Our role models

Aamir Khan
Akshay Kumar
Shah Rukh Khan
MS Dhoni
Sachin Tendulkar
Kapil Dev
Amitabh Bachhan

Very famous people in contemporary India! Also some of the most recognizable faces in the world. These are names that every child in our country has grown up loving, admiring, idolizing...even worshipping. They are our country’s great heroes and our biggest role models. Personalities that have excelled at their craft and reached the pinnacle of success. Some started out small and made it very big, at times with very little help and against astounding odds…the stuff that legends are made of. People who have earned tremendous fame and wealth by doing something they were really good at and loved doing. Their primary and often sole focus has been on building and demonstrating their own outstanding talent and abilities. They have been very driven individuals…driven towards achieving unparalleled popularity and wealth. Truly a source of inspiration for a country of a billion people.

Why is it that we are so inspired by people whose lives have centred around achieving fame and success for themselves, rather than by those that lived solely for the good of others? Why do we not find social entrepreneurs, inventers, doctors, writers, army generals, civil rights activists, monks and philanthropists amongst our biggest role models? Not to mention politicians…

These are some thoughts that play on my mind as I fly from one corner of the world to another on an extraordinarily long flight. It is not that I don’t have personal admiration for these personalities. I do. I have immense regard and respect for them and their unique abilities. Neither is this a lament on the current state of affairs in India, or for that matter the rest of the world. I am merely inquisitive about why our present day society values individuals with personal achievement and material success to such an extent. What does this mean for our culture and the values of our generation? What does this say about us?

If we had drawn up a list of the biggest role models in India fifty years ago, would it have looked any different? I was not around at the time, but here is my guess of possible names that would have shown up…

Rammohan Roy
Bhagat Singh
Subhash Chandra Bose
Sarojini Naidu
Sri Aurobindo
Swami Vivekanand
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

Reformers, social activists, spiritual leaders, freedom fighters…

What explains this change? Are our values different now and has our culture evolved from idolizing the selfless to worshipping self seekers?

I believe there has been a change.

The first half of the last century produced a generation of leaders that dedicated their lives towards the upliftment of India, and of getting us freedom from foreign occupation. They did this by effecting grass root change through education, empowerment, spirituality, organized protest, upheaval, as well as non-violence. They united a nation of diverse ethnicities towards a common cause. Their lives were characterized by personal sacrifice and even extreme impoverishment…and of espousing the supremacy of common good over personal gain. These people did not even possess much materially, if at all. But they left behind a lasting legacy and a nation that could hope to chart out its own destiny.

However, the next fifty years did not create any such leaders. Now that it was a free nation, our people were no longer unified by a common cause. Nor was this a land of prosperity. So along the way the society turned to seek individual gain rather than the collective good. People migrated from villages to towns and the big cities, looking for a better life. The focus was on one’s family – a secure job, roof over the head and education for the children. Somewhere I feel that we spawned a generation of people with mediocre aspirations, craving a life of little effort and average gain…not to say that there were no exceptions to this. There were several. But in general, that is how I feel about our society. The government became a huge and benevolent employer, giving opportunities to millions but not seeking any accountability for output. We produced lazy bureaucrats, negligent officers and a corrupt and criminalised political system. Even religion was not left behind and crafty godmen completed a compelling picture of a society with a gaping hole in value based leadership. Those with ambition to achieve and to live a life of relative comfort often chose to leave the country in droves…in what was famously referred to as India’s ‘brain drain’.

And for the one billion who continued to reside here… Where could we turn to for inspiration? There were always two places to look towards - cricket and films! We had one shot at global supremacy…and that was cricket. We produced world-class players with regularity and each contest carried with it the hopes of a billion expectant people craving national glory, which would rarely be forthcoming. While we had great players we were never known to be a great team, not until very recently. And so for a people starved of national heroes and tales of glory, all we needed to do was go to the neighbourhood cinema and watch the latest blockbuster. It would have all the necessary ingredients - the rags to riches story, the fairytale romance with song and dance, and the angry young man single handedly taking on the nexus of evil. This is what spawned the next set of national role models - our new idols. Cricket and film stars…who were elevated to demi-god status by an adoring and fawning public.

There are various views and beliefs about contemporary India and us Indians. Mine are one amongst them. I do not claim to have a correct explanation and I may be way off the mark. But I have not written this to invite a debate, nor to prescribe a view. These are my thoughts borne out of introspection and expressed as freely as they have arisen. Critical as they may sound, I believe them to be true. Yet, I am not at all devoid of hope…

I do believe that the wheels of our society are turning again, slowly but surely. I see a new generation of leaders emerging in the not too distant future. A generation which will be as inspirational as it will be charismatic. Which will make its mark by striving for the larger good rather than narrow, self serving interests. Leaders without dichotomy between what they preach and who they are. The Indian ethos is deep and our values are enduring. These values may not always be visible and apparent, but they exist. Sometimes I sense the manifestations of these values in interactions with people when we go beyond the superficial. At other times, I see them alive in people who live the change they wish to see… Yes, there are such people! Today they are not famous and may not idolized, but they will be in due course. And I see others who simply work quietly and without fuss, striving for a better tomorrow for our people, and without any ambition of being in the limelight. These are people who will lead from behind. People we ought to salute in a world where we have only been taught about leading from the front.

There is hope and there is excitement about the India of the future. I once heard Verghese Kurien, the man credited with turning India into the largest producer of milk in the world…father of the White Revolution of India. He expressed his dream of a resurgent India and he had no doubt that we would become a superpower soon. And he hoped that we would be a superpower with a kind and gentle face. I pray that this vision of India is true and that I get to experience it in my lifespan. I wish to contribute to such an India in my own little way. And as before, the famous words of Rabindra Nath Tagore ring in my head…

…into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake!