My Blue Salaam (1) !

By Manuwant Choudhary

Both Kanhaiya Kumar and Narendra Modi speak with an earnestness that really scares me.

They are both eloquent and speak from the heart.

They both represent two ideologies (Red & Saffron) that has had a field day for the past 60 years and see where India is.

On his release from prison Kanhaiya Kumar made this rousing speech at JNU on Azadi....Azadi not from India but within India.

 In the same breath he spoke about Azadi from Poonjiwadi (Capitalism)

He also spoke about how he believes in the Socialist Indian Constitution.

Then he went on to Azadi from Jaatiwaad.

And almost back-to-back  he spoke about two bowls on his food platter he was served in prison - one was Red and the other Blue....he explained what he and his colleagues want...a unity between the Reds and the Blues (by blue he meant the blue in B.R. Ambedkar's flag).

An alliance between the left and the dalits ! (is this not casteism?)

Anyway even Modi talks about Ambedkar even in Shanghai for the same reason.

Azadi from bhook (Hunger) but has socialism ever solved this problem ?

Arakshan, Samaantaa, samajwaad, loktantra, des, gareeb, border par sipahi, chai-wallah, kisaan ka beta all form the lingua Kanhaiya shares with Modi.

And then the chants....Lal Salaam, Lal Salaam....like in street plays by left groups.

My blue salaam to both Kanhaiya & Modi.

My blue, unlike Ambedkar's, is of a lighter liberal shade..so don't confuse.

And the Samvidhan (Constitution) that Kanhaiya and Modi defend does not allow my Blue to even contest an election.

Loktantra..kaisa loktantra....is des mein to loktantra hai hee nahin. (There is no democracy in India)

Yes, there is a half-baked Socialism,

I recall my meeting with Minoo Masani, a member of the assembly that framed India's constitution and he told me an anectode.

Minoo Masani, "As a student in London my father asked me to meet a friend of his who was a British Member of Parliament."

British MP, "Son, what is your politics?"

Masani, "I am a socialist."

British MP smiling, "Son, if at 20 you are not a socialist then you have no heart but if at 40 you are still a socialist then you have no brains."

The MPs vision was so accurate that when Minoo Masani turned 40...as Mayor of Bombay in 1944 he wrote a book `Socialism Reconsidered' where he renounced socialism and accepted capitialism and Gandhian trusteeship as an economic model for India.