ignorance  Part II

Often armchair idealists( without excluding me) write preachy articles that sound sufficiently didactic and inspiring  to garner acclaim from friends and relatives even if their acclamation is just a polite and courteous response. I want to take the next step as a sequel to unveiling the cover of ignorance and this is  to explore new ways to make Mission Smart Villages successful.  This is an appeal to all the educated middle and upper middle class who even in the midst of pandemic remain safe and secure in the comfort of their homes- homes built over  the sweat and labour of all the migrants who are now retreating into their rural cocoon, unable to  withstand the scorching emptiness of life without work, money and shelter.

We need professionals from all walks of life. Architects, preferably green architects can design compact, elegant houses, spacious and not too large,schools and hospitals with available material in the villages . City teachers who are today trained to provide online lessons can extend their reach to cater to villages. Offline classes to be held in schools which  have to be provided smartboards and computers and trained teachers. The current crop of city teachers can provide the training to village teachers, in particular, in the use of digital technology and new pedagogies. Health workers in particular from paramedical units must serve the village clinics under the overall charge of a city doctor deputed to serve in the villages. It is essential to consult doctors like Dr.Devi Shetty from B’luru who had conceived a scheme of monthly insurance charge of 5/per member in each family .This will entitle the whole family  for free medicines, free consultation and if need arises free admission to  major city hospitals for treatment and surgery. A family of two adults, their parents and their children need to pay only 30/- per month for all medical requirements. Self help for women and upskilling of villagers in areas of production, cultivation and crafts unique to every village is urgent. The craft design and execution that combines utility and aesthetics must be made with an eye on export has to be taught by city bred connoisseurs of arts and crafts. The same applies for textiles. What is to be emphasied is to provide training for products for consumers at three levels- local, national and global. Agricultural sector  needs specialised techniques of growing and harvesting besides educating the farmers for rotation of crops, preferably to go in for cashcrops that may not require too much water. What is needed is to learn from success stories where cooperative ventures between the urban and rural have blended well. Late President Kalam had conceived of project PURA, providing urban amenities to Rural areas. Kalam’s PURA offers insights into making villages self sufficient, modern and organized to become smart viilages

 A dynamic, dedicated and liberal minded group of professional from different walks of life has to be formed and in consultation with the members of local Panchayat identify areas  unique to the village and work towards improving and modernizing them without sacrificing the local interests. This new approach must be  a mix of tradition well complemented by modern standards of living. Someone can take the initiative to have a web conference of interested professionals and work out strategies . There is no dearth of money in India. Finance should be the last worry. Those of us onthe right and wrong side of 70 and 80 can financially contribute and alos offer suggestions from their varied past experiences. What is needed is passion, commitment and love for humanity.

Literary Therapy for Corona Virus

 Literary Therapy for Corona Virus.

The global response to Corona virus has been singularly uniform. It is a mixture of angst, dread, disquietude, distress underscored by helplessness and despair. Despite this universal unease and anxiety, the Corona warriors -the doctors, nurses , paramedical personnel and hospital attendants,  the law enforcing authority and the countless organizations that have volunteered to provide food to the millions, suddenly uprooted from their employment with no means of survival- have been the exception  doing noble  service by their fellow beings.  Their vigil and fight against the lethal virus is a superhuman effort and the whole world is overwhelmed with gratitude and appreciation for their heroic and valiant endeavour.  They have shown the spirit of humanity that has served the world all these millennia.     

But for the vast majority, it has been a terrifying experience. The virus which in its diameter is between 80 and 120 nm(one nm is 10^-9metre), something of the size of 1/1000^th of the width of a human hair,  has proved  its might  vis-à-vis Man  who, in particular in the last few decades  has been arrogantly striding towards the status of Homo Deus as the conqueror  of the little planet Earth, not to leave out  his efforts to grow human embryos in the laboratory and rivalling  the Creator. What an irony that this  self proclaimed Lord and Master of the world, imperiously exercising his power  over all other created species suddenly finds himself powerless before the grip of an invisible spike of a virus with no means to escape its clutches except by  incarcerating  himself within the four walls of his habitation.  The Overreacher has tumbled before this  infinitesimally micro small organism  in ways similar to his predecessor Faustus about whom Marlowe wrote ‘Cut is the branch that might have grown full straight’ when  he tried to soar high  like the Icarus bird  that flew  near the Sun and got its wings singed. Didn’t Shakespeare say: “like wanton flies are we to the Gods/who kill us for their sport.”?

