ACHIEVEMENT ORIENTATION II

I wrote in an earlier post about how anti-achievement oriented we Indians are as a society and how we maligned an achiever by stripping him of his present position on the day after his greatest achievement. While the conventional political and social wisdom would attribute this to his being a Dalit or a Maharashtrian or both, my inquiry suggests otherwise: that it was entirely due to his world-record beating achievement. In other words, his achievement cost him dear.

We are an anti-achievement society. We prefer to inherit than to achieve. You can guess where this is going.

Whatever the field of endeavour, the inheritor is more respected than the achiever. We prefer Dalit-hood to be inherited than achieved. As for Brahminhood, it is a debased currency that no one wants to possess either way. Prime ministerial position is conferred or inherited rather than achieved through ability, track record and merit. So also other positions of  prominence in politics or government. Ditto for places in the so-called "professional courses", especially in Engineering and Medicine. Jobs are sought to be inherited through a process of ever microscopic segmentation of the society (in order to justify inheriting the privilege). History is twisted and wrung until rights and wrongs can be extracted  which are then used to justify some sort of entitlement programme in education and jobs.

Where does all this come from?

The Great Indian Movie which is a bellwether of Indian social norms, desires and aspirations and is a true mirror of the Indian society, reflects this accurately. The "hero" or the protagonist is invariably the scion of a titled moneyed and landed family of consequence. When in the beginning he appears to be otherwise, in the end he is discovered to be the long-lost scion of a titled, moneyed and landed family. His ability to single handedly take on a few dozen baddies and drop-kick and karate-chop his way into the heart of the girl and the audience is attributed not so much to his skills in martial arts as to the natural inheritance of a young man of noble birth. The "villain" or the baddie, on the other hand is invariably born on the wrong side of the bed or railway track, whichever analogy tickles your fancy, and is thus not a true inheritor of the riches or great facility with his legs or hands. He is invariably shown to be a thrusting upstart who was not born to greatness (but one who merely aspires to it) and therefore does not deserve it.

Even the Hindu mythology is full of this  line of thought. Some characters obtain great powers from Gods through diligent worship and through severe penance. In the end all their boons and powers are to no avail when confronting the ones who inherited their great powers. Just recall any story from the myths...

In modern times, Nehru was preferred to  Patel,  Indira to to a legion of politicians derogatorily referred to as the "syndicate", Rajiv to Pranab, and now Yuvraj Rahul to anyone of the  other aspirants.

The effect of this is nothing short of disastrous.  Instead of striving to achieve excellence or greatness, the race is on to achieve and accumulate great power and wealth so that the next generation can inherit them, thus gaining a leg up on their competitors. So we amass political power, land, money, gold and anything whatsoever which can be passed on to the next generation. That this act of amassing power and wealth requires one to break various laws and moral injunctions is the real issue. We have thus created a political criminal / amoral class who are all set to pass on their advantages to the next generation. The real damage is done to the psyche of the public: all that matters is acquiring power, whatever the means. Therefore the scant respect for the rule of law.

Achievements are democratic - anyone can aspire for them. Inheritance is reserved for the privileged few.

We are on the side of inheritance.