The Wild West Theory

It all began with the stroke of a pen by Thomas Jefferson in 1803. Louisiana was bought by the Federation of United States of American. The wild west was created. And so was the term we today know as the "wild west". The wild west, was not just a territory, it was an idea. It was a concept, that of lawlessness and immorality. It was a land where courts were not honoured and presidents gave a blind eye to any and every illegal activity. I think the India of today, is just that - The wild west of the new east.

One need not go further than our very own gali to understand what I mean. Invariably the sight involves a couple of guys riding a bike on the wrong side of the road creating nuisance for the girls of the neighbourhood, or an aunty parking her car in the middle of the road in impeccable fashion gushing with self praise at the achievement! We do not bother to say thank you nor do we bother to hold the door for someone behind us. We dont believe in giving other vehicles side because we dont believe in lane driving, or worse, most of us dont even know that the lanes are meant for driving in and not for fog driving! We are a nation that's always in a hurry, we never follow lines and rules. We believe we are smart and hence can break the law without harming anyone...!

After having thought about this for a long time, I think I know the root cause for the way we behave. We're all insecure inside and are only too eager to throw the insecurity aside by some outward power show. India is the country with the highest savings percentage in the world. We save more and more, without spending a penny, till the day we die, because it makes us feel rich. We break lines to move ahead, because it makes us feel "on time" even though there is no deadline to be anywhere, leave along being "on time". We honk and push and shove our way through traffic, because it makes us feel that we're not going to be late, even if it were a ride from office to home after work. We never gift our old stuff away, because we feel it'll come in handy, when it hardly ever does.

Insecurity is the single largest reason why we behave exactly like lessor educated men and women behave over 200 years ago half way across the globe. It took them 100 years to become a super power in the world and over 150 years to give women the right to vote. It is a shame we are still the same wild west after 63 years of independence even after having learnt from the American experience. Even then, if we are hell bent to follow in their footsteps at their pace, I wish this country and its citizens good luck, for they need it a lot, for a long long time to come.