A Giant Spitoon Called India

What's is it with us Indians that we think the whole country is a huge public toilet or one large spitoon? Many may have written and spoken about this topic in length, but little seems to have changed on the ground. Most of our brethren continue to defecate, urinate, and/or spit as, when, and where they choose.

And believe me it has got nothing to do with being rich or poor. I have seen beggars have a go on our compund walls and I have seen guys owning Mercedes cars open the door or roll down the window and splash the ashpalt with red or brown paint, depending upon what their gutters, oops mouth, is masticating at that point of time. I just have one question: Why eat anything that is so inedible that you need to spit it out?

This malaise cuts across religious lines. I guess it mainly has to do with lack of ownership. You don't see this happening in most parts of the Western world and the Middle East. However, off late the bug seems to have bitten many in Sweden. But wait before we jump in joy; studies show that it is people from our part of the world who have decided to fertilize Sweden.

No wonder we find it extremely difficult to get visas to any country remotely Western. This reminds me of a Lalu joke that used to do the rounds a few years ago. It went like this: A Japanese prime minister on his visit to Bihar told Lalu, the then CM, that give us Bihar for three years and we will turn it into another Tokyo. Pat came Lalu's reply: Give us Tokyo for three days and we will turn it another Bihar. To my Bihari brethren, no offence meant.

As I said, it has to do with ownership, or lack of it. To me, we as a people don't think that anything that is not registered in our names is ours. Hence, roads and public infrastructure are not ours. So why bother about keeping them clean. It's the government's job, right?

The problem to this solution lies in people understanding that though it is public property and we do not own it, we do pay for it. For those smartalecs who believe that since I do no fall into the income tax bracket, I can deface public property, here is the answer. Dear friends, you also pay for the building and maintenance of public property. Remember the VAT and local taxes extra that you pay on almost every item that you buy?

Yes, that's right. It's your property too. So people take ownership. Even if you feel it's a waste of time advising people against it, you can refrain from doing so individually. That's all we need; if every one of us acts individually, we can and will make a difference collectively. The point is do we think strongly enough that we own more than our homes; we own India and India makes our home.