2020 is according to the Chinese calendar the Year of the Rat. True to this year of the Rat, the self proclaimed Homo Deus is today scampering to find a burrow to hide like a rodent.  Like the Old Macdonald he sees a virus in a sneeze here, in a cough there, in a droplet here and in a leaky nose there, and scampers breathless into his hole, shaking and screaming E-I-E-I-OOOOOOO...  The Corona Virus (CV) has reduced the  Home Deus to the Hollow Man referred to by T.S.Eliot nearly a century ago.

We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together

Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!

 Our dried voices, when
 We whisper together
 Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass

 Or rats' feet over broken glass
 In our dry cellar

Shape without form, shade without colour,

 Paralysed force, gesture without motion;
   

The nightmarish question that haunts everyone is how to get out of this hole and when? There is no help visible around except for the invention and arrival of a vaccine.  With the mysterious virus lurking anywhere and everywhere, our movements are paralyzed. Virus, Virus everywhere, not a place to hide! Neither can we be visitors nor can have visitors. Our contact with the world has become virtual and our   only companion, almost our saviour is the Smartphone that   has given us the illusory power that we have the world at our  fingertips.

It is a strange paradox that while remaining paralyzed and immobile and sitting crouched inside our homes for fear of the virus latching to our cells, we cannot arrest the mind from its function- to think. The mind refuses to be stilled and leaps many centuries back to the 14^th C when  the Black Plague consumed one hundred millions of the European population  and  to the Spanish flu, one hundred years back that devoured millions of people in some parts of the globe including Mumbai, but this CV is a Super spreader, far more potent and deadly than any of them because it spares no one in any  part of the globe.

We have all been traumatised by this pandemic. From young to the old, from man to woman, from nation to nation, from continent to continent, Covid19 or CV is almost like the Superpower that is omnipresent and omnipotent. For people like me in their late 70s+, the idea of waiting for a minimum period of 12-18 months for the vaccine to be available is a frightening prospect. I often wonder whether the earlier phase when one was moving about, self tending to one’s needs both within and outside of the house, taking the daily leisurely walk through the park may not return before we tune off forever. Things have changed all too sudden to frighten us that this phase may not be passe^’ for us and we may have to remain incarcerated within the house for the next few years seeking the assistance of others to get our essential needs. Have we reached the last leg of our journey, using Eliot’s lines quoted above, with “paralyzed force, gesture without motion?” For the next generation, the change from a happy go lucky life to one of restraint, discipline and virtual company is a daunting prospect. The warmth of handshake and hugging have to be replaced by ‘namaste’ standing at a distance of one metre. No swinging at the rock concerts, no more watching games and sports except from the screen in your living room, no collective entertainment, but isolated viewing from inside your home, no seminars except webinars, no conclaves other than e-conclaves, no thrill and excitement of face to face meeting and interaction with great speakers, orators and celebrities, no dining out without being overcautious of violating the guidelines of keeping distance, no sharing of meals with friends and families... How to upend the way we had lived all through and accept a new normal, follow new dining etiquettes with a mask on, how to get our make ups done with half of the visage hidden ... the prospect of a new life is unnerving and disconcerting.

The mind refuses to stay quiescent and waits desperately for the Whatsapp messages that give a sense of collective sharing of such worrisome thoughts.  Most of the messages are about ‘do’s and don’ts’ and there is a continuous repetition of the importance of handwashing , facemasking and following the new sneeze etiquette. There are also message giving us free dietary advice with emphasis on our herbs-turmeric,pepper, ginger etc etc. Then come the astrological predictions that give us hope that the CV will go away from India by such and such date when the Rahu-Ketu leave Jupiter and The Sun regains its power that had been dimmed by those two and so on and so forth. Well, we cling to the announced dates of CV exit, as hope is the best antidote for despair. The famous Biblical proverb that Samuel Beckett quotes with his penchant for tongue in cheek comments comes to the Mind: “Hope deferred maketh the heart sick, but when it comes,it is the tree of life”. The prophesied dates come and go while the CV continues to consume more victims everyday. Then there is the message from the Gita where Lord Krishna says that when the world reaches total chaos and disorder, I will come to set it back in order. We wait with hands folded and wiht prayers on our lips” “Lord,forgive our trespasses”. But “nothing happens, no one comes, no one moves and it is awful “ to quote one of the lachrymose tramps in Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot.

