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Obama wonder and Bush blunder

— Photo: AFP

A DEMOCRATIC PHENOMENON: Barack Obama is more than a fine candidate who has won fantastically.

Barack Obama is now White House supremo in the making, the hero of a historic and happening event, a democratic phenomenon incarnating as President. He is the unique symbol of an awakened young generation in the United States that was until now lying latent. The silent mega-majority has suddenly spoken in an electro-campaign and burst forth through the ballot into a profoundly progressive, powerfully anti-George Bush, policy shift.

America Inc., as big-business-driven and aggressive as authoritarian George Bush is in the White House, has been a global menace and an extravagant international unipolar freebooter. Sovereign India, liberated from the British Empire in 1947, has been diminished into one of its satellite states. It has obliged the U.S. with a nuclear deal, expanded imports from and exotic investments in the U.S. In doing all this, India has tended to neglect both its great tryst with destiny and the constitutional preamble that has inspired a creative socialist democratic republic. Swaraj has become a fading mirage.

“Small is beautiful” is the Gandhian quintessence. But unlike Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Lal Bahadur Shastri (of ‘Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan’ fame), our new masters, with a seeming nuclear affection for Mr. Bush, have developed a passion to deal with American big business, including the nuclear barons.

But now the transformation led by Mr. Obama demonstrates to New Delhi the paramountcy of the common people, beyond the futile exaggeration of the billionaire-millionaire command over the national economy. Mr. Obama proves that a people’s change is coming, not merely in the U.S. but wherever the little person in large numbers is beginning to speak and to vote. The world wants radical reform. ‘Yes, We Can,’ is the message of November 4. Mr. Obama tells the leaders of the world that he heralds a change towards full and fine democracy. He was called a Communist as part of election polemics. (Was not Chief Justice Earl Warren of the U.S. told by President Eisenhower that he was a close ally of the Communists?)

Those who corner political power and money power in India do not remember that Gandhiji, the ‘half-naked fakir,’ had said that India lives in its villages, that swadeshi is integral to swaraj, that people and panchayati raj institutions are the ultimate sovereign entities of the nation.

The Obama caveat is clear. No longer will ‘Manmohanomics’ and ‘Chidambaromics,’ propitiating the proprietariat, ignoring native agriculture and self-reliant industries, and the dignity and employment of the humble masses, sell. The fulfilment of their fundamental right to life is not inconsequential. India’s have-not humanity, if offered a free and fair electoral opportunity, will tell the quarrelling and power-hungry political parties that the little man and woman in the little booth will make his or her little mark in favour of a pro-poor socio-economic change and against hunger and homelessness. What is needed is a haven where everyone will have social, economic and political justice. I have a dream, then, that this will happen in Bharat before long.

Let the statesmen of Bharat listen: politicking conspiracies and communalist camaraderie will not do. The franchise of the billion needy people will overpower the politics of aggrandisement of the dollar-rich creamy layer. That layer cannot control or condition the destiny or destination of sovereign India.

Mr. Obama is more than a fine candidate who has won fantastically: he is a great cause which has triumphed as an inspiration. Where people are in despair he has kindled the glimmer of a better future. I salute him and the great American people who have worked tirelessly and triumphantly against mighty odds to cause a real miracle. No longer should the White House invade, exploit, browbeat or rob other peoples and rulers — or dump nuclear power on an obliging Prime Minister in Delhi. A new comity of nations will dawn where a jurisprudence of universal justice will make for a better world, where Mr. Obama’s victory will be a beacon, and not an illusion.

This is the beginning of a change the world over, and the end of a greedy regime of global domination. India stands for peaceful coexistence among all nations. In this glorious process Mr. Obama, as President of the United States, and its great people, including the young Americans, have a cosmic role and creative power to exercise. Not nuclear bombs to wipe out the earth but the pursuit of happiness as everyone’s right, is the paradise on earth that we must pursue together. Humanity, in its holistic aspirations, is one and indivisible. No nation is free until all the nations of the world are free. No one lives in dignity until wherewithal for all is globally assured — free from war or terrorism.

Dr. Manmohan Singh is a straightforward statesman, but how he happened to embrace Mr. Bush and assure him without any warrant that India loves him, is a mystery. But now the same Prime Minister has greeted and invited Mr. Obama magnanimously and assured him of the good wishes of all Indians.

India too must change. Its satellite status must end. Our resources are superb, our relations are friendly with all countries. Now that Mr. Obama is President-elect, Indo-U.S. bonds will be good, great and glorious. Mahatma Gandhi was Dr. Martin Luther King’s guru, and Mr. Obama too acts on the basis of Gandhian principles. Henry David Thoreau was Gandhiji’s guru. We have thus a spiritual-temporal linkage, not dollar domination, big business exploitation and the nuclear power dependencia syndrome.

Islam is a major religion with faith in a one and only God. It is committed to world brotherhood in peace. India has a heavy Muslim population, even after Partition created Pakistan. This religion, centuries old in India, enjoys friendly fellowship with other religions, including Hinduism, the foundational faith of Bharat. On account of the shocking doings by the Taliban in New York, Mr. Bush declared hostility towards them. Osama bin Laden committed outrageous terrorism on the WTO building and he was considered to be among the Taliban. But eventually an anti-Islamic cult possessed Mr. Bush. He violated the canons of humanism, the sovereignty of nations and the principles of international jurisprudence. He invaded Afghanistan and Iraq and threatened to attack Iran. Muslims were suspect in America — which was unfortunate. Islam stands for peace and world brotherhood: there may be terrorists in any group or faith.

One of the finer consequences of Mr. Obama’s victory is that Islam will cease to be a national anathema in the U.S. After all, President-elect Mr. Obama, although a Christian, is not allergic to Islam — as his middle name itself indicates. It is fair to assume that Americans will now drop this hate cult and allergy towards Islam. U.S. Muslims too are American patriots, as there are great Indian Muslims who are good Indian nationalists like good Christians and Hindus. Cultural secularism and global patriotism make us all members of a single world fraternity.

Once again, I salute you, gracious Barack Obama and the sublime people of the United States of America who have made a dream a dramatic reality. The battle is on. We have promises to keep and miles to go before we sleep.

Corrections and Clarifications

A sentence in the twelfth paragraph of an article "Obama wonder and Bush blunder" (Op-Ed, November 11, 2008) was "Osama bin Laden committed outrageous terrorism on the WTO building and he was considered to be among the Taliban." It should have been the World Trade Centre (WTC) building or the Twin Towers.

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