Copyright@kamleshsujata1
By Kamlesh Tripathi
By Kamlesh Tripathi
 |
| George Orwell |
Novels and movies are the best mirror of times for they often
spill the beans, whereas history can be contrived and VVIPISM most certainly, imposed.
Nothing has changed. In this scathing and zipping novel ‘Burmese
Days’ written by George Orwell way back in 1934, Indians and Burmese are referred
as niggers and beggars in some pages: and thus denied membership in a local
European club in Upper Burma.
To come to think of
it, what has changed in India, even now? Earlier the Britishers used to keep Indians
at an arm’s length, and today the VVIP Indians. For you still have special roads
and parking areas, grand lounges, devoted policemen, security men and muscle power
for the VVIPS. And the list doesn’t end there for you also have several allowances,
free passes and free tickets, subsidies only for the VIP race. The only
difference is we are not referred as niggers or beggars anymore but as Aam
Aadmi.
The book mentions that in British regime when an illiterate domestic
servant used to misbehave he was sent to a prison with a chit—15 lashes. And today
many VVIPs continue to do the same in the event of dissent.
Perhaps, there was an opportunity for this great writer to
write another book on India after the British Imperialism on Indian VVIPISM titled
“Indian Days.’ But sad, he is no more.
In the ‘QUOTE-UNQUOTE’ below there is peace 1 and peace 2
that tells the unkind ways in which many Britishers thought about Asians. But since
1934 Indians have moved ahead and so will the Aam Aadmi of India.
QUOTE
Peace 1
“The old type of servant is disappearing,” agreed Mr.
Macgregor. “In my young days, when one’s butler was disrespectful, one sent him
along to the jail with a chit saying ‘Please give the bearer fifteen lashes’. Ah
well, eheu gugaces! Those days are
gone forever, I am afraid.”
“Ah, you’re about
right there,” said Westfield in his gloomy way. “This country’ll never be fit
to live in again. British Raj is finished if you ask me. Lost Dominion and all
that. Time we cleared out of it.”
Whereat there was a
murmur of agreement from everyone in the room, even from Flory, notoriously a
Bolshie in his opinions, even from young Maxwell, who had been barely three
years in the country. No Anglo-Indian will ever deny that India is going to the
dogs, or ever has denied it—for India, like Punch,
never was what it was.
Ellis had meanwhile
unpinned the offending notice from behind Mr. Macgregor’s back, and he now held
it out to him, saying in his sour way:
“Here, Macgregor,
we’ve read this notice, and we all think this idea of electing a native to the
club is absolute—--“ Ellis was going to have said ‘absolute balls’, but he remembered
Mrs. Lackersteen’s presence and checked himself—“ is absolutely uncalled for. After
all, this Club is a place where we come to enjoy ourselves, and we don’t want
natives poking about in here. We like to think there’s still one place where we’re
free of them. The others all agree with me absolutely.”
He looked around at
others. “Hear, hear!” said Mr. Lackersteen gruffly. He knew that his wife would
guess that he had been drinking, and he felt that a display of sound sentiment
would excuse him.
Mr. Macgregor took
the notice with a smile. He saw the ‘B.F.’ pencilled against his name, and
privately he thought Ellis’s manner very disrespectful, but he turned the
matter off with a joke. He took as great pains to be a good fellow at the Club
as he did to keep up his dignity during office hours. “I gather,” he said, “that
our friend Ellis does not welcome the society of—ah—his Aryan brother?”
“No, I do not,”
said Ellis tartly. “Nor my Mongolian brother, I don’t like niggers, to put it
in one word.”
Mr Macgregor
stiffened at the word ‘nigger’, which is discountenanced in India. He had no
prejudice against Orientals; indeed he was deeply fond of them. Provided they
were given no freedom he thought them the most charming people alive. It always
pained him to see them wantonly insulted.
“Is it quite
playing the game,” he said stiffly, “to call these people niggers—a term they
very naturally resent—when they are obviously nothing of the kind? The Burmese
are Mongolians, the Indians are Aryans or Dravidians, and all of them are quite
distinct----“
“Oh, rot that!”
said Ellis, who was not all awed by Mr. Macgregor’s official status. “Call them
niggers or Aryans or what you like. What I’m saying is that we don’t want to
see any black hides in this Club. If you put it to the vote you’ll find we’re
against it to a man—unless Flory wants his dear
pal Veraswami,” he added.
o
Peace 2
“It’s all very well,”
grumbled Ellis, with his forearms on the table, fidgeting with his glass. The dispute
with Mr. Macgregor had made him restless again. “It’s all very well, but I
stick to what I said. No natives in this Club! It’s by constantly giving way
over small things like that that we’ve ruined the Empire. This country’s only
rotten with sedition because we’ve been too soft with them. The only possible
policy is to treat ‘em like the dirt they are. This is a critical moment, and
we want every bit of prestige we can get. We’ve got to hang together and say, ‘We
are the masters, and you beggars—‘ “ Ellis pressed his small thumb down as
though flattening a grub—“ ‘you beggars keep your place!’”
UNQUOTE
****
No comments:
Post a Comment