Samikhsya Bureau
What a transformation ! Those days Independence Day or Republic Day kept us days before it agog with a sense of cheer on the parade grounds. We came from different schools and colleges, attired for the day as students, taking part in the rehearsal sessions when the end part keep us more enthused than the drills. It were the small packets of tiffin that normally includes a few lozenges.
There was then no need of any identity, no gate pass nor anything to prove the legitimacy as a participant. Before the march-past we were left stand-still till the guest for the occasion comes in.
Then the lectures were just brief, remembering the greats like Netaji or the Mahatma for whatever they did to make the nation .
Now, there is a paradigm shift in the content of the speeches aired from the rostrums. Topics now range from village square issues to International and unity to divide. It has become more political than patriotic.
There were hardly any bamboo fencings lacing the stretch from one place to another, which by now has become a round the year eyesore.
There were hardly any police ‘bundobust’ all along and, the only police visible were the participating groups from the barracks.
We from the NCC were the privileged ones, lead by the leader cadet, clad in tight and starch caked uniforms.
Anyone then could just walk in from any side to get a glimpse of the parade. That was a different kind of no holds barred independence.
Each one who showed up there was a legal citizen, no gaping eyes looming on anyone nor were any concept of sharp-shooters panning their eyes like kites from roof-tops.
Now the taste of the freedom gets sieved through many layers. Barricades are the principal features making all the outlets to freedom blocked and Ids.
Today the celebrations belong to a certain class and not to the ones like us, as then. That way the Day can now hardly belong to us, but only to a system .
