Inspiring words have the power of
galvanizing the society[i].Tilak,
often described as the “Architect of Indian Nationalism”, had used the
terminology of Swaraj to ignite the flame of patriotism dampened by the British
rulers for more than a century. Swaraj or Self-rule meant that the nation
belongs to the ones who are born in its soil and only those people can rule it
as a State. To achieve Swaraj, Lokmanya elucidated and stressed on the 3
primary means – Swadeshi, Boycott and National Education. While Swadeshi and
Boycott movements would make India economically self-reliant, national education
would equip people with the knowledge that is required for the proper utilization
of the state’s resources vis-a-vis national benefit. But the core of Swaraj, if
considered with contemporary relevance would be political, social and economic
independence. Swaraj, in today’s date would be a State where there is no place
for intolerance and discrimination and where everyone gets an equal opportunity
– be it an elite child learning in a private school or a tribal kid from the
remotest part of the country struggling to understand the basics.
In Tilak’s times, voicing one’s opinion was not as
easy as it is today. Yet despite all the restrictions imposed during the
British rule, Lokmanya Tilak had uttered the words “Swaraj is my birthright and
I shall have it”. One can’t force agreement out of disagreement, a yes out of a
no, silence out of speech and assent out of dissent. It was because of leaders like Lokmanya, that the “Indian
unrest” was voiced. From childhood we are taught to swim through the currents
but not against them. We are taught to speak, but not raise our voice. We are
taught to hear, but not to be too loud for the people to hear us. We are taught
what the society needs us to learn, but not what we want to. So was it
different then during Tilak’s times?
Tilak’s Swaraj, to put in simple words, meant
Self-rule i.e. the rule of the people to whom this land belongs. And by people,
Tilak meant those people who call themselves Indians and not Hindus or Muslims.
Tilak was understood to be an extremist. But he wasn’t a Hindu extremist. He
believed in secularism more than we do today. His articles in Kesari and
Mahratta, the speeches he gave on different platforms advocated Swaraj with
hues of secularism, equality and non-discrimination. His Swaraj consisted of
the idea (which now seems utopian), that India should be ruled by the people
who live in it and not the castes, religions or classes which divide it. Tilak
believed that as a civilization, we have been accepting and adapting to
diversities since old times. Be it different invasions like those of Hunas,
Persians, Greeks, Mughals and the century long British rule, we have
assimilated bits and pieces of their culture and made them one of our own. He
had stated many times that we don’t belong to one single race; we are one
single race- India. And yet, here we stand, a modern India divided by chasms of
hatred against the other religion, the other caste, against one another. Hatred
which was ignited by our colonizers and fueled by our own political leaders
over the years.
But one thread that’s holding our fragmented
ambitions together is the existence of Swaraj – our own rule. But what does
Swaraj mean for us being the future guardians of Tilak’s legacy? Swaraj is who
we are, individuals breathing free with choices and opinions in their hands, rights
in their pockets, views, opinions and the freedom to express them. Swaraj is
something which assures us that we would remain not mere voters and collectively
vote banks, but entitled citizens. Swaraj is something which ensures that we
are an integral part of the state and that our questions and concerns cannot be
pulverized like some infrastructures. Swaraj is something which ascertains that
our problems are solved and not clinched like some illogical contract
forcefully signed. Swaraj, for every Indian citizen today, is something that
guarantees the shackles-free life that we are entitled to, when many in the
world aren’t. Swaraj changed the common people from mere subjects to entitled
citizens. But Swaraj seems a utopian idea today. Tilak’s Swaraj didn’t just
mean self-rule. It had many dimensions to it. One can never be able to rule
independently unless he is devoid of certain dependencies like economic,
cultural and social. And though it was freedom from cultural and social
discrimination at that time (religion and caste along with other parameters),
today it is more about economic discrimination. To be free from this
discrimination on domestic as well as global level is to achieve ‘Economic
Swaraj’. It’s no secret that India will become a global leader in the
coming decade. India’s improving international relations and efforts taken
towards global diplomacy are surely going to yield benefits in the coming
future. But the real question remains that if we are to lead the world one day,
what kind of a leader should we be. A country with high rates of GDP and more
developed cities with metros running up and down cannot be considered a
developed country if more than half of its population goes to bed with an empty
or half filled stomach. In such a case, it won’t be Swaraj that we would be
living in, because despite our people being the ones running the country, we
won’t be ruling it. Global politics (for example how the world is slowly being
re-centered towards right-ism), economic politics (for example how the trade
war between US and China is affecting the economies of third world countries) and emotional politics
(read nationalism) would be the ones ruling us. Then how can we then say that
we are walking on the path of Swaraj where majority of the wealth lies with a
few, and the remaining population is fighting to make their ends meet; where on
one side of the road high rise buildings are touching the sky, while on the
other the slums are shouting and telling the real condition of India. There is going to be a tomorrow in the near future where our
State would have the highest ranking in terms of Population and Youth
Population. Tilak was an intellectual who believed that National education can
be the most effective tool to achieve Swaraj. It is quite unfortunate to say
that India has neither education nor any system providing it. This has
created an intellectual vacuum which has resulted into the massive influx of
literate but uneducated generation which in turn has increased the number of
human “liabilities” and reduced the number of human “assets” for the economy in
terms of human capital. This is the reason why unemployment is on an ever
increasing scale. We need to have a sustainable job-led growth rather than
unsustainable jobless growth which will result into job-creation and in-turn
would reduce poverty, thus, paving a way for Economic Swaraj.
Intellectual vacuum is an underrated concern,
realized only when an eye-opening incident occurs and is forgotten as quickly
as it is comprehended. Intellectuals acted as the collective conscience for
politics: they provided a bridge between philosophy and power[ii].
But today politics has limited itself to power and its management. The general
idea of politics being used to transform a vision into reality (like fair
distribution of resources, equality and non-discrimination, etc) has become a
lost cause. The very basic fact of shaping the generations who will be
tomorrow’s leaders has been forgotten and the few who remind those in power
regarding the same are subdued and sidelined. Without intellectuals and not
academicians and prolific writers, who is going to give a direction to those
searching for a path? In today’s India, where more than half of the population
is young and this young population is prone to fall prey to addictions and
become liabilities for the economy instead of assets, what we need the most is
geniuses like Tilak. What we need the most today is Intellectual Swaraj.
[i]
Dr. R. A. Mashelkar, Tilak in Our Times.
[ii]
Andrew Marr, Who Will Fill the Intellectual Vacuum, Voices, Independent.
References:
·
Raghunath Mashelkar, Dileep Padgaonkar, Tilak
In Our Times, 2016
·
Jai Narain Sharma, The Political
Thought of Lokmanya Bal Gangadhar Tilak, 2009
·
Gangadhar Gadgil, Durdamya, 1970
·
Jadan-Ghadan Magazine, Lokmanya Tilak
Special Issue, June 2014
