Turning Young @ 80

The awakening among the young people everywhere as we observe the 80th anniversary of the Indian Independence Day is a welcome change to the political scenario of our times where 52% of our parliamentarians are above 55 years of age, while 86.7 % of the Indian population is below the 55 age mark. The non-partisan political awakening of young India is a breath of new life into a context of polity and governance which until now is in the domain of the parties with aging and tired leadership.

The call of young India to a transparent and accountable regime in every sphere and walk of life has provided the dream and energy to the idea of ‘sovereign-citizen’ vis-a-vis persons paid from taxes for public service both in the executive and in legislatures. Turning this right side up will go a long way in establishing peoples’ democracy at all levels be it representative as in the case of state legislatures and national parliament or participatory as in the case of gram sabhas under the Panchayati Raj system.

Communalisation of governance, criminalisation of secularism, conscious attempts to set narratives that divide, cultivating mobocracy, conniving with forces of profit- oriented market, control over ‘freedom’ of thought, word and deed, commodification of societal values, commercialisation of development goals have sadly discredited claims to be a vibrant democracy even after eighty years of experimenting together.

The right to a Viksit Bharat, already long overdue and deliberately delayed, pushed to a future date another two decades from now @2047 leaves much to be desired. Reducing Viksit Bharat, a slogan of concurrent human right, to a campaign for political gain is symbolic of a power oriented hegemony to a people oriented governance.

The movement around the demand for immediate roll out of the Women Reservation and delinking it from links to any other piece of legislation present or past, the differentiated rights available and required for peoples of different minority communities questioning the move to bring in a Uniform Civil Code for the whole country, the affirmation of freedom to practice a religion of ones choice without being economically penalised affecting a section of only those seeking to embrace Christianity and Islam, attempts to resist delisting of peoples of tribal/ adivasis based on the religion that they seek to practice, are all pointers toward healthy attempts to challenge the homogenisation of a naturally diverse and cohesive socio-cultural, economic and historical demography of the country.

In this the eightieth year of our independence let us rise as the ‘oak’ that symbolises the year- strong and standing tall, shoulder to shoulder with every citizen, claiming for ourselves and coming into our own- just as young India shows the way.

The National Council of Churches in India representing the faith and missional aspirations of 19 million Christians of the Protestant and Orthodox Christian heritages prays God’s blessings on the nation and our leaders, pledging for realisation of a viksit bharat that is relevant for all – here and now.

God bless India ! Long live India !

Jai Hind !

Rev. Asir Ebenezer
General Secretary