Reference Points

Yesterday we got into an oft-repeated discussion on India vis-a-vis the so-called first-world countries. It was actually triggered off by how heritage is being preserved and marketed in London - the London cabs, the Sherlock Holmes museum at 221B Baker Street, the scene of the Ripper killings at Whitechapel, etc.

There was the most obvious lamentation on how India, despite having so much to offer is doing absolutely nothing to preserve and/or market our heritage. A counter viewpoint to that emerged, which was frankly quite novel to me. India has so many other basics to take care of before we can even think of spending money to preserve our heritage. There is a load on the infrastructure, the population, basic civil amenities, etc. The first-world countries don't really need to worry about all these looming problems that India has and therefore they have the time and money to think of extras like heritage.

An extremely valid view-point I thought. I probably wouldn't have given it any more thought but I had just finished reading Persepolis. For those who don't know what that is, it is a poignant graphic novel by an Iranian author called Marjane Satrapi. She grew up in a liberated Iranian family during the religious revolution and the rise of the Ayatollah, followed by the decade long war with Saddam. Her parents pack her off to Austria for further education and to protect her from the Iranian repression on women and civic liberties. Life is not too easy for her there too. She then comes back to a war-ravaged nation and tries to make a life there, ultimately giving up and migrating to France for ever.

The point here is, when one reads such lives, it makes us feel how lucky we are in India to have never experience what Marjane has in Iran. Suddenly I did not feel so sorry for ourselves.

Ultimately everything is about reference points. When compared to the West, we do have a lot of problems to overcome. But are we really as bad as the Middle East or Japan after WWII? Can there be any excuse then?