Today 3rd April 2010, an article came in the editorial page by S. Gurumurthy, titled "Free sex or free speech". I have always appreciated his articles about any topic be it political or economic. But off late when he talks about Indian morality and Indian culture he sounds more like Pramod Mutalik and same thing is happening in this article too. Sorry sir, old age is catching up with you. In old age a person becomes more and more rigid and less & less flexible about his beliefs he has acquired through his life. He mentions "moral values" and "country's ethos" but not at all elaborates what are these values. One thing is pretty much clear is that he is not happy with the Supreme court's observation about premarital sex and he somehow wants to oppose it without sounding contrary to Supreme court. From the first two columns of his article this is the only outcome. Now the first question is Which Indian culture he is talking about ? Ancient Indian culture or present day ? I am sure he is talking present day because this Supreme court observation came in response to a present day issue. Now what is present day Indian culture ?
Killing your daughters in the womb itself. (please note that this is exclusively Indian culture), Denying the women and the young most basic freedom.
Killing women in the name of dowry. Caste prejudice throughout the society. Honour killing of the young lovers. Rampant child abuse in the society.
We are fully covered in dirty, filthy mud and he is attacking US. Our own culture is very similar to Talibani society but he is finding faults with the west. Do I sound radical ? How can I compare our culture with Taliban ? Oh I can. A Taliban mullah lashes a young women publicly for talking to a man and that is not the saddest part. The saddest part is her own brother was holding her by her hands while she was being beaten. Similarly in Mangalore Pramod Mutalik and his goons beat young women for going to pub and this is not the saddest part, the saddest part is that not a single brother or father of those women came out to register an FIR against those goons. Not a single brother's or father's blood boiled by seeing the images of their sister or daughter being beaten brutally. Till date no one has come out to thrash the face of Pramod Mutalik (and his goons) or crack his bones. Is Gurumurthy trying to defend this culture ? At least I do not feel proud of this culture and this is not the culture I have learnt. I have learnt from lord Krishna that no matter what I will protect my sister even if it is against any social norms. Thats why he came to help Draupadi when she was being disgraced. I have also learnt from him that follow your heart and your love. Thats why he kidnapped Rukmani against the will of her brother and her father and then married her. What is happening today ? In Haryana the young couples are being shot by their own father or brother in the name of social norms for following their heart. There are two most important decisions for a young man or woman, first one is career and second is life partner. Indian youngs are denied of both these choices, both the decisions are taken by family or society. Gurumurthy says that laws can not reform society then how come we have controlled Sati pratha and child marriage.
Now let us come to premarital sex, for which Gurumurthy is bothering so much. This issue don't deserve this much attention. Yes premarital sex is against our present day culture but it was not earlier. "Gandharv Vivah", I can easily say that this is synonym to premarital sex and it was part of our society. We all know that Danveer Karn, is product of Gandharv Vivah between Kunti and Surya. Now everybody, including her family and her sons knew about it, but did they hound Kunti ? Did they call her "kulta" or "Chhinar" or characterless ? Did Pandavs do any disrespect to her ? No, not at all , nothing of that sort happened. A person can not be judged by his sexual orientation. A person can be sexually promiscuous but at the same time can be truthful and honest and great leader like Bill Clinton. He is leading the rebuild effort in Haiti. I have seen many people in my life who have no reservations about taking a bribe but none had premarital sex. I wonder why old age people are too concerned about such issues. Sometimes I think it is what Amitabh Bachchan said in "Cheeni Kum". He said to the father of his would be bride "You are jealous". With a life of unfulfilled sexual fantasies and now to justify the way they have lived they impose sexual restrictions on their kids. I am sure this is indeed a reason for many oldies.
Gurumurthy says that first problem with premarital sex is that it is creating more number of single mothers in US. Again he is making issue of a non issue. What is the need of a father for a child if he is not the provider of the bread and butter ? To beat the child. Let me put it this way, what is the harm if a child is fatherless ? I do not see any, because I know that Lav and Kush were also raised fatherless and they went on to defeat the army of their own father Lord Ram. Bravo, Three cheers to them. Cakravarti Samrat Bharat, was also raised by a single mother Shakuntala and today our country is named after him as "Bharat". Second problem he mentions because of premarital sex there are big number of divorces. Again I see the the divorce as the manifestation of women empowerment rather than a problem. In US women are empowered so they kick off the unsuitable guy. But in India women have nowhere to go so they continue to sleep with the enemy. Then he enumerates several problems of US without giving any supportive arguments. As I told earlier we as a society are fully covered with filthy mud so Gurumurthy attacks US to throw some mud on them and then prove that they are also ugly, so lets remain ugly our way why follow their way. I just want to tell him that despite all the problems US continues to be the best and will remain best because they are not narrow minded like us. They learn good things form anywhere in the world but Gurumurthy finds only problems with them. Today "Yoga" is popular in India and world because Americans made it fashionable. Rather then finding problems with US we should concentrate on our problems and learn good things from US. One of them is individual freedom.
