I’m going to write about three guys and their world views and I would try to figure out the credibility of formal education from it. 

The first guy is the taxi driver, who drove me from my home to airport on my way to US. He is a Somali immigrant to Australia and is a Muslim. He told me how concerned he was about the killing in Mumbai and one of the saddest days of his life was 9/11/2001. He was quite concerned about the misinformation, wrong teaching and murder of innocents in the name of jihad. I was quite impressed with this guy. He must have been an asylum seeker in Australia and he is not very educated. But his level of maturity, his world view, his guiding principle and his concern for Islam being used in a wrong manner are commendable. Contrast this taxi driver to the terrorists who carried out 9/11. Many of the terrorists were professionally educated. So my question is ‘Whether the modern education is really teaching us anything?’. All that the modern education is doing is producing workers for corporate. Otherwise how can we justify that a simple man, who escaped the killing fields of Somalia, has such a profound empathy for the humanity yet well educated blokes are killing innocents?

The second guy is a highly educated corporate worker in my office. A guy from China was having a conversation with this corporate guy. The Chinese guy was trying to say how Chinese way of life is different. Nothing more nothing less. But the corporate guy retorted back ‘If you don’t like Australian way of life you can go back to China’. I’m sure he does not really know what ‘Australian way of life’ is. He probably does not know that Australian parliament has said ‘Sorry’ for the atrocities committed on the aboriginal community. After the European arrival, Australia has been a melting pot of numerous cultures. So what is that elusive Australian way of life? It is a land of immigrants without a real culture and tradition. So I’m coming back to my question about ‘formal education’. How far formal education is helping us to be good human beings? I don’t think formal education is helping us in anyway except to be corporate rats. A century ago, Gandhi was absolutely correct to realize this.

The third guy is the taxi driver who drove me to Chicago airport. As he is an American I assume that he must have been educated. He is running his own transport company. I asked him the ‘Political’ question i.e. whom did you vote ‘Hillary’ or ‘Obama’? He did not support Hillary because of her outbursts, which is definitely dangerous. He was frank enough to acknowledge the stupidity of Americans (credit culture). He was also candid enough to speak his mind on ‘Trigger happy Bush’. Highly qualified people from Top-MBAs become Investment Bankers in USA. And we all know who screwed the economy and how. So let me visit my question again. How far formal education is preparing us to be good human beings?

Richard Branson is not highly educated and nor is Bill Gates. But any Harvard MBA will bend over his/her back to get a job at Virgin or Microsoft. So bottom line is that prevailing formal education will help you to be a corporate worker but it won’t help you to be a responsible and enlightened human being.

My dispute with my neighbour has a long and nasty history. People say we both are at fault. We have fought long and hard in past. But we were at peace since last few years. But all of a sudden my neighbour started throwing grenades at my home. I was very concerned about my family. I tried to persuade him to stop. I appealed to others’ in the society to stop this atrocity. But nobody came forward and the grenade attack continues unstopped. What were the alternatives for me? Should I wait for some of my loved one to be killed? Hell no. I banged my neighbour hard and kept banging him till I destroy all his grenades. I wanted to ensure that he won’t repeat this story again in future. I’m sure I have the right to safeguard my family.
Following are the actors.

Me: Israel
Neighbour: Hamas
Society: UN and other countries

Logic is very simple. I can’t blame Israel. You can’t always be hard pressed. If you don’t take action you will be judged as weak and you will invite more injustice. So get up and take the battle right to the doorstep of the enemy. And that’s what Israel did. With due respect to the choice of Palestinians, I can’t see the rationale of selecting Hamas in an election. I don’t think any rationale person would have difficulty to understand or guess the tragedy of an urban war. But it seems Hamas leadership either does not care about the death and plight of Palestinians or is irrational. As I’ve always maintained that you should cast vote by mind not by heart as your choice will determine your future. I sincerely hope that we all learn from this tragedy and take steps to avoid similar situation in future.

Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death

– Patrick Henry

In my childhood, once I asked my mother to buy me a parrot. I was fascinated by the talking-parrot of my neighbour. My mother said that parrot will never be happy to be caged. It will certainly get better food, better shelter, protection from predators and love from human. But it will still be unhappy because it will lose its freedom. If it wants to fly, it won’t be able to do so. If it wants to meet other parrots it can’t. So locking an animal is not a good idea. Well, I was not convinced. I thought she has a fancy story to deny me what I was asking for.

