An aunt of mine working with a public sector bank was moaning yesterday about what she called the erosion of values in today’s times.
Yesterday was Martyr’s Day, the day Mahatma Gandhi was shot dead. And it is customary to observe two minutes of silence at about 11 in the morning, as a mark of respect for all those we know as matrys in the cause of this free country. She says, our bank forgot about this…. are there no values left? What will my children grow up respecting?
Today is Preity Zinta’s (1.) birthday. FM radio stations in Bombay have not stopped repeating this fact, running contest after contest in Zinta’s name. And people have not stopped pouring in with their messages, all for an autographed t-shirt from the Zinta lady herself….. get ready for this aunty, this is what your children and my children will grow up with….
Reminds me of an October a couple of years ago. The month began with the afore-mentioned Gandhi’s birthday and progressed on to the birthday of a close friend (now turned foe) of another erstwhile Gandhi. Amitabh Bacchan(2.)
It was AB’s 60th birthday that year and we all but had a national holiday…… Someone had calculated the column space devoted to AB in TOI and figured that is was a few hundred times more than that given to MK Gandhi. All that Gandhi received amounted to a passing mention and a day off for the staff. This was not restricted to the TOI but common to all media.
After all, what does Gandhi (not Sonia, people, I am still talking about Mohandas) mean to anyone today? This is not meant to be a eulogy for Gandhi or an argument about his relevance in today’s times. This is only a question about values, as they exist today…..
We are talking about kids who voted for Anil Ambani as their role model, bypassing other ‘contestants’ like Abdul Kalaam and Sachin Tendulkar……
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1. Preity Zinta is the current reigning starlet in Hindi cinema
2. AB was a close friend of Rajiv Gandhi and his wife. The friendship was as publicised as the consequent fall-out with Sonia.