Jan 22, 2007 07:18 PM
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On Dec 1, 1955 a black woman named Rosa Parks refused to vacate her seat on a bus in Montogomery, Alabama.Her resistance led to a snowball effect, and would prove to be the basis of the Civil Rights movement in US demanding that blacks stop being treated as 2nd rate citizens.
In a small town called Pietermaritzburg, a young Indian lawyer named Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, was thrown out of a reserved compartment, though he had a reservation. His crime, was that he was not a white person and he could dare not think of even traveling in reserved class. That incident prompted the young lawyer to startSatyagraha, and which would eventually result in the end of the British Raj in India.
Abraham Lincoln, the President of the US, remarked after meeting with a frail black lady, called Harriet Beecher Stowe- “So you are the woman whose book started a war”. He was referring to Stowe’s classic Uncle Tom’s Cabin, which revealed the horrors of the slave trade and also the brutal way in which black slaves were treated, pricking at the conscience of a nation, and leading to the US Civil War.
Rosa Parks, Mahatma Gandhi, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King, Dr. B.R.Ambedkar all names associated with the fight against discrimination of one kind or another. *
Shilpa Shetty** is an actress in Bollywood, who save for the occasional good performance, appeared mostly in forgettable roles in equally forgettable movies. Most of her roles required to sing duets with the hero, weep a few tears, walk around in skimpy dresses. Oh yes she had a great body for sure. Oh by the way, she was in a big controversy some time back with a textile manufacturer over missing payments. And she is also known for her interfering Mama. And yes a sister called Shamita Shetty, who acted in some movies, but that’s it period.
Big Brother from all what I know is one of these celebrity based reality TV shows, which I never watch and have no intention at all of watching.
Apparently Miss Shetty was paid a cool Rs 31.5 million for her participation in this show. In keeping with the current fad in UK for all things Indian, they bought her in to boost the TRP ratings, never mind the fact that she is just one more Bollywood heroine. Anyway as per reports, she had to face racist comments from some of her co participants.
But even Ms Shetty would not have imagined in her wildest dreams, that these comments would catapult her to such international status. The Indian Govt, which normally cares a damn, for the racial abuse faced by normal Indians in UK, US and the blatant exploitation of Indian workers in the Middle East, suddenly woke up to the fact that Indians were the target of racism and issued a stern warning to Britain. And we had the equally idiotic spectacle of the British Govt bending over backwards in proving it’s commitment to fight racism.
Consider this Indian workers in the Gulf region along with Pakistanis and Bangladeshis are the most cruelly exploited lot. Many live in sub human conditions and get cheated by unscrupulous touts into paying lots of money. During a recent building fire in Dubai, many Indians working there were charred to death. Many of these men are poor, semi literate, and have often mortgaged all their assets in the hope of providing something for their families. How come the Indian Government, has never taken up their cause? How come Mr.Anand Sharma, the Minister of State for External Affairs, never thought it fit to take up this issue with the Governments in the Middle East? Mind you what many Indian laborers endure in the Gulf is nothing worse than the Nazi labor camps, the prisoner camps in Siberia,but so far neither the Govt nor the media nor the people who went ballistic in Shetty’s case seem to be bothered at all about their plight.
In Fiji, Indians, have been attacked, their homes ransacked, their businesses destroyed, yet the Government never even bothered about their plight. WhenIdi Amin expelled all Indians, fromUganda in 1979, the Government did not even bother to lift a finger to help them. And ironically, they had to find refuge in a foreign country. Poor Indian women are sold to rich sheiks in the Gulf to satisfy their lust, small boys are forced to run as camel jockeys in theMiddle East, Indian maid servants in the Gulf region are routinely mistreated and exploited. But yet the Government cares nothing about what happened.
The only time the Government of India( hate to call it a Government) wakes up to the fact, that Indians abroad, face racism of one kind or another is when a big name is involved. Else most of the time it just sleeps, like an ostrich with it’s head in the sand. So please spare us this talk of Indian honor being insulted. The Government has never cared for Indians working abroad, and have only treated them as a cash cow to be milked, that’s all.
Racism in the West, is about skin color. But what about the blatant racism we have in India. We are the only country where fairness creams have a market. Had Fair& Lovely or one of those skin cream makers, come up with those fairness ads in US or Europe, by now they would have been sued for racial discrimination. We advertise for “fair skinned brides”, and there is a lot of difference in which we treat white skinned foreigners from black skinned ones. Oh by the way, if you are going toUS, you can be sure to get lots of advice to avoid black people or avoid black dominated areas. Much in the same way, we are advised to avoid going to Muslim dominated areas. We ourselves treat dark skinned people in the most derogatory manner, so what right do we have to crib about racism.
And of course the untouchability we practice in villages, is no worse than apartheid or the black lynching in Southern US. Lower caste people are routinely killed, denied entry into temples, made to sit outside hotels. South Africa and the Deep South of US, have put their racist past behind them, and are making an effort to move into a more diverse society. Unfortunately, we still live in the medieval ages as far as caste discrimination is concerned, and we violently resist when some one tries to make a change.
The British did not rule over us for over a 100 years just because they were smarter than us. They simply took advantage of the differences and prejudices we had, and made us slaves in our own country. Unfortunately, we have not learnt anything from that. Indians are their own worst enemies. We need to get rid of the prejudices and cobwebs in our mind, before we can accuse others of racism. And for a change our Government needs to look more proactively into the issues facing Indians in other countries. But then our Government is more instead in getting publicity, banning AXN and protecting Indian culture, rather than doing something so unglamorous. The racial slurs on Shilpa Shetty need to be condemned, but by blowing up the issue to that of Indian honor and pride, we are ignoring the real problems, and all we have succeeded is in boosting the ratings of a 3rd rate program.
