YEH AZAADI KIS PANCHHI KA NAAM HAI ???

It is 74 years since we received the gift of Independence ( Azaadi) and can we place our hands on the left side of our hearts and say that we have been breathing in an atmosphere of freedom and we all are experiencing the spirit of freedom? - Ali Peter John

We were promised a land (Desh) Where there would be no hunger, no poverty, no unemployment , no exploitation of workers and women and we would live in peace and satisfaction of getting all that the leaders had promised ?

How many Indians have really known what living in a free and Independent country is ? Can we tell ourselves before going to bed at night and after waking up in a morning that we are free from all anxiety and all disappointment and disillusionment?

These are some of the questions that should worry us on this Independence Day, if we have not worried about these problems in the past ? If we are a fully Independent country , why do we have so much of bribery, corruption, unemployment, hunger, thirst and exploitation all over our country and the one big question we should ask ourselves is why the rich are growing richer and the poor are growing poorer and why there are so many cases of Indians dieing of hunger and why there is so much of anger , depressions and frustration among our people even after so many years of freedom ?

We seriously need to look within ourselves and find answers to these burning questions if we have to proceed on the the right path to progress ....

I need to tell only four little stories to know how there are several Indians who don't even know what freedom means ...

Some years ago, I met an old man who was begging on one of the prominent streets of a suburb called Bandra in Mumbai .

He was sitting in one place and looking at every car passing by with great expectations of the Indians inside the cars , but those Indians were so busy with their own worlds and so heartless that they didn't even look at him .

There were other beggars running up and down the street and they were getting more attention and money then the old man in that corner ...

I managed to talk to the old man after putting some money in his hands and what he told me shookup my heart ( it is during such moments that I know that I still have a hear inside me ) .

His name was Parshu Ram and he had acted in flims made during the silent Era. I asked him to tell me how much money he made by begging in a day and he said , "aajkal logon ke pass dil kaha hai ?

Acha hua mera koi nahi hai , nahi toh unka kya ho jaata ? Mera toh chal jaata hai , paise se zyaada log jab mujhe kuch khana dete hai toh mein kush ho jaata hu" .

It was nearing Independence Day and I asked him what the big day meant for him and he looked blank and said , " humne bhi azaadi ke sapne dekhe the , lekin kaha hai azaadi ? Agar sach mein azaadi aayi hoti , toh mein kya yaha bheek mangta ?"

I couldn't answer his question, but I have not forgotten the expression on his face when he ask me that question.

I lived in a suburb called Versova which was a fisher man's village once and had now turned into a suburb were only the rich and the stars from bollywood lived in swank apartments, stars like Shahid Kapoor, Priyanka Chopra, and many other smaller stars , directors , writers, music directors and technicians.

I use to pass by a little and dingy hut-like structure at the end of a lane . It was an odd sight to see a lonely old women living all alone in that hell of a place and just staring into space with her eyes which had lost all the tears that were there once .

Her face was so full of wrinkles that one couldn't count the number of wrinkles on her face and it seemed like she had not combed her grey hair for ages . I kept asking the people if they knew anything about her .

I finally came to know that she once lived in a proper room in an area marked out for the Armed Forces during the second world war and that she had no house after her husband died in the war and she had being living in the hut for several years .

She was waiting for justice from several governments , but had not received any help . There was no information about her children or her family .

No one was seen talking to her and it look like she had got use to her homeless and hopeless life . I tried talking to her once and she told me her name was Savita Bai.

She didn't know how old she was and I asked her from where she got her food and she just looked at the sky with her almost dead eyes .

I tried talking to her again , but the pandemic took away my chance to meet her because she had vanished and the hut was replaced by some other structure. She also was mother India, but which Indian cared for this mother ?

On Independence Day last year I followed a little boy who was selling paper flags at a junction.

He kept running from car to car and begged of people to buy his flags , telling them that if he didn't sell enough flags on that day , he would not get anything to eat . I saw him again at the end of the day and he was crying.

He told me , " yeh bekaar ka dhanda hai " and he took whatever flags he had and dump them in a dark corner and started begging and within no time , he had made enough money to buy a " vada pav " .

There are thousands of boys like him who look forward to Independence Day only to sell paper flags to earn or living .

I asked several boys what they thought about azaadi and not one of them could give me and answer. For them azaadi was getting their daily Vada pav twice a day...

And I have just returned from a rich friend's house where I met the ten year old Kavita who was the servant in the house .

Her parents from Andhra Pradesh had left her there and they had made arrangements to see that her salary of two hundred rupees was sent to them . I kept looking at Kavita and wondered what her future would be in Independent India....

AISE AUR BHI LAAKHON KAHANIYA HAI JO SACH KE SIWA AUR KUCH BHI NAHI. KYA HUM AB BHI DILPAR HAATH RAKH KAR KEH SAKTE HAI KI HUM AZAAD DESH KE REHNE WAALE AZAAD BACCHE HAI ? EK BAAR INN KAHANIYO KE BAARE MEIN SOCH KAR DEKHIYE, SHAYAD PHIR HINDUSTAN SACH MEIN AZAAD HINDUSTAN HO SAKTA HAI. JAI HIND.