But then comes the whatsapp message which is the like the proverbial last straw on the camel’s back. This is  about a pastor in US who defied the Governor’s  stay at home order and got his parishioners to the Church for the Sunday Mass,   becoming the latest victim of CV. The mind fleets back to Albert Camus’ brilliant novel The Plague, that tells the story of the plague sweeping the French Algerian city of Oran. The plague rages for months and the city wears a look similar to what we see today. People want to flee the town, but barricades have been put up and they have no escape from the plague. In the midst of this disaster, there is a catholic priest Father Paneloux who attributes the plague to the sins of the people of Oran and asks them to accept it as a case of Sin-Punishment syndrome. But ironically when a seven year old boy dies of the plague, the protagonist, Dr.Rieux lashes out at Father Paneloux wondering what sin the little boy could have committed. The greater irony is the priest himself soon after falls a victim to the plague.

 Camus’ novel has an uncanny resemblance to our present condition. Camus’ is forthright and honest as he does not invest the plague, the suffering and the deaths it unleashed with having a rational meaning. Camus who coined the term Absurd” to signify the meaninglessness of our existence does not provide any moralistic or rational explanation for things that happen beyond human control.  The Plague like the COVID19 is a collective concern for all and calls for a collective effort of the whole humanity to stand up and fight it. There is no guarantee that this  fight will bear success at the end, but the struggle has to be there as it is the only meaningful action left for the humans. Camus’ phrase “enter into a dialogue with the plague” sums up his  optimism in the midst of hopelessness. As a commentator notes “Everyone who chooses to fight the plague, to rebel against death, knows that their efforts increase their chances of contracting the plague, but they also realize they could contract the plague if they did nothing at all. In the face of such a seemingly meaningless choice, between death and death, the fact that they make a choice to act and fight for themselves and their community becomes even more meaningful;(italics mine)  it is a note of defiance thrown against the wind, but that note is the only thing through which someone can define himself.”

The mind does not stop reflecting  as it almost comes to grip with CV, human condition and the spirit of rebellion.  Father Paneloux’ sermon takes the mind back to the Book of Job in the Bible. Job, the most pious man and the beloved son of God is suddenly deprived of all his wealth, family and status and is turned into a leper, ostracized and banished from his town.  He does not know that God had a wager with Satan who cynically  asked God  whether Job his beloved son will continue to be upright and blameless if he (God) denied him His grace and instead deprived him all his bounty and tormented him with ill health and suffering. Initially Job says  “Naked I came out of my mother’s womb and naked shall I return. The Lord has given and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord”^. But  when Job experiences immense physical suffering and mental anguish for the inexplicable reason of God’s denial of grace to him, he questions God as to what sin he had committed to be denied His benevolence. God refuses to enter into a dialogue with Job, but His Voice thunders asking him to follow him through a walk. God points to him the Sun, the Moon, the Stars and the sky  , the plants, the trees, and the flowers, and asks him if he had created this universe.  He asks Job  “Where were you  on the day the universe was created? Where were you  when the architecture of the  universe was designed with  seas and  continents?”  God continues to admonish Job saying  when everything was given to him, he never asked the reason for the bestowal of such a bounty. But when they were taken away, he seeks god’s explanation as to why it had happened. Job realizes his mistake  for seeking answers to happening that were beyond  his making. He was neither the Creator nor the Preserver nor the Destroy erof the vast universe.. The Book of Job is all about inexplicable human suffering. Its portrayal of one man's sufferings, his struggle for faith and understanding –all these mirror our own present experiences. There is a Power – God or Fate or Destiny or the Absurd as modern existentialists describe it  or CV that we have in our midst today, call what you will, thou shall not find answers to the whys  and whats and wheres and whens , but develop strength to accept it  not in abject surrender, but in stoic acceptance of what you have no control over and fight for survival even if the fight is more a fight for a loss and not for a win.

 ‘Seek not, thou shall not find

Ask not, there shall be no answer

Reason not, thou hast no control

Accept with grace and with no questioning,

Fight  even it is for a loss and not for a win  

Therein lies meaning of life and human dignity.

Random Reflections during the Lockin period.

Random reflections during the Lockin period.

