Are Ours Truly Aspirations

Rajannya Lahiri

A recent debate in school put forward the following question to our
young minds: which one is greater? between the jananee (mother) and
the janmabhoomi (motherland). Almost all of the debaters who took a
stand behind the podium pointed out with confident ease that to them
is neither the greater, but money that is. Professionally, I made my
usual moderator that day; however, I remember feeling dazed in my
immediate personal response to their speeches. And finally when I was
reflecting back on that day, my interpretations were shocked about the
blind speeches which I had moderated...
The interest in the goings-on of a human mind and the attitude of
approaching and interviewing people from various strata of our
hierarchy are attributes which had never failed me. Though plush
shopping malls have never been much of a comfortable idea with me, I
had been to some of these spots and always had chanced to catch young
people around my age idling about in groups, or in pairs. I see them
leaning over railings and staring aimlessly out, walking with a gait
that might put snails to shame, and talking with such expressions on
their faces which, after practised observation on my part, give away
the fact that they are talking gibberish. Approaching them with just
as thoughtless yet measured an attitude, I find that most of them are
jobless, or are acclaimed school-bunkers; visit these places for a
chunk of hours every day of the week; and choose to come here when
someone has a "hook-up" as well as when someone has a "break-up" as
well as when someone has a "patch-up". Ask them about the things
happening outside these malls and they are incredibly ignorant.
I know of acknowledged toppers at my school who do not know a thing
without the prescribed limit of textbooks and simply hanker after the
tiniest fraction of marks. I have been under certain "teachers" who
really mean it when they say that the marksheet is all I should live
for. I have interviewed guardians who prohibit our young minds to
think of any future beyond school till we have bagged superlative
grades in our school-leaving examinations. I am aware of some parents
who advise their school-going wards to take up subjects/jobs which
could promise the best of money and fame! Which direction is the youth
heading to?

"Aspirations" of the youth include only marks and money, observing by
the abominable majority. They are ignorant of the Self; their opinions
on the affairs of the globe are limited. They not only disregard
history and undermine the future, but also live in a transient snatch
of the present. Their thoughts are not their own; their disposition is
unstable; and their minds are narrow. I take the liberty of addressing
my counterparts as "they" and not "us" because I do not feel one among
them for I have Rabindranath Tagore and Ramakrishna Paramhansa in my
library instead of Chetan Bhagat and Stephenie Meyer, for I cannot
regard elders and teachers as alien creatures, for I cannot
underestimate with false notions the hobbies of reading and writing,
for I cannot think obvious the decision to settle down in the west in
my future. But even marks and money are not youth aspirations: these
are only volatile ideas hammered into their impressionable brains in
the merciless purgatory created by the practical education system
prevalent not in the board-circulars and chairpersons' speeches, but
in the lives our young souls are choiceless about living.
The people I have been following on Sefirah, who happen to be of my
own age-group, do not nor can represent the aspirations of our youth.
Those who think about the truth of India's progress, the irony of
India's wealth, and the intransient aspect of the world around us,
constitute exceptions from and not examples of the youth. I believe
that humankind is beset with too many troubles and too much ignorance
for me to live a life of self-centred ingesting, digesting, excreting,
and procreating; to let such volatile things as marks and money impact
my education and ambition; to give up my thirst for the purpose of
life and for self-knowledge.
I cannot be dispassionate about the increasing BPL population of India
and the big wheels' contrary claims of India's being a developed
nation. I am unable to derive intellectual pleasure from Dr Manmohan
Singh's declaring that every child in India has now the lawful right
of education when the truth down at the practical levels of our
federation is jocularly apart! I do not have the instinct to place
science before art, maayaa (illusion) before aatmaa (spirit), my own
luxuries before my nation's hunger, perfumes before a bath. I fail to
acknowledge the legal measures adopted to improve the conditions of
our women when at the same time am I forced to clutch my backpack
cautiously against my bosom in the seat right beside the autorickshaw
driver, or cannot walk in peace the Baghajatin Station Road in the
later hours of the dark. My aspirations are my own. Is any space
rendered in the consciousness of our youths inspite of the limited
lives we are made to live, lives limited by an inappropriate system of
education, by the silent scream of unyielding penury?


"Youth Aspirations" is not only a complex term, but also imply a
muddled sense. We are a torn people, a mangled nation, with an
unheroic future in today's youth. We need a spiritual education, an
appreciable emotional quotient, respect for what is actual history,
broadness of interpretations, and the humble knowledge of our
ignorance and of the many liberal fields of knowledge waiting for us
to discover which. Only consciousness to such a degree can
substantiate and add meaning to our aspirations.