It makes sense to look at traditional values that appear to be relevant even now and consider how they can be worked into the lives and perceptions of the young.
NOT very long ago, I watched a rather interesting documentary film made on different generations of students in a womens college in Delhi. The oldest ex-student who was interviewed said that after she graduated she got married because that was what her parents wanted. Asked by the film-maker whether she protested or resented their decision, she said no. It was something she took for granted; her parents had decided and she did what they wanted her to do. What about her degree in political science and all the studying she had done, was it not a pity she could not take it further, or use her knowledge for a specific useful end, she was asked. She smiled and said, But it was what my parents wanted. That was the most important thing for me.
The film ended with an interview with a young woman who had graduated recently. She was asked if she would marry if her parents wanted her to. She said she would not. On being asked why not, she said, Because I dont trust their judgment. I found this more interesting because both were educated, having graduated from the same college, but over 30 years the change in attitudes was significant.
There are, of course, the usual riders. While these views are by no means typical of the two generations and it is not possible to draw conclusions from them, the fact that they existed points to a change in perceptions over the decades. What one is trying to highlight is not so much the change as the differing attitudes of two former students chosen, if one goes by what the film-maker says, at random.
This kind of change is fairly evident today in the behaviour of people. The life of a good many married people has changed from that of the wife devoting herself to the home and children to one of both husband and wife working and leading a lifestyle that keeps them away from their children for a longer time than it was for parents 30 years ago. Demands have changed and, on the darker side, violence has entered social relationships and society in general at levels and in areas that may have been free of it earlier.
Again, these are statements based on what has been provided by the media, and it may well be that the media present more information today than they did 30 years ago, at least on these subjects. But it cannot be all put down to the media. There have been changes that have flowed from the increased access to education and the emergence of new professions one does not need the media to realise that.
Change as such is not something that would need to be discussed, leave alone worried about had that change been something that was accepted generally as a progression that was inevitable. The fact is, however, that a good deal of the changes have been dark, even ugly. Gang rape, for example, is something that has been occurring in virtually every city and even in villages whereas in earlier decades some cities took pride in the fact that women were safe on their streets. Kolkata is one such, when it was called Calcutta. It was taken for granted that the parar chheley (local youth) would ensure that no girl was not only not molested but not even spoken to in a manner she found objectionable. One understands this was equally true about Mumbai in the days when it was called Bombay, and about Chennai when it was called Madras. (The names have, of course, nothing to do with the argument it is just a historical signpost.)
It is convenient to point a finger at television as the villain of the piece but it would be facile to do so. It may be that television has a role in these dark changes, but there is a great deal apart from television that one needs to look at. One has mentioned the change in lifestyles brought about by the fact that both parents work, which in turn has become possible because of greater access to education, education that has increasingly become specialised with new skills being taught in more and more institutions of higher learning.
Another factor has been the gradual fading away of the joint family, which appears to exist only in matters relating to taxes, where the concept of the Hindu Undivided Family is a formidable entity. It is not something dramatically cruel, such as old people being driven out by ungrateful children in a King Lear kind of scenario, but something that has happened almost naturally.
Parents have built houses somewhere, children have found employment somewhere else and, inevitably, the children have begun to live separately. For example, in the apartment complex where I stay, virtually every family is of an old couple on their own, and, in some cases, of a single old parent as the other has died. The children work, for the most part, abroad or in different cities in the country.
The children of these children spend more time with their peers than their parents and, at times, the dark characteristics that we occasionally hear about, such as schoolboys killing one of their classmates or using violence more frequently, arise from a combination of all these factors.
It is natural to be appalled by such dark changes in behaviour; to fear for the future of the younger generation. But that will not be sufficient. It is necessary to come to terms with the fact that there are changes and that there will be more changes as the economic nature of the country changes, resulting in inevitable social changes. A mindless, strident harping on traditional values will not only not work, but may even be found to be funny, because there is a general tendency to glamorise the past, make it appear to have been a kind of paradise of perfect behaviour.
It makes more sense to look at old values that appear to be relevant even now and consider how they can be worked into the lives and perceptions of the young. One way, for example, could be through the arts. There is a story I was told by Mulk Raj Anand which may well be apocryphal that when Charles de Gaulle became President of France he asked his close friend Andre Malraux what portfolio he would like in his Cabinet. Minister of Culture, Malraux said much to de Gaulles amusement. Why Culture? he asked. Because I can then build cultural complexes in every town, Malraux told him, for schoolchildren to visit and see the arts for themselves. And that, Mr. President, will save your country.
Malraux did build such cultural complexes, Mulk Raj Anand told me, but one does not know what effect they had on the younger generation. If one were to go by the rush of applications to join the numerous music conservatories, art schools and the ballet schools run by such organisations as the Paris Opera, then they certainly have had an effect of some kind; not by conserving the old but by giving the new a deeper dimension.
This is just an illustration. It is imperative that some of those who are in positions of responsibility sit down and think about how they will handle change; not as a problem but as a natural phenomenon that needs a suitable response that can bring a greater richness to change and perhaps counter, to some extent, the darker, more negative changes that surface from time to time.
This is neither esoteric nor a luxury we cannot afford. The nature of Indian society in the years to come may depend on such consideration and debate.
