First it was Aravind Adiga's Booker winner "White tiger",then the multiple award winning "Slumdog Millionaire" with a largely Indian cast and a British crew and most recently the much publicized sojourn into the mud huts of Amethi by the visiting British dignitary David Miliband.What is common to all of the above?The Indian connection or more appropriately the shockingly poorand horribly under developed Indian connection.
All these events have provided fodder for many debates in the media regarding the projection of real India.From being a land of sages,snake charmers,Gandhi and the Hindu rate of growth(term coined for 3-4% GDP growth) in the 60s and 70s,India today occupies a firm place in the collective subconscious of the whole world as a place of extreme opposites.A country of a few thousand millionaires and millions of poor people(who survive on less than 2 dollars a day,in the words of Miliband) living in urban slums and villages.A country which has registered record breaking figures of growth in the recent decade yet it somehow doesn't seem to uplift the standards of living of a huge part of it's population.
What they seem to have missed out on is the thriving middle class which is the actual majority in this country.This middle class which you and I are a part of,is the real success story of the twenty first century India.But in it's quest for fascinating stereotypes,the western world has zeroed in on the poor street urchin and conveniently ignored the real progressive Indian.What it has also failed to highlight is the vibrant diversity of our society where the people from the so called minority segments have risen to high offices with heart pleasing regularity.Hence as the world goes ga ga over Obama's rise in the US they also need to take a look at India where the same feat which took US more than centuries to accomplish,has been achieved a lot more times in the 60 years of our independence.
There is nothing wrong in portraying the plight of the poor Indian to the whole world and we should not be uncomfortable with that.What irks me though,is the generalization and the exagerration of such depiction.Much of the developed world views India as a glass half empty whereas we educated Indians should have no doubts in realizing the fact that it actually is half full.
