Government authorities illegally shot dead a leopard in Delhi instead of tranquilising it, when it wandered into a populated area. For this breach of the law, the government servant has not been punished. Why? Is it because the law does not apply to those in the service of government? The man killed the leopard. He should have shot it with the tranquiliser gun. He defied the law. He got away with his crime. If that be the case, we should all become government employees and run amuck!
On the other hand, the same ?authorities? ?raid? a home, discover two old inherited elephant tusks, arrest the owner with no questions asked, summon the press to display their living ?human? trophy, put the man under arrest even though he has some of the relevant papers. He was not a government servant! These are the joys of being an Indian in India.
The press, instead of questioning what is happening around them, seem to have gotten into the habit of blindly accepting stories fed to them. When the ?raiders? called them, they appeared at the spot and mindlessly, without checking the facts, published their pieces. They couldn?t even get the name of the person right. I suppose they were hanging about in the office waiting to find a ?scoop? to fill a few column inches of space.
Alas, that is what we have reduced ourselves to. Shame. Having demeaned an individual with their pens, they did not follow the story to its conclusion. They did not tell us where the person was right and where he was wrong. Fortunately, readers are used to irresponsible and superficial reporting and the public knows well how the ?authorities? function. Both are letting down this country and the people.
The same press forgets that times have changed and that ?foreign brands of liquor? are legitimately available in India. To read reports in 2003 insinuating that the possession of imported liquor is illegal, is absurd. Maybe the time has come to have refresher courses for the press as well as the authorities on such issues. Government should look at their archaic excise laws and rewrite them to make sense today. Why do we have to carry the rather inane and insane baggage of the past? Why can Indians not have legitimate wine cellars like all other people the world over? Or, are contemporary laws only for those Indians who ran away, the Persons of Indian Origin and the Non Resident Indians?
Why must we be so hypocritical? On the one hand we want to be partners in the global environment and, on the other, we continue to wallow in the redundant regulations of having been a colony and thereafter a command economy. Small wonder that China is seen to be far more acceptable to the world community than India. Why doesn?t the Indian press push for these changes, changes that will make the subcontinent a far more civilised place?
I discovered yet another ridiculous law concerning antiquities. If an Indian national wants to bring back an antique to India, its country of origin, the person has to pay a fat duty, a fine! What could be sillier? And you cannot take anything older than a 100 years out of the country, national treasure or not. Beware, you may find a new rule that if your grandmother has crossed 100 years, she needs to be registered with the Archaeological Survey of India! There is so much junk masquerading as ?antique? that everyone is being taken for a ride. The treasures that lie in our museums are carelessly treated, many get damaged as they sit unprotected except by words, and those who are at the helm of the institutions of art and culture, the guardians, are callous with their ?jewels?.
If only we would spend time, thought and energy in attempting to give dignity to the many representations of our varied heritage. Instead, officious officials with a smattering of knowledge, strut about waving an obsolete rule book. Indians have proven to be fine curators of Indian collections in the museums abroad but there is not one such curator in India with international standing and reputation. National Pride…where are you?