I have deliberately used the word ‘Lockin ‘ in place of ‘Lockdown’. The reason is not far to seek. We are not yet down and locked out, we are still in- in our homes, still in possession of our reasoning faculties, still in an objective mental frame to think and analyze all things-(not) “bright and beautiful,” (not) “wise and wonderful” quoting the memorable lines from Cecil Fernandes Alexander’s poem. The one great advantage of being ‘in’ is we have more time to reflect even if randomly and less time to indulge in futile talk and gossip. For barring one’s family and that too limited at best to a couple of peer group of elders or bored youngsters, there is hardly anyone to talk to.

Not one given to Whatsapping messages to and fro, the lockin period is to me more stimulating than the much awaited lockout period  a few days hence when I will see the sunlight on the streets and breathe the fresh air with the lines of Sir Walter Scott humming in my ears

Breathes there the man, with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native soil(land)!

I write this piece to record all my reflections during the lockin phase that will fade and disappear the moment I sniff the air of freedom. Freedom is what we treasure most and we know the truth in the words of Rousseau “ Man is born free; everywhere he is in chain”. Rousseau asserts that modern states repress the physical freedom that is our birthright, and do nothing to secure the civil freedom for the sake of which we enter into civil society.  Today globally there is mixed reaction to the imposition of stay at home orders. In US it has given rise to Coronavirus protesters who shout with guns in their hands “ we want liberty”. This group- hopefully still a minority- does not understand the difference between liberty and freedom. Freedom,  as Rousseau said is our birthright, but in the last two millennia since he wrote, a lot of changes has taken place and we need to rewrite Rousseau without fear of his disapproval and  say “ Man is not born free, but is set free by the creation of the human institutions that protect his rights.” We expect the state to provide institutional guarantee of that freedom which shall hold us responsible for the welfare of our fellow human beings. In the words of Marcie Bianco of the NBC, “Liberty is a type of freedom defined and limited by civil society. It is not an unrestrained, unchecked license to do whatever one desires. Rather, liberty is a right constituted by the society — or, here, nation — one lives in.”  She points out the clear distinction between freedom to and freedom from. In the context of Corona Virus the question is do we have the freedom to infect or do we seek freedom from infection?

Unlike Americans whose incompetence, as Yuval Harari says, has been exposed by the Coronavirus, Indians and in particular the middle class have not sought liberty to break free of lockdown order.  It is a pity that it failed to stop the poor migrant labour who defied the order, preferring freedom from hunger and poverty over freedom from Corona virus, exacerbated by the privileged elites and policy makers who, locked in the comfort of their homes turned a blind eye  to their hapless misery. But the rest of India – the middle and the wealthy class out of fear and nervousness about CV has acted with maturity and discipline much to the surprise of the West that has all this while painted us as the most undisciplined group, suffering from queue phobia.

As the mind aimlessly flitted through many things happening around us, it stumbled on the statement of our FM on higher education.  FM during the course of her fourth and final announcement about the government’s economic package gave assurance to her colleague, the HRD minister that she is one with him in using the Corona period to push through educational reforms. The gloomy prophecies from our political leaders citing the WHO experts that the virus has found its permanent abode in our midst and we should learn  to live with it( either share our space with it or cede our space  in its favour and find a 6’x6’ niche for ourselves  underground) have made our ministers and policymakers to crystal gaze into the future of higher education and come out with  the quick fix mantra-‘Go online , Go digital’. Otherwise why the FM while announcing one tranche after another take a breather from the world of economics and  enter the world of higher education,  with her  proposal to make a push for online education, e-Vidya, a technology driven higher education? This proposal mandates the top 100 universities of the country that include IITs and IIMs and a large number of private universities to go online

Sitting in the quiet of my living room, I reflected on these changes. Having been an active teacher for over four decades and an active learner thereafter for the last 15 years, I wondered why the government was in such a hurry to seize the Corona time to make a quantum jump towards digital learning? Does this extra budgetary allocation for digital education from the PM’s 20lakh crore package mean making it supersede traditional classroom learning? Inter alia, this means our accepting Corona virus as a permanent cohabitant in our little planet and making  adjustments by  remaining at two arms length from each other. In numerical calculations, this means not more than 12 to a classroom, which effectively will shut thousands of students from college education. No more classroom teaching ( and I shudder to visualize to what use  all those great university and college buildings will be put to),no more interpersonal relationship between the student and the teacher, between student and fellow students and replace the human- centric institutions to soulless  machinery!  I remember one of my students telling me that after three years of life in the lap of liberty in colleges, she found it difficult to be tied to her desk on a 9 to five job. Imagine what will happen if there are no classes at all for  the future generation. At least now students get ready, dress up and reach college in the morning. Flexible timing- a euphemism for freedom to learn whenever and wherever one wants to- will mean losing even the iota of discipline to wake up in the morning and start the day’s activities. The lovely Wake Me Up song by Avicii will have to give way to Chris Brown’s song

Don't wake me up, up, up, up, up, up
Don't wake me up, up, up, up, up, up
Don't wake me up

sung in the context of extending love dream beyond sunrise..

