is the place of contention between Telengana and other parts of State. Truth be told, office spaces and townships here are on par with any city in Western world. Road which leads to Durgamma cheruvu is a clear indicator of land boom. But along with this nouveau riche we'll also witness grinding poverty. The proximity of that kind of poverty is really troubling.
India is a land of diversity. That's true in cultural aspects and also in wealth
distribution. I guess India is one of the countries where so much of wealth is in the hands of very few people. That's true for any country (80:20 theory). But after spending time in the hustle and dust of Indian roads, the disparity is more drastic here in India. The poverty we witness from our train journeys are emotionally exhausting.
The following two things crossed my mind in the last few weeks.
One of the widely quoted lines from the Hindu Dharma is Manava Seve Madhava Seva. Indian people are also very religious. We all go to Temple, pray to God(s) and plead them to fix our problems. After that we'll generously put money in the temple Hundi. The moment we step out of temple, our generosity ends. Half of us wouldn't give a single rupee to the panhandlers. Many of those beggars are really old people with physical ailments. There's no obligation to give money to them, but these are the needy people. Almost all the religions teach the same principle. Feed the needy.
Indian weddings are really long with so many rites and pujas. So much money goes into it. Dinner or Lunch for the guests is one of the significant features of any wedding. These days astronomical amounts of money is spent on food in Weddings. But that's restricted to our guests only. We tip the servers and cooks so less and scold them for asking tips. I am guilty of few things mentioned above.
Above two things which I mentioned are related to the upper middle class families. There's another class in India who gained immense wealth in just 5 years through corruption, and contacts in Government. One prime example is Gali Janardhana Reddy. This person donated a diamond Crown to Tirupathi Venkateswara Swami. That crown costs 42 Cr Rupees. (9 million USD). (Don't get me wrong here, I'm also a devotee of Venkatewara swami, but he's already rich. He's not in dire need of new 9 mil USD Crown.) So all the wealth gained through Nepotism turns into God's jewelery. Ironically he also talked about Madhava Seva and Manava Seva. I wish at least these people help the extreme poor and needy instead of contributing to God's jewels. This might at least provide them some redemption. (as if they care)
My thoughts aren't very clear on this. The poverty here troubles me a lot. Govt. spends so much money on welfare programs, but most of it is sucked out by politicians, govt employees et al. Poverty, lack of education and street crimes go hand in hand. If progress can be made in one aspect, we can see improvement in other things. Not sure when that day will dawn on us.
Well I'm one of those numerous bloggers complaining about India. But I'm willing to do more than just writing about. I'm looking for those organizations and if any one can point me to a a right organization I'll contribute my time and money to them.
Peace.
Update 03/15/10
Actually, there's a change in my position about the beggars/homeless people outside temples. I started recognizing faces of few of these people who're there while I was in college. They've been doing this for more than 10 years and don't allow any new person to beg outside those temples.
I just want to use this as an example to portray poverty. I don't mean to imply that person denying money to beggar is a bad person. There're many ways to help the needy and contribute to society. I stand corrected now.
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