Good prospects?

All my life I have seen and heard that India, overall, is in a bad way ('e deshtar kichhu hobe na' , this country has no future, is something I have heard as a lifelong refrain among moderately educated, middle class people, which, some observers say, is being crushed anyway). Well, maybe that's true, but at my age I have stopped putting all the blame squarely on our politicians, regardless of their party affiliation and professed ideology. Several reasons why.

First of all, from a spiritual point of view, I am not a very deep believer in western ideas about the infinite perfectibility of man and the human condition. No matter how much 'progress' we try to bring about by political, commercial and technological means, our 'solutions' only create more and new problems, and also, there are many problems that simply do not have a cure. You have to learn how to deal with life with the least possible stress and suffering: no one can make a world that is nice for everyone. Hence all my concern with the spiritual path.

Secondly, politics has always been called merely 'the art of the possible', and there are strict limits to what is possible and achievable by politicians, even if they are very well-intentioned, public spirited, committed and energetic (which most are not!). You simply cannot improve whole societies very much against their will, at least not in the short or medium term. Besides, in broadly (loosely) democratic societies, politicians, elected by the people, must necessarily reflect the people's common tastes, habits and predilections - thus India cannot be made a quiet, peaceful, orderly, cleanliness- and hard work- and honesty loving society, because too many people would find that unbearable. 

Thirdly, from the history of the world over the last few hundred years, ever since different sorts of 'progressive' governments started coming to power, we have seen that no matter how much they try, great inequalities of income, wealth and opportunity will continue to exist in every society. When some kinds of old privileges and privileged classes are weakened or removed (such as feudal lords and priests, or business tycoons and technocrats), they are invariably replaced by new ones (like the apparatchiki and 'princelings' in officially communist countries, or the new scheduled caste- and female elites in contemporary India, who have taken full advantage of affirmative action laws and insist that their pampered progeny should go on getting the same). Some countries are more just and fair in some eras than others, of course, but it is a matter of sheer luck where and to whom one is born, and one will enjoy or suffer much accordingly for no merit or fault of one's own.

Finally, in India at least, we as a people broadly speaking do not want much change, no matter which section of society we belong to. Children become very much like their parents, and the old underprivileged, as soon as they are a little better off, start imitating their earlier 'superiors' in their likes and dislikes. So any big change is likely to be brought about only piecemeal, in firefighting fashion, provoked by extraneous shocks - such as foreign conquest or economic crisis (as the reforms of 1991 were compelled by the economic crisis that preceded them). Well, I am an Indian myself, by genes, tradition, education and experience, so I have always hated the idea of revolutions anyway, convinced that revolution devours its own children, and causes too much harm along with too little good. So I must resign myself to gradualism (slavery was abolished after thousands of years, after all, and women did finally get the vote and right to property), keep faith in democratic socialism, and, to stop myself from becoming a tired and cynical old man like Kedar Chatujjye in Parashuram's stories, put the rest of my trust in God. There will not be much change for the better in my time, of that I am sure, and I worry that things might get worse in my children's time.