Analysis and questioning – these are two aspects for an open
mind and it has to start from one’s within. While second-guessing your own self
on a continuous basis may not be good for the confidence, it is indeed needed
to put a mirror in front of you and face a tough question or two to stay on
course.
Outside - in quite a few situations, we just accept things
lying down with a mindset that there won’t or can’t be any change by raising
any voice or question. Someone somewhere
might gather courage to stand up against the atrocities and things might get
changed. We, then, would end up thinking that we also thought about it but did
not do anything to effect the change. A feeling of guilt encompasses but, it is
too late, by then.
The point I am raising here is twofold.
First, regarding the parenting and education system, do we
really encourage our children to analyze and ask questions? It has been often
seen that a question is not appreciated at home or by the teachers and an
environment gets created where children just listen, and learn by rote. There is hardly any effort to spark the light
in their mind to analyze and ask – in the process, making them ready for future
where they are required to address the unknowns faced in life. As we cannot
make them prepared beforehand to face each and every situation in life, inculcating
this ability is very important for them to confront the world on their own. I
am not generalizing all parents, teachers and institutions here but hope you
would agree that this is not very uncommon.
Secondly, it is related to standing up against the issues in
our professional or social circles and even in the four corners of our home.
While it is true we are forced to ignore a lot of misdeeds done to us or to the
system, with a fear for life or name of ours and our near and dear ones, there
are cases where we should have taken steps but just gave it a pass. There are
ample cases where we just close our eyes without raising a single question and
accept the things as it is. Can we not come out of shell and take small steps
to change the course in such cases?
I do agree that people who have tread these steps, have paid
the price with their lives. None of us have forgotten the whistle-blowing cases in
relation to construction work for golden quadrilateral project in Uttar
Pradesh. The brave man who could muster courage to raise his voice against malpractices
was ruthlessly killed. While the Indian Government has decided to act on this
by passing an act to protect such whistle-blowers, we do not feel safe and shy
away from such scenarios. Knowing fully well the repercussions, yes, we need to
have the line drawn in a pragmatic way and ask questions before leaving
everything only to fate.