 Do our youngsters have the freedom to decide if they want to go online or offline? Why is there such a push when one is hopeful of the possibility of Corona losing its grip over mortals in the next few months- at best in the next 12 months?  A lot has been said in favour of face to face teaching and learning.  College education is multi dimensional-it is not about academics only,  it stretches outside of the classrooms and helps the student to assimilate new ideas  through exchanges with peer groups and professors.

 College is best described as liberty hall. It gives the freedom to learn or not to learn. The choice is that of the student.  But even without any conscious effort, the student gains by exposure to other bright and brilliant minds. Debates, dialogues, seminars are part of the learning schedule,  providing a window to the thoughts and ideas of scholars and ideators.  Webinar is the newbie in place of open seminars. But the difference is between reality and reality shows . There is no gainsaying the fact that the impact of listening to a speaker in person far outweighs the same heard over a digital platform. It is like attending a live concert and watching it on the TV in your living room. What we need is not either-or but a mix of both what has come to be known as blended learning. College life is the time to enjoy and rock through live concerts, participate in music and dance, theatre and arts and they help the student develop aesthetic and artistic sensibility which in turn promotes human sensibility. When I had my house painted a couple of years ago, one of the labour employed by the contractor was different from the rest. He warmly greeted everyone as soon as he came to work, worked diligently, spoke softly only when spoken to, showed himself to be a person with reasonable understanding of politics and society which he never displayed until we engaged him in conversation. When I asked him how he had acquired so much knowledge, he smiled and shyly said he was a graduate and since he could not get employment, had taken up the job of painting. He added that the three years in college had shaped him to understand, accept and appreciate life in its myriad forms.   A three year stay in college makes every student turn into a mature and responsible social being.  Cultivating social etiquette, learning the art of listening, acquiring elegant manners are packaged into college education.  Colleges and universities are the crucibles in which different social forces and intellectual influences come together and bring forth  new developments towards building the future citizens of the nation. Our Gurukul heritage stands as a testimony to shared learning and living with fellow students and their Gurus. Our pride in our heritage is not matched by our abandoning its basic principle of learning together.

Corona time is abnormal time. But abnormality does not demand junking traditional education that has shaped Man to what he is today. When times are chaotic, colleges and universities function to steer Man out of chaos. Major researches for the Corona  vaccines are coming out of university laboratories of  Oxford, California, Pennsylvania, China, Imperial college of London and from universities in Germany, Israel,  Italy and Spain  It is not  that Indian universities lag behind-  Pune University, Vellore Institute of Technology, IISER in Mohali and Trivandrum and IICT  Hyderabad, to name a few. They illustrate the importance of universities in respect of research both in sciences and social sciences. The most pressing need today is developing Indian youth to shoulder responsibility as a future citizen of India and the foundations have to be laid in colleges and universities. IGNOU is doing yeoman service for those who want a degree through online courses. Let us not forget that Coronavirus  interruption is temporary. The university contribution is perennial.

 Yet another disturbing thought in my mind is about the order seeking obedience to downloading Aarogya setu, the COVID 19 tracking mobile application. There has been a slight let up as the government has retracted from the compulsory enforcement of this App at least for the private employees though it is required for travel by train or metro or flight and for all government employees. The important point to note is this app requires the individual to give details of his /her health history. It has the GPS that records his/her movements. If an individual wants health insurance and if these details despite the assurances of the Government get hacked, the Insurance company may not provide the health cover or may jack up the annual charges  even if the health problem was a thing of the past. Cyberhacking is  not something we can be blind to.  If one wants to change jobs, the health factor that comes into the public domain may inhibit his /her induction even if he is otherwise healthy. It is natural for any employer  to be risk averse  in appointing a COVID19 recovered  healthy individual. Genetic inheritance of Huntington’s disease, Cancer , Alzheimer , Aids where pre screening and reports  may predict the possibility of a terminal ailment- if not now, maybe in one’s late years, - which if recorded will disturb the privacy and well being of an individual  The relationship between an individual and his/her physician will  no longer remain a private affair.. I wonder if those who have designed this app as a bridge to health did not think of the personal and private concerns the data will raise for people.

