[Written in context of the various criticisms that Amitabh Bachchan has been facing ever since he became a fellow-blogger.]

OF A HAPPY LIFE

Facing personal vilification and condemnation is the exclusive privilege of men of eminence. They thrive on it, and it only makes their positions stronger.
 
Whether it is the timeless heroes like Socrates or Jesus Christ or Mahatma Gandhi, or iconic mortals of their time like the Beatles or the Rockefellers or the Manmohan Singhs or Sonia Gandhis or Amitabh Bachchans... all of them must pay a price for their monumental fame.
 
And the price is that the same masses who elevate you to the status of a living God, will condemn you to hell if they dislike anything that you may do even in your personal life. Either you are God, or you are Devil. The masses are too emotional to allow you to be what you are... a human being.
 
Ronald Reagan was famously known as the politician with a teflon-coating. Even the worst charges or slanders wouldn't stick to his skin for long. He made grand mistakes, but still the public loved him and forgave him everytime. Why? Because he was able to take life in his stride and could accept all criticism with a great sense of elan and humour.
 
The Time magazine in one of its commemorative issues on Reagan, wrote these words about his incredible sense of humour: "When Reagan was shot at by a would-be assassin, he was bleeding under his arm and from his mouth, had a lung punctured, and was rushed to the hospital in an armored vehicle. On the hospital bed, he put the nervous doctors immediately at ease with these unforgettable words: "I hope you guys are Republicans..."
 
But Amitabh Bachchan, like most of us on this earth, is not Ronald Reagan. To become Reagan is to master the art of politics and the art of charming the masses.
 
Amitabh Bachchan, if one tracks his past record, has never been a successful politician. He reveals his true emotions, which is the perfect recipe for disaster in public life. He likes to defend and explain himself, he has the urge to hit back at any criticism that he perceives as unfair, he gets angry and tired like most of us -- and worse still, he shows all of it. These are not the qualities of a good politician.
 
Recently, in a television interview, perhaps for the first time Amitabh Bachchan explained why he had decided to fight back the Bofors allegations that vilified him and his brother and family for years. Initially, like every sensible human being, Amitabh continued to ignore the mad, unsubstantiated Bofors charges, and maintained a dignified silence. He did not show any outrage, he did not defend or explain, he simply did not react at all.
 
But finally it was getting too much for him to digest this endless scandal as he started feeling that his father's name "Bachchan" was now sullied foever. One day he was flipping through a Times of India 150-year sesquicentenary celebration book, which carried the most historic front-page Times headlines of the past 150 years. One of the pages in the book had a screaming headline that said: "Amitabh Bachchan is a traitor."
 
That was the last straw. That very moment Amitabh, together with brother, decided to fight back the charges and clear their family name. They systematically filed suits in four countries, invested all their resources to fight that complex case to its logical conclusion. And won. And Amitabh says that he did it so that when after 150 years from today, the Times of India brings out its next sesquicentennial publication, it will have a headline that says: "Amitabh Bachchan is not a traitor."
 
The moral of the story is that all men are not politicians. Some are emotional human beings too.
 
Perhaps the best advice for Amitabh Bachchan would be from Seneca, the Roman philosopher and statesman who wrote 2000 years ago in his work "Of a Happy Life": "It is the practice of the multitude to bark at eminent men, as little dogs do at strangers."

First, a Persian couplet:

Gar na beenad barooz-e-shapparah chashm
Chashma'e aaftaab ra cheh gunaah

If a bat cannot see the brightness of the day
The blame for this cannot be put upon the sun

THE "RICE" CRISIS

In her remarks at a Peace Corps Conference earlier this week, Condolezza Rice listed the following 4 causes for the looming food crisis in the United States:

1. Rising oil prices
2. Increasing use of bio-fuels
3. Inefficient food distribution systems
4. Improving diets of human beings in India and China

It is this 4th cause that has raised eyebrows in both China and India. Rice went on to say in her speech: "It is not so much declining production as apparently improvement in the diets of people, for instance, in China and India, and thus the pressures to keep food inside their country. So that's another element that we have to look at."

Particularly, the words "we have to look at it..." made it as nasty as it could be. Reacting to Rice's comments, the Indian Minister of State for External Affairs clarified to the reporters diplomatically: "Ms. Rice has a different perception about India. Our people will eat what they need." 

Arrogance, ladies and gentlemen, is an unfortunate side-effect of those to whom much has been given. The arrogant assumes that his personal views and opinions are the Gospel of Truth.

