the soul of a nation, long supressed, finds utterance

On the midnight of Independence, Nehru promised that the India of our dreams will be a free India. Free to choose, free to speak, free to express. But the newspapers today say a different story.

Dance bars banned in Maharashtra
Gujarat Courts Need Parental Consent To Register Marriages
Jeans banned in colleges
Smoking banned in films

Is the government responsible for safeguarding the rights of the people or in-charge denying them? Are these guys, with a collective IQ marginally better than that of a goat, trying to tell us that they are capable of deciding what is right or wrong for us? Insulting our intelligence by declaring that we are not smart enough. Apparently it is a long to-be-banned list, MMS, SMS, advertisements, massage parlours, TV channels, TV serials, discotheques, belly-dancing and pornographic material. Why does this hegemonistic attitude reign in the world's biggest democracy? I agree... we are probably not intelligent enough to choose the right government either (seems apparent now), but in no way does it condone this. If something needs to be banned, it is franchise (that's just a euphemism for booth capturing anyway). Today, when governance has been relegated to changing the names of cities and roads, burning effigies, and banning dance-bars... the common man is lucky if he can feed himself at the end of the day.

India has traditionally been a nation of suppresed thought. The founders of this nation had a vision. They envisioned their nation and its people thinking freely. Thought unprejudiced by caste or religion or gender. Thought towards greatness and power. But somewhere in the melee to attain the evasive "satta" (seat of power) the vision was lost. But we, the people, cannot afford to accept what is given but have to take what is ours. It is time for a revolution, a revolution of the minds, a revolution of thought. Free thought.

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high.
Where knowledge is free.
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
By narrow domestic walls.
Where words come out from the depth of truth.
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection.
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit.
Where the mind is led forward by Thee
Into ever-widening thought and action.
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.
- Rabindranath Tagore, Mind Without Fear, Gitanjali