PATRIOTISM, NATIONALISM, INTERNATIONALISM ET AL ... 1

 PATRIOTISM, NATIONALISM, INTERNATIONALISM ET AL ... 1

Patriotism means progress, propagation of our culture, preservation of our heritage and promotion of India and Indians throughout the world. This is what Netaji embodied in his being whether at home while free, immersed in intense activity, or in prison, improving confinement conditions and insisting on basic amenities such as proper food and recreation facilities and the occasion to celebrate cultural events such as the Durga Puja, or abroad, recovering health and promoting international understanding about India and assisting Indian students overseas in every possible way for them to make it to the highest academic levels.

Patriotism is not a barren, brazen exhibition of raw power that is redolent of forest ancestry but is a refined art in expression of all that is best in a nation from heritage and holding. It is the intense feeling of sympathy with one's fellow beings across the national spectrum and the urge to rise to their defence and help by offering sublimating service unto them.

Patriotism is the consciousness of an entire country within one's mind and the enlargement of one's self to embracing the whole of it. Words, emotive and inspiring, are not enough, but deeds that translate them into real life are the cornerstone of patriotism. It is the life that matters, not the airy articulations or frothy talk that politicians and their ilk have practised to perfidious perfection, and it is the life that breathes life into the soul of a sinking nation that eventually lifts it unto the realm of real living.

A nation of 1.38 billion people, and ever increasing, can hardly afford such political frothy talk or foolish endeavours nor can the polity expect any real rise in the nation's destiny by ever playing the blame-game thus. We must sink in our ploughshare of individual effort to the building of the nation and our collective activity, positive and peaceful, will lend substance to the aspired change we all seek in our country's course. We may recall President Kennedy's swearing-in address to his nation in this context and apply it to India, "Ask not what America can do for you but ask what you can do for America." These were words pregnant with possibilities and they remain so, not just limited to the country of its origin but universally valid the world over.

End of Part 1

To be serialised

Written by Sugata Bose