The arrogant sees first himself. Rather than offering respect to all, he demands respect from all.

Dismissive by nature, he ends up vitiating every relationship: with himself and with others. He is the most friendless, the most disliked, the most unfortunate man on earth.

Self-worshipping to the core, the arrogant sees others as less human -- as cardboard cut-outs with no feelings or emotions.

Just like a fanatic believer proselytizes, shoving his own path onto others as the one and only way, browbeating and telling others that they are inferior beings on earth who can be saved only by following his chosen path.

In reality, though, the path of arrogance is the surest path to ruin.

Just like humility, arrogance does not come in a day. It takes years and years of misguided self-indulgence.

Constant introspection and critical self-analysis is the only faithful vigil against arrogance. And it is particularly important for those who are used to immense power and are likely to suffer from delusions of grandeur.

Those in positions of immense power must be on constant guard against this evil of arrogance. Saddam Hussein is an easy case in point to remember.

Those who suffer from delusionary self-belief and arrogance, will usually have the following common conditions prevailing in their immediate environment:

1. Excessive stress and fatigue.
2. No time for family or friends, excessive isolation and pressure.
3. Fear, anxiety and paranoia about the historic immensity of your job.
4. Privy to awesome amounts of sensitive information.
5. Escalating responsibilities and commitments.
6. Overwhelming inner need for protecting image and reputation.

In these severe emotional conditions, there is no scope left for logic. Those who practise the art of cultism, actually cultivate these conditions in your mind, and then indoctrinate you. This is how a terrorist is created.

When Rice says: "We will have to look at it...", she is actually terrorising, without knowing it. When Bush said after 9/11: "Either you are with us, or you are against us", he was doing the same. And then he launched into a war against Afghanistan and Iraq.

These things happen when you are undergoing the above-mentioned conditions -- and you are not strong enough handle such pressure-cooker situations with ease and self-control.

An emotional man will fail utterly in these conditions. He will decimate everything, including himself. Only a logical man will be able to resolve his mind, and stay calm through the crisis. In this case, the "Rice" Crisis.

This title is inspired from Subhash Ghai's recently released movie. The chief protagonist of this movie, like every emotional human being, sees everything in Black and White.
 
Though if we dive to the depths, we shall know that everything exists in shades of grey. Complete black or complete white is an illusion of the mind.
 
An emotional woman can never find anything wrong in her daughter, nor anything right in her daughter-in-law. This applies universally across cultures, and across ages and time-periods.
 
Godse becomes a Monster, and Gandhi becomes a Mahatma. Though both were human beings.
 
Similarly, Mohammad Ali Jinnah was a man of exceptional qualities and character. Before things went terribly sour between Hindus and Muslims, Gopal Krishan Gokhale, a distinguished Brahmin leader, called Jinnah "the best ambassador of Hindu-Muslim unity."
 
Errors, like garbage, float on the surface. Good qualities, like pearls, remain hidden in deep waters.
 
Crows pick on the garbage. Swans look for pearls.
 
Osho Rajneesh wrote a book titled "Gehre paani paith". This title was inspired from the following doha:
 
Jin khoja tinn paaya, gehre paani paith
Main baawri boodan dari, rahi kinaare baith
 
Whoever has found the truth, had to dive in deep waters
I, like a fool, was scared of drowning, and kept sitting at the shores
 
[Note: "boodan" is the same as "dooban", in a colloquial usage.]
 
It takes courage to search for the truth. To challenge the status quo. Because fear is a great resistance factor, which opposes the search, and proposes Bhakti.
 
In the deep seas, a sense of calmness takes over, and silence prevails. Whereas shallow waters at the shores are extremely noisy and excited.
 
Excitement is eliminated from our flesh, once we understand that others are not perfectly black, and we are not perfectly white. Empathising with the other side gives birth to peace.
 
When a monstrous wave hits the deep sea, the wave becomes the sea. The sea is larger than the wave. Similarly, when a shallow man meets a man of depth, the shallow man will calm down.
 
Whereas... when both men are shallow, it is time for Kali's act.

