Kerala Feeds: <<=M=H=O=>> The Sethusamudram shrine....

Wednesday, January 30, 2008

<<=M=H=O=>> The Sethusamudram shrine....

The Sethusamudram shrine
Anger at dissent isn't reason enough

The Sethusamudram shipping canal project's

okay will be decided between the

Supreme Court and our politicians,

but

there is one aspect to it

which is becoming disturbing.

This is the notion that unease,

let alone dissent,

on the project is traitorous to Tamils,

much like any questioner of the

Narmada project in Gujarat has to take into account

the risk to his own life and property.

Like Narmada,

the Sethu idea always had

a number of ecological and economic issues

which required reasoned debate,

and the fact that successive governments

in Tamil Nadu were so convinced that

they made it an issue of prestige to get

an okay from Delhi isn't enough of an answer.

Yes,

the required procedures at

Chennai and Delhi

were gone through, but the degree to

which environmental and public concerns are reflected

in government policy is an issue on

which there is much to say.

Indeed,

part of the answer given by the

Supreme Court majority

which cleared the Narmada project

was that it was rather late in the day to decide

on a halt when so much money

had already been spent on it,

a view not shared by the dissenting bench.

The occasion for making this point is

the recent event at the Southern India Science Fair at Tiruchi,

where students from close to 200 schools

from the four southern states displayed projects on various themes.

One, from a school in Andhra's

Kurnool district, questioned Sethu on various scientific grounds,

triggering angry protests

from political activists.

And the district administration's

Chief Educational Officer was quoted saying

he had warned the students as

"no one can be allowed

to question our project on our soil."

This is an extraordinary attitude

for such an officer to take.

Education

is about opening the mind

to factual reasoning and inculcating an attitude of inquiry.

In our rather conformist culture,

it is something that school students

insist on freedom to question

the official mind.

Exactly

what lesson was being taught,

when they got an official warning

instead of the debate they asked for?

We in India

are particularly prone

to this regrettable mindset,

of driving home the value of shutting up

in the face of majority or official opinion.

It is not an attitude

which makes for a healthy society

and if governments and politicians

don't intend to take a lead

on change in this regard,

the rest of civil society must do so,

in our own interest and that of our children.

--

Hinduism is more a way of life than a method of worship.
Dharmo Rakshati Rakshithaha
If you protect Dharma, Dharma will in turn protect you

__._,_.___

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