The third reflection has been on the migrants’ pain and hardship. I am not interested in apportioning blame on anyone but I know that even to raise a question seeking accountability in today’s authoritarian rule is to be labelled anti- national. The fear of being detained under the draconian UAPA where no questions shall be asked of the cause of detention sends shivers down the spine. The same fear desists many like me from questioning the innumerable initial lapses including the mass gathering of more than 1.5 lakhs of people to greet President Trump when CV had already made inroads into the country, asking why a new PMCARES fund is needed when PMNRF is already in existence, why there was delay in ferrying migrants to their homes, why there was delay in testing initially, why 20,000 crores should be spent on Central vista redevelopment  by dismantling the existing structures- almost like the monkey in a Tamil ballad saying after destroying the nest of the cuckoo bird “I do not know to build, but I know to dismantle built nests.” There is no freedom to raise ‘why’s and ‘wherefore’s but there is freedom to accept implicit obedience because it is hammered that  whatever is done is for the welfare of you and me.  

Vaclav Havel, the former Czech President once remarked that “Freedom is only one side of the coin, on the other side is responsibility.” PM has asked us to take on the responsibility of atmanirbhar-self reliance. We are free to pursue atmanirbhar as our responsibility. As for the State their responsibility ends setting up institutions only to protect those rights that the state has given us. Today the State has given the people o India the right to stay at home to be free from the Corona assault. CV has turned Rousseu’s concept on its head. This is the new world, the Corona world, a digital world that opens up your personal and private world only to protect your health and welfare, a new form of the much reviled  communism where the state owns everything by preciously  guarding your privacy in its digital app. In this new Corona world, the State has the power without responsibility(accountability)and the people have the responsibility without power.

Do I have the freedom to express myself? I pause in trepidation.

Uncover the Veil of Ignorance

The paradox of life is most of the time- and in particular in present times with the pandemic lurking everywhere waiting to let itself in- we have nothing much to do except to attend to the same dull daily routines while the mind refuses to stay quiescent whether waking or sleeping, up and about or sitting and vacantly looking at the ceiling. The paradox is the mind is passively active and actively passive as we go through the lock-in period.

The stay at home order is one way of keeping the Corona virus stay away from infecting our healthy cells, especially those in our lungs. It does breed some comfort that we have barred CV from crossing the lakshman rekha we have drawn for ourselves. We have a distinctive advantage over CV as we can see its lethality all round but not for CV as CV cannot cross our threshold and enter our homes.  But CV has its last laugh as it has taken hold of our minds to the extent that all our thoughts, feelings and emotions are secured by it. The CV refuses the mind to let go of it and has latched on to our thought process. Thus our minds are quarantined within the folds of the Corona virus.

Anxiety, fear and a fervent hope of a vaccine to release everyone from its vicious grip swirl through the active mind currently in a state of limbo. “ Nothing to be done, but wait”- these eerie words of the tramps in Waiting for Godot  keep echoing in the mind. The tramps in Samuel Beckett’s play engage themselves  inventing new  activities to pass the indeterminate time before Godot arrives- though there is no certainty that he will  arrive. My mind turned to the migrants marching in the hot sun, trudging through highways and railway tracks for thousands of kilometres to reach their homes in remote areas far from the madding cities. Like  Beckett’s tramps they are trying to find some meaning to their hopeless existence of being without a job, without money, without food, shelter and in some cases without footwear but imbued with hope they will reach their destination i.e., find their Godot. They are not deterred by the scorching sun;  they are not scared of the Corona Virus,  they are not daunted by the infinitely long distance to cover because they have one single goal to be back home where they belong  to.

In the comfort of my four walls, I reflect on what goals are left for me to chase in a post pandemic world. I envy the migrants – if for nothing else, at least for the indelible fact that they are not waiting for a Godot to save them- neither to the Government with all the resources at its command nor its critics with their ingy-mingy effort to provide a semblance of assistance to them They have identified their Godot and have decided to march ahead.