Xenophobia -- The fear of foreigners 115 years ago, on September 11, Vivekananda took America by storm when he addressed the World Parliament of Religions in Chicago with the phrase "Sisters and Brothers of America". Such words were unheard of in the western world, and the audience was taken by a complete surprise when they saw an unknown Indian monk addressing them as "Sisters and Brothers". If one observes the nature of living beings, one may notice that a meek animal like a squirrel or a rabbit or a deer lives in constant fear of any alien animal coming after it. The instinct of self-preservation is so strong that all weak animals who have not been equipped by nature to defend themselves ably, live in a constant state of alert against any attack by the enemy. Whereas a lion moves about with a casual stride and freedom, truly like a fearless king of the jungle, with immense muscular power to fight back and defend itself against any attack. The same is true of the human society. Phobia runs in our blood from generation to generation, almost like a genetic disorder. Though there are exceptional individuals, evolved and matured, who are blind to any religious, cultural or racial dissimilarities between men. They are the fearless, lion-hearted kings. They are the men whose self-esteem is so high that they cannot even conceptualize that somebody can hurt them or cheat them or rob them. They begin life with the foundation of a basic trust. But there is also the vast majority of unevolved mankind that begins life with the basic premise of distrust and fear. When you begin with distrust, you will also receive distrust in return. Whereas when you begin with trust, 99 times out of 100, the other person will try and live up to the reputation and respect that you have given him. Only a man who respects himself will respect others. Whereas a man who has no self-respect, he is bound to begin with a premise of disrespect and distrust for anyone who does not belong to his herd. When you live in a multi-cultural, globalised environment, your unfounded fears will shatter. But that is an unrealistic utopia. In reality, we tend to exist only in highly homogenized environments. We tend to form sub-groups within groups, sub-nations within nations, sub-castes within castes, and so on. That's the divisive and destructive nature of a fearful man. And that's a savage way of life. Divisiveness and groupism, as against teamwork, creates an atmosphere of fear, prejudice and hatred -- due to utter lack of information and knowledge about the other groups and their thought-processes. Fear, gentlemen, is the mother of negative thoughts, and sees an enemy where there had been a potential friend. Almost all enmities on this earth germinate from lack of knowledge and understanding about each other. And as Seneca warned two thousand years ago that "once the enemy (anger) has advanced within the city-gates, he will not respect any bounds set by his captives." Once anger has occured, it will be reciprocated with even greater force from the other side. And this fire will not rest until the whole forest has been burned down. In this uncivilized war of anger versus anger, there are no winners, only losers. And the tragedy is -- there was no real cause, only lack of knowledge and understanding about each other. Iqbal, the man who understood the concept of self-esteem better than most, used "Shaheen" (Eagle) as the ultimate symbol of free spirit. Eagle is one bird that loves to soar higher and higher in the sky, till it feels the most extreme atmospheric pressure and can sustain it no longer. The eagle, by nature, builds no permanent home (aashiyaanaa) -- just like a faqir. If you observe an eagle even in a city, you will notice that it always tends to choose the highest point of the highest building to perch itself.  Iqbal said these words for mankind's salvation: "Nahin tera nash-e-mann kasr-e-sultani ke gumbad par Tuu shaheen hai, basera kar, pahaadon ki chattaanon par" It is not your final destination to be the prince of some small worldly palace You are an eagle, your true abode is atop the highest mountain peaks Large-hearted men are the men of free spirit. The whole world is not enough for them. They do not live in holes. Holes are reserved for the petty men -- the fearful slaves who do not know freedom. And freedom cannot be taught or preached. Just like a rodent cannot be turned into a lion by preaching.

Lord Krishna speaks to Arjuna in his Gita discourse:
 
"Krodhat bhavati sammohan... buddhinasat pranasyati"
 
From anger arises delusion
From delusion arises paralysis of thought
From paralysis of thought arises destruction of reason
From destruction of reason arises the ultimate downfall
 
Two thousand years ago, during the Roman Imperial period, Seneca wrote in his famous work "On Anger": "... The enemy, I repeat, must be stopped at the very frontier; for if he has passed it, and advanced within the city-gates, he will not respect any bounds set by his captives."
 
Seneca tried to show a clear dichotomy between reason and anger: "Reason grants a hearing to both sides, then seeks to postpone action, even its own, in order that it may gain time to sift out the truth; but anger is precipitate. Reason wishes the decision that it gives to be just; anger wishes to have the decision which it has already given seem the just decision. Reason considers nothing except the question at issue; anger considers everything outside of it."
 
Seneca does not advocate non-violence which he calls unnatural anyway. A hunter chases a wild boar and kills it systematically. But is the hunter angry with the boar? In a civil society, criminals must be captured and punished. Justice must prevail. But it will prevail only in the absence of anger.
 
