I love India. I love its diversity, its idiosyncrasies, its magic. I love its people. I love the way we stay unorganized, and still manage to surprise them all with the end product. i love the intelligence that’s found in abundance here. there are thousand sundry other things i may love to list here, but i choose not to, as there’s another aspect to us, which i would much rather want to highlight. and that’s the cynicism, the hypocrisy that we usually propagate at every possible instance. Here’s what i mean:

- When casually walking on the road, in your office, in a mall etc, how many people smile at you? Or to how many people do you smile? Compare the same when you are in US, or in any developed nation…We Indians probably think a stranger is mad, if they smile at us. Does it harm to smile at someone, even if you do not know him/her?

- How much support do we give to someone who is climbing the ladders of success? How happy are we with the progress being made by someone who is not directly our family? Is our tendency not to pull the person down at every possible instance? Of creating and sharing detrimental stories about that person, as we are not too keen to see a person grow?

- How convenient do we find to criticize our society, our system, our bureaucracy, our shortcomings, our red tapism and so on? How much effort do we put in placing things right? How many of us are willing to pay the traffic cops the full amount against a challan? And then we go on and blame the Indian system as being utterly corrupt?

- How many of us dont think twice before spitting on the road, before throwing litter on the road, before smoking in public, before criss crossing the road with scant respect for rules, for lane driving? How many of us follow the rules and procedures? How many of us love breaking the rules, without thinking twice? And we suddenly change, as soon we step out of India?

- How many of us have pride in our country and more so, in the cities we live in? Perhaps Mumbai is the only city where people are passionate about being a mumbaikar. Where else have you seen that passion? Is Delhi passionate about hosting the Commonwealth Games, which are barely 9 months away? We keep complaining about the state of roads, the dust, the construction, the mess that Delhi seems to be because of all the ongoing projects. But have we, for a minute, stopped to think of what it might all eventually lead to? Is it for our better future? Is it fair to criticize every single motive, every single step that the Government takes? Is it fair to boast about the Delhi Metro, after spending months complaining about the same, when it was undergoing construction? Where was/is the support, when projects are underway??

- How many of us use condoms openly, but suddenly feel odd/shy when asking for the same at a chemist? How many of us start sweating when a condom ad comes on TV, with the family watching? How many of us are shy of uttering the word sex in open, but are amongst the craziest breeds in private?

If all this is not hypocrisy and cynicism, then what is? Why can’t we stay happier? Why can’t we smile more often? Why can’t we appreciate the good, honestly? Why can’t we respect our society, our fellow citizens, our rules, much more than we do? Why do we love to place the blame on to the other? Why don’t we take things in our hand, and try to make a difference, rather than waiting for someone else to?

Can we truly say, We the People, and not We the Cynics?