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Can we make a difference?

Venkat Prakash

Everybody reads articles of

1. A minor being raped in Kerala
2. A newly married woman on pilgrimage raped
3. People set ablaze as local villagers suspect they were 'possessed'
4. The Tamil Nadu and Karnataka governments bending backwards to please forest brigand Veerappan
5. The Uttar Pradesh government borrowing money for its employees' salaries but allowing its ministers to go on foreign jaunts
6. The government's handling of the Jammu & Kashmir issue

I can continue, from zoo deaths to ills of caste politics... but does it make a difference?

We are a privileged few, who are not affected by floods and/or by onion price rises and/or by prisoners' release and/or by the J&K carnage.

How many Indians get a chance to visit rediff.com? I'm not aware of any statistics, but even if it is one per cent, can this make a difference? Do we really try to make a difference or gain artistic pleasure in articulating ourselves well and it stops at that? Or, do we just read and keep ourselves informed? Or, are we convinced that the problems are too complex to be solved?

Sometimes I get emotional and follow up reading with a discussion with my wife or call over some friends for dinner. I'm one of those fortunate ones to be in the software industry and in the United States, and I guess, you can fill up the rest for a typical desi in the US.

Can we make a difference at all? Typical work pressures and family chores give us little free time. But, this thought does dominate; for most time, in any given week/month. I'm sure there are many out there thinking on similar lines.

Lack of education, poverty, lack of morals, over-population... there could be 100 reasons for problems, but why can't we make a difference? Or may be it is the slow pace of things changing for the better... or the rapid rate at which things are disintegrating?

However, politicians who make decisions are not affected by any problem. Our great Amma is not affected by the loss of millions to the Tamil Nadu government. She is ensuring that the money protects her.

The chief ministers of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka are not affected by the release of prisoners, nor they did lose their kith and kin in police/army operations. The zoo authorities are not affected by the death of tigers and peacocks

Cannot we talk/write to them, seeking an explanation on what people really expect from them and what they are doing? Do they bother to know? Do they realise that it was their problem in letting the bandit grow?

Sure, may be they know... but, when people see a movie like Shankar/Arjun's ideal Mudhalvan and like it and it is a box-office hit, is it wrong to expect change from politicians? Or, it is wrong to expect the actor-turned-spiritual leader, who talks of atma and soul within ourselves, which I myself believe in, to come out of the shell and be a leader with a difference?

I don't know. Sometimes I feel that I should join politics. Sometimes I feel I should kill a few hundred politicians and accept the blame, to send the message across. Sometimes I wonder if I can make a difference and writing this itself is one such attempt.

Though I love writing and sometimes used to wonder if my writings can make a difference, I tend to believe that all things are well said, with a few words and even if the above are not, I don't want to belabour any point, as all readers understand the core issue.

I would like to end to with a question: Can we make a difference?

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