I wonder where is my Godot who  I should wait for. I do not want to acknowledge the truth that there is really no Godot to wait for.  But I desperately  need a Godot to sustain myself, to give some meaning for my existence.  I know I am not the odd one, everyone wants a Godot, an anchor for their life.

Socrates’ wisdom flashed on me: “To find yourself, think for yourself.” This is what I should do while locked in. I have to reinvent myself to step into a new world with a new normal. The old world of narcissistic arrogance  where my goal was to work towards savouring to the full ‘God’s Plenty’ with no thought of sharing it with fellow beings has been devastated by the invisible microorganism. How true is Abba’s  song

 Money, money, money

Must be funny

In the rich man's world.

I have my bank balance. Where do I go to spend my money that I have accumulated? Parties, theatres, sports, entertainment –( they are now to be watched  sitting at 2 meter’s distance from others and I  should avoid shouting and shrieking in excitement lest I should sprinkle droplets on fellow spectators)- have become things of the past. Nothing shall be real; everything will turn digital. Watch all sports and games, theatre and dance, cinemas and concerts twice removed- from the world of reality to the make believe world of the theatre and then to the digital world.  We are changing. Everyone says it is going to be the new normal. Change is universally pervasive. It is said   “there is never the same pus from one second to the next”. So to cling to the old world is to remain in creative falsehood. We must change with the world which is constantly changing. The real world is the world of ideas and that world is unchanging and eternal, to borrow the wisdom of Plato. That is the world we have to create- what I call the world of creative truth for us..

My thought process now begins  to accelerate.  I realize more profoundly the truth in Socrates’ saying.- “ think for yourself” We have for long been in a post-idea world where to think and speak have been taken over by instant ,inane tweets. We have given thinking a long holiday.   Socrates had made the famous statement   “It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. “
 John Stuart Mill in his book on Utilitarianism had gone one step further and said “And if the fool, or the pig, are of a different opinion, it is because they only know their own side of the question. The other party to the comparison knows both sides” (Utilitarianism, Mill). If I am a human being, I need to understand the other side, the plight of the migrants. Instead of seeking to apportion the blame for their plight on A or B or C..., I must find out how to help them in the post pandemic world.

 One of the most beautiful things I have seen in England is its green countryside. Nature has also  similarly endowed our land with rivers and mountains, lakes and grasslands, with flora and fauna. Some migrants have returned home. Others are on the move. Sooner than later, they will settle down to a quiet life away from the humdrum of cities and towns.

Let it be the mission of every NGO, of everyone of us who can either physically contribute or financially contribute to develop the villages with  the help of the migrant returnees. Let Mission Smart Village be the concerted goal of all those who enjoy the comforts of a lockdown today (I am deliberately not looking to the government and politicians for this mission). John Rawls in his A Theory of Justice has spoken about ‘ the veil of ignorance’ which we deliberately put on to conceal some disturbing thoughts. With incisive understanding, a Kashmiri Scholar Irshad Rashid writes:

“ in the vein of Rawlsian veil of ignorance, imagine this: You knew a few months in advance that a deadly pandemic is about to strike and you were asked beforehand to design a political system for your society to deal with this disaster. You are however deprived of certain information about yourself... you don’t know if you will turn out to be rich or poor, old or young, healthy or sick... migrant labourer or landlord and so on.” The truth is we do not know. This is the veil of ignorance to be uncovered to ensure that we take both sides- for we do not know which may be our lot –the positive and the negative and work for fairness of both the sides. So we must work for a society that takes care of the poor and the marginalised in the villages and ensure their welfare, education, healthcare. The plight of the migrants has shown that we who are the beneficiaries of the work done by the migrants must in return ensure that they are also guaranteed the basic rights that we enjoy. In the most piercing way, the pandemic has shown what Wordsworth had said  “ we are all bound each to each by natural piety”- a natural reverence for life around us. Let us unveil the cover of ignorance and work in whatever way possible to execute a new social covenant based on the principles of equity and justice. Let us work to build schools, hospitals and houses in villages, let us educate the poor to be self sufficient, let us upskill them, let us preserve the  pristine purity of the rural places  while providing them modern standards of good living.

Thanks to Irshad Rashid’s article “From Behind the Veil” my veil of ignorance is uncovered.

 This is Part I.  Part II will follow that deatils briefly how Mission Smart villages can be achieved.