The angry man is incapable of granting a hearing to the other side. Almost all of us fall into this category.
 
Justice demands that if you have been offended by someone, give your offender his right to defend himself. And then if he deserves to be punished, there must be reason behind it -- the reason of justice, fairness and equality. But not the emotion of anger or madness.
 
Anger arises from a lack of self-esteem, from a dependence on some imaginary superior authority. A man who values his own self, also values others. Whereas a man who degrades himself, will also degrade others. This happens in direct proportion.
 
A perfectly degraded man is willing to kill himself. He is also willing to kill others.
 
A man who hates himself, also hates others.
 
A man who is not free himself, also cannot allow others to be free.
 
The very fact that you relate yourself to others to some extent, demonstrates that you lack in self-esteem to that extent. A completely worthless man lives all his life in relation to others, and not himself for even a minute.
 
Conversely, a man with a complete self-worth is entirely related to himself and his own creative purpose. That man is the creator, civilized and spiritualized.
 
If each man gets involved with himself alone, it will be the end of man's politics, and the beginning of man's spirituality.
 
Involvement with the self is "Ishq" (Love), in the real sense of the word. It is discovery of the soul. Involvement with others, to that extent, is the absence of love of the self. Absence of love, in other words, is hatred.
 
"Loving others" is the forgery of a hypocritical age. It is a perfect lie. It is actually hating yourself to that extent, and as a consequence, hating others to that extent. "Loving others" constitutes the basis of a fearful, guilt-ridden, demoralised society caught in its complex web of self-deception and perfect lies.
 
Lack of self-esteem lies at its root.
 
One of the earliest masterpieces of Mohammad Iqbal, the poet-philosopher and original mentor of Pakistan, was titled "Asrar-e-Khudi" (Secrets of the Self). In this great epic poem, Iqbal said that the system of the Universe originates in the Self. And that the continuation of life of all individuals depends on the strengthening of the Self.
 
Afraad kay haathon mein hai aqwaam kee tanzeem
Har fard hai millat kay muqaddar ka sitaaraa
 
It is in the hands of men how they run their own world
Each individual is a star that shapes the destiny of the Universe

About four years ago, the then Defence Minister of India, George Fernandes, who was on an official visit to Washington, was "strip-searched" by the U.S. security at the airport. In response, the usually thunderous Fernandes behaved like a scared puppy, and stomached his humiliation quietly without telling a soul. A year later, Strobe Talbott, the former U.S. Deputy Secretary of State, published his memoirs where he spilled the beans on this eminently memorable (or, eminently forgettable, depending upon you are on which side of the table) Fernandes incident. It naturally caused a shock and hurt to India's pride, with Fernandes admitting that the stripping had indeed happened, and eventually the U.S. government was forced to tender a formal apology to India, albeit belated.
 
Year 2007: In May this year, the Minister of State for External Affairs, Anand Sharma, got into a scuffle with the airport authorities at the Delhi airport, when he was asked to submit himself for security procedures and frisking. The incident caused such an uproar among the Ministers of State (MoS) in India that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had to agree to add the MoS category to the list of "exempt categories" that do not require security frisking, which already included the President, the Vice-President, the PM, the Speaker, the Cabinet Ministers, the Chief Ministers, the SC judges, and the ambassadors and their spouses.
 
And very interestingly, now after sixty years of independence, suddenly, the armed forces of India have also woken up to the realisation that the Defence Chiefs of the three armed services in India must also be included in this "exalted list" of those who are over and above ordinary security procedures that are meant only for the common man in India. (As if going through a security procedure is an "insult", and not simply a procedure.)
 
The government of India has responded in the Rajya Sabha that it would not be possible to extend this privilege to the defence service chiefs, because if the favour is bestowed upon one department, then every government department would start demanding the same status for their chiefs.
 
The debate has caught on in the intellectual circles, particularly because the "Defence Services" command a special respect in the eyes of everyone, considering the great sacrificial nature of the service.
 
The Point: It takes an evolved and matured society to understand the meaning of leadership by example, and not by lecturing others. When thousands of ordinary jawans have to undergo security procedures, their leader must lead by example and first of all submit himself for frisking at the airport. The point is not security. The point is displaying an exemplary regard for duty. The point is setting an example before your team, and standing tall before them, and showing them the way. That's called leading from the front.
 