But twenty years hence, I can understand my mother’s perspective. Without much knowledge about world affairs and the theory of ‘freedom’, she relied on her common sense and culture. Freedom is something that is birth right of every person. Freedom is a very intriguing concept. We can never have absolute freedom. But freedom with justification and mutual respect are what we all need. We can force another human to do things that he/she does not like. We can wage a war and subjugate the enemy. We can kill and wipe out civilizations to assert our power. But can we buy the sprit of a human? Never. Spirit can’t be caged and can’t be conquered. Spirit is free and will remain so.

History is the best teacher. Turning the pages of human past is the best illustration of the value of freedom. Mighty empire of Britain is nowhere to be seen now. And that empire is never remembered with respect either. British Empire is a hated figure because of its attitude to rule by force. That mighty empire is now confined to a small country off the coast of Europe. Great fighters such as Alexander are not viewed with respect. They can be great in their country, they can be great military commanders but they are not great human beings. Who commands more respect than Mother Teresa? A frail woman conquered the world with her love and affection. Another great example might be Buddha, who ran away from his palace, wandered in Ganges plain and preached us Buddhism. People who win over the heart and mind of others are respected over centuries and millennium. And these are the people who preach the spirit of freedom. By granting freedom they spread the principle of love and friendship. But those who cut short the freedom could not hold on to their machiavellian plan for long. They dot the history as evil and serve as examples of what should not repeat.

I’ve come across and interacted with people from various countries. Level of freedom varies from country to country and society to society. It has always been my experience that people from countries where there is no freedom for speech tends to be much less happy. They might enjoy economic success and luxury of life. But as the parrot story goes, material pleasure can’t be a viable alternative for real freedom.

In India, We already have a certain degree of freedom. But we need to couple the freedom of expression with freedom from hunger. Real freedom is not possible until we wipe out poverty. As long as there is hunger there will be repression and exploitation. When 40% of Indians go to bed hungry, it is a huge social problem. Poverty is due to lack of opportunity and we all should work hard to eradicate the inequality and help others achieve their freedom.

Reading the comparison between India and the US especially when it comes to democracy is quite familiar. This comparison is more intense now as the US and India are cozing up as far as defence cooperation goes. Well I have always held the US to be the most successful democracy in the world, but that notion will crumble when facts are examined.

India got its independence in 1947 and US in 1776. India has 1.1 billion population and the US has 300 million. So it is statistically easy to brand India as the largest democracy and the US to be the oldest democracy. But I believe India is largest democracy but the US is NOT the oldest democracy. India as a democratic country is older than the US as a democratic country. My reasoning is very simple and it is as follows.

Democracy is all about right of people. And in a country ‘right of people’ means people having the freedom and choice to choose a leader. Let’s flash back on the history of the US. Technically it is a democracy since 1776. But only white and male citizens were allowed to vote. Then slowly at the beginning of twentieth century white women were allowed to cast vote. And not until 1960s African Americans were allowed to vote. But in India since Jan 26, 1950 all citizens are treated equal. Male, female, white, dark, upper caste and lower caste all have same right in India long before the US gives its citizens the same right. Thus India as a democratic country is older than the US. In India we don’t say Punjabi Indian or Tamil Indian. But in the US the term ‘African American’ and ‘Asian American’ are quite common even today. So a person whose parents came to the US 200 years back from Africa is not an ‘American’ but an ‘African American’.

Let’s look at the type of leader the US citizens are choosing over past two centuries. Till now, the US does not have a non-white, non-Christian president. All presidents in the US are male. Does it mean that women and non-white are so intellectually deprived that they can’t lead the most successful country in the world? Contrast it to India. We have a Sikh Prime Minister (PM) now. Those of you who don’t know what ‘Sikh’ is, it is a religion. Don’t confuse ‘Sikhism’ to ‘Hinduism’. They are different. India had a woman as PM. We had PM who could not speak our national language. We have Presidents from minority communities. India seems to be a better democracy than the US.

Well I’m not justifying anything. I’m just convincing myself that despite all our problems we can come out victorious. If the US is most prosperous and successful nation in the world with all its defects, why can’t we? We have a better system in 60 years. We can always match and surpass the US. Democracy and freedom is our strength. Let’s transform the land of million mutinies to the land of million opportunities. From chaos will come ideas. All we need is an able leader who can unite the country under a common goal.