Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for
themselves – Abraham Lincoln
“At the stroke of the midnight hour, when
the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom”- Tryst with
destiny, the speech still awakes the nostalgia in every Indian. After great
movements and never ending wars the SWARAJ was achieved by India. After that
midnight every citizen was free from the clutches of British rule. Everyone
cheered together and celebrated. The leaders had a dream, the dream to see this
country with a right vision, to move forward in all paths of knowledge and be a
humble guiding light to the world.
More than half a decade has passed; we
proudly call ourselves an independent nation, an independent India. But that is
not convincing enough. Last week when the day had approached for celebrating
the 69th Independence Day, the invitation was on table to attend a
flag hoisting ceremony. The thought of patriotism was invoked but I had few
questions that kept on repeating in my mind, time and again!
Few simple questions;
These questions always don’t have
simple answers. If the answers are Simple they are the most difficult ones to
understand.
I Could not make it to the flag
hoisting ceremony this Independence Day. Was I lazy? Was I enjoying my freedom?
May be!! Was I insulting my country?
And the heroes who gave me that freedom? Well... NO! I WASN'T! What I was really doing was, fighting my own little
freedom struggle. Struggling to find answers and struggling to ask questions...
Are we really free? What does freedom really mean? Specifically, what does it
mean to us?
“Freedom” the power in word itself, is
the ability to make choice, dream the destiny, to be able to take a decision and
to be able to stand by that decision till the end. Freedom in the physical
environment is a thing of past. Freedom is emotional and psychological
boundlessness. Where is the freedom to think differently, the freedom to act
differently, to let the curious minds loose... to discover new arenas, to
accept new ways, to learn new spheres, to explore the depths and to soar into
the heights?
And this freedom from what?
From the clutches of the old and ugly
lies. Blind faiths and narrow visions.
The urge to be free is the basic
necessity of my life. I don’t want to be looked down upon for being a woman.
Nor do I want any advantage for being a man. I want the kind of freedom where
there would be "individual and unique human beings" irrespective of
their gender.
I want to be free of fear - fear of
forgetting, fear of failure, fear of loss, fear of death!
Freedom is being you! And I shall not
settle for anything less.
Let the concept of this great
democratic, independent country be given a wider and deeper meaning. The
independent India be given a fresh thought; the freedom of thought be used by
every free thinking citizen.
But then the thought still comes back
in my mind, “I am not living in a free country”.
There are still narrow walls of castes
between our people. There are bigger walls of gender. Then there is religion
and faith and dominance and rape. There is filth and garbage and we think
cleaning is the lowest job in life. There are limits and we hate to take it
far. Dreams are secondary and money is divine. Killing is ok, speaking is crime.
Entertainment is worth the spending, charity is not! We love the rich, poor’s
exist not.
They judge us on every step, and weigh
to be good or bad. No this can’t be called as freedom. This is emotional
dungeon.
So I decided to stay home this
independence day. Bowed down to the war heroes and saluted my flag from
here.
They said I wasn’t patriotic. I didn’t mind. It didn’t matter. Here I
am still fighting my own little freedom struggle.