In India, every Tom, Dick and Harry is in the habit of bypassing rules and regulations, simply by citing that he or she is related to so-and-so VIP. Why? Had the VIPs been submitting themselves to rules and regulations, this rotten culture would not be born in the first place.
 
Now since the Defence Services of India have already caused a furore over a silly issue, let us seize the opportunity and turn the debate on its head (even though this debate will never be understood by the Lok Sabha or the Rajya Sabha of an immature democracy): Scrap this provision of exempting VIPs from security procedures. Let the Cabinet of Ministers and the Defence Chiefs and so on lead the country by example. A good leader must not only respect the law, but he must be "seen" to respect the law. That's leadership.
 
Kautilya described in Arthashastra that one of the foremost duties of the King is that he must get in touch with the ground realities of his citizens first-hand by moving among them in disguise, and not merely depend upon the reports of his informants and advisors. 
 
Can you comprehend the pain of a burn theoretically, if you have not experienced it first-hand? Can you understand the pain of hunger unless your own child has to go to sleep without food? When a Minister's car entourage gets stuck in a city traffic jam, only then he will understand the trouble a common man goes through everyday on the roads. In public life, as in business, the real leader must be willing to face the frustrations of his weakest citizens or workers, so that he remains close to the bitter ground realities, and stays constantly motivated.
 
A great leader can turnaround a nation, just as a great CEO can turnaround a loss-making, demoralised organization. The key is understanding the problems of your people. Once you understand a problem, solution is child's play. 
 
Hands-on leadership is a rare sight in the Indian society, because bureaucracy and hierarchy is seeped into the bones of Indians. If we do not break these bones even now, then these so-called "leaders" of India shall continue to make a hue and cry regarding all kinds of fake honors and privileges, without knowing the ABC of meaningful leadership.
 
Har kuue'n mein hai bhaang padi
Rahbar-e-kaarwaa'n kya hoga

Har shaakh pey ulloo baithha hai
Anjaam-e-gulistaa'n kya hoga
 
* Rahbar-e-kaarwaa'n = Leader of the caravan
* Anjaam-e-gulistaa'n = Fate of the garden

Pain, physical or mental, can have such a damaging and permanent influence that it can paralyse the mind forever.

In a jail, if you torture an innocent victim too hard, he will almost start believing that he is the murderer, even if he had actually nothing to do with the crime altogether.

Fear of pain and fear of being killed are the chief weapons of a dictator which he uses effectively. You can single-handedly force an entire nation to crawl on all fours before you, if you can terrify them enough.

Fear blurs logic completely. You can start fearing your own shadow if you are walking alone in the dark in an abandoned alley in the middle of the night. Even if the shadow can do no harm, and it is powerless like a paper tiger, yet you cannot get rid of the fear as you imagine it to be someone much more powerful than it actually is. The fear of being attacked or killed by something or someone is so overwhelming in such a situation that it paralyses logic.

Gandhi was one man who dared to face fear logically, and realised the hollowness of its claims. The moment he decided that death or a jail term was "okay" for him, he had no fear of these any longer. Once you have accepted the worst, you are not afraid anymore.

Gandhi destroyed the colonialists' only weapon -- fear. There was a powerful scene in Richard Attenborough's well-researched film "Gandhi", where Gandhi tells his followers that each one of them will keep breaking the police cordon, and keep getting hit by their wooden batons on the head -- without any retaliation in return. At each hit, the man would fall down, and the next man would come forward to face the next hit. One after another after another. That one single piece of cinema must be one of the clearest and most visual demonstrations ever of how to finish the game of fear.

The job of the police baton is not to hit you, but to scare you. If you refuse to get scared, you have punctured the dictator's plan. Why? Because the numbers are already hugely against him. He is one. You are innumberable. He cannot win this unequal battle by force. He can only win it by paralysing you psychologically.

There is an old Chinese saying that a panther would attack you much more ferociously than it does, if it knew that you are afraid of it.

In 1989, the Chinese students took to the streets in a massive uprising against communism, and took seize of the Tiananmen Square in Beijing. The government quickly understood that it was a battle of fear versus fearlessness, and that the hollowness of fear would be soon exposed, unless fearlessness was nipped in the bud. The government swiftly ordered its military to open fire on unarmed students, and as per the New York Times count, about 800 civilians were killed, while the Red Cross estimated the number of dead to be around 3000. (3 times the Jallianwala Bagh massacre).

Like China, even Pakistan is a slave nation till today. The great Punjabi poet of Lahore, Ustaad Daaman, had summed up the fate of Pakistan quite succintly in two short lines as follows:

Pakistan de dou Khuda
La ila, tey Marshal Law 

But now Pakistan, after nearly sixty years of perfect slavery (with a few brief interruptions), is finally waking up from its paralysis of fear, and raising its voice against the shame of dictatorship. Men like Justice Choudhary, Imran Khan, Benazir Bhutto or the fearless owners of Geo TV etc. are finally getting to a point where fear is no longer an option. They must maintain their courage in their trial by fire. They are not alone, because the Pakistani masses are with them.

Though the Indian Ministry of External Affairs has merely "regretted" the emergency in Pakistan, but our message to our Pakistani friends should be slightly more straightforward: If you can have the courage to expose fear, you will see that the emperor has actually no clothes. Dictatorship is a guaranteed hoax. It is a toy bomb hijacking an entire airplane. Have guts to call their bluff and you will see limitless cowardice beneath their upper false layer of cruelty. If you decide to stand up to their terrorism, the cowards will run for their life, and seek amnesty for their crimes from you only.

But of course, it is easier said than done. To overcome fear, sometimes even centuries are not enough. Fearless men are not born everyday. The national poet of Pakistan, Iqbal knew what he was talking when he spoke these lofty words in praise of Gandhi:

Hazaaro'n saal nargis apni bey'noori pey roti hai
Badi mushqil sey hota hai, chaman mein deedaawar paida

nargis = earth
bey'noori = absence of charm
deedaawar = the one who is worth watching

When Arnold Schwartznegger won his elections in California, the Austrians celebrated back home.

Similarly, Sonia Gandhi's victory caused jubilation in Italy, and became a hot topic of discussion in Italy's political circles, and the leading Italian newspapers frontpaged the news in headlines. And perhaps the most generous compliment of all, came from a magazine owned by the then Prime Minister of Italy (media magnate Bertolusconi) that said: "Now we are going to have two Italian Prime Ministers, but theirs is better than ours."
 
It is the destiny of the narrow-minded to view everything through the colored glasses of race, religion and nationality. Whereas, if you view it through the prism of humanity, the victories of Arnold Schwartznegger, Bobby Jindal and Sonia Gandhi are the victories of humanity over parochialism and narrow-mindedness.
 
These victories are the little joys of life that are shared and celebrated by those who understand their meaning. As humble immigrants, Arnie and Bobby came to America with hope and with stars in their eyes. They rose to the very top amid stiff hurdles and extreme competition.

But the most delicious victory of all, perhaps, was the victory of Sonia Gandhi in India when she demolished the highly seasoned "ghaags" (I don't have an English equivalent for this term) of Indian politics -- in one swift stroke with her humility and straightforwardness.
 
They heaped personal insults on her, such as repeatedly referring to her by her maiden name "Sonia Maino", and making fun of her Catholic religion, and even mocking her culture, accent, food habits and so on.
 
It was the most vicious personal campaign ever orchestrated that single-mindedly attacked an individual's personal life. And yet that simple woman of Italian origin won against all odds and all opinion polls, and provided a fresh lease of life to the dead and buried Congress party of India.
 
Let us understand a fundamental truth about humanity: Left to themselves, human beings do not discriminate. It is not in their nature. Hindus and Muslims lived like brothers before the partition riots -- their diverse cultures and diverse religious beliefs notwithstanding. Hindus and Sikhs lived the same way in Punjab before terrorism of the 80's.
 
Politics, i.e., divide and rule, is man's second nature. Therefore, discrimination among humans becomes a critical divisive tool of politics. For the politician, it is easy to fool the emotional masses by using this tool effectively.
 
But in an increasingly globalised world, this tool of race, nationality and religion is beginning to lose its discriminatory value. The dividing lines are blurring, even though very slowly. Jindal's or Sonia's victories are only a reaffirmation of this fact. Merit comes before anything else in today's competitive times. The choice of the candidate must be professional, and not emotional.

Let us not forget that the Indian ancient thought was based on the principle of "Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam" (the whole world is one family.) 

Warning: But don't tell all this to emotional fools who are experts in fake patriotism. Even when the times are changing, you will never be able to change their thinking.
 
An old Mewari saying:
 
Akal deveyo'n naahi aavey
Eey tou heeyo'n hi upajey

Sensibility cannot be given
It sprouts from within