Even as we begin to ask, is any of this ever going to make a diff, can I move on again, I'm going to spend some time here convincing (if only myself) about the arguments that are anti-change:

* Its elitist to ask for change this time: South Mumbai was attacked. Shrug. big Deal. Trains, buses were blasted to smithereens earlier. Who made such a big hue and cry then?
Answer: 15 years is a long time to keep shrugging. At some point if a last straw doesn't hit the camel's back, you need to wonder ... And what is elitism? Everyone’s only concerned when it affects them personally. You Gandhi? I’m not. I take 2 hours and 24 kms to reach work everyday. I stopped taking trains when the blasts occured, because I’m too scared to set foot in them, because I need to get home to my son every night. I can ill afford a car right now and after the cops were killed right next to it, I’m too scared to drive, though I still do. What’s my next option? Chopper? I’d tell friends I was shifting to Goa for a ‘peaceful’ life. They just sounded a terror alert in Goa. Where are you going to run now, girl? There’s no more saying 'Ill manage. Ill get past this’. The elephant is not only in the room, it’s bright pink, and it’s standing on your toe.
Solution: If you need a personal reason to join a movement for change, you need to find one that deeply affects you. We are all individuals looking out for ourselves. And hey, Gandhi needed to be thrown off the train in Jberg first to be able to be humiliated enough to want a change. Find that reason that works for you.

Terror and security are beyond me. Let the experts solve that one. That's what we hired/elected them for...
Answer: Have you ever hired household help and just let them totally do their own thing? A cook? A cleaner? A driver? An employee to look after the stock in the back office? Funds missing, stocks missing or misplaced, unexplained leaves of absence… Everybody needs supervision in a job. That’s what being a good boss is about. The best I’ve worked with always know what you’re doing with their office supplies even if they don’t need to keep asking. Beyond a point when nobody cares, the guy who is doing his job doesn't either. If everyday concerns of living in this larger framework of a nation-home is not our concern, it's not going to concern the guy you hired to do it either.

Solution: Use the Right To Information Act (fought for by ONE man), and find out about security concerns in your neighbourhood. You would move consumer court if an appliance you spent thousands on didn't work wouldn't you? You pay thousands in tax every year on security. Don’t not pay tax and deny yourself a utility. That’s self defeating. Make a fuss instead.

I don't make a difference. I'm too small. I'm a nobody.
When was the last time you read about ‘somebody’ changing the world we live in? Most of the achievements in the recent past, from the Grameen Bank to the right to unfurl the national flag in your home, to free food for kids in municipal schools, were achieved by nobodies. I can't remember a somebody who has changed the way in which I live my life in the recent past. I know many nobodies who have influenced me to be a better person. I’ve also learnt we are all not meant to be in the list of somebodies, win medals, reach glory. The black cat commandos were always shadows behind politicos ever since I was a kid. I think they’re way cooler and infinitely more powerful now.
Solution: Pick one thing you believe in and push for it. It can just be the recycling of garbage in your community corner. For all you know terrorists could just be planting bombs in rubbish piles at street corners! No one clears them up for days anyway! Nothing you do is ever too small. Maybe you can't move legislation, but like, all I could do was use my access as a journalist, and find somebody who would actually fix an appointment with the Chief Secretary of State and push him or her to go and meet them with some sensible points! I had more than 1000 unanswered smses from people who probably think I’m an smsing lunatic but all I needed was that 1 sms that said ‘yes, will do it for Mumbai’! Our plan is with the Chief Secretary and will go to the Home Minister next week. It's going forward.

I can't make this my priority. I have a family to feed, EMIs to pay, kids to educate. I can't take a pay cut for even a day. I need to get on with life.
Answer: Gandhi was a lawyer dependent on his brother for the support. It was important that he be a successful lawyer for the sake of his personal dignity and finances. He was living the Indian dream at that point. But he reached a point where he could take it no longer. He just personally couldn't live like that anymore. Then destiny propelled him.
Solution: I cannot fly to Delhi to meet the home minister with our petition, now that the state government has cleared it, next week because I simply can't afford it. This is the month that I clear school fees for the term, I was hoping to get the dents off my car and I honestly need a vacation. i also have a book to finish, my kid to play with and thousands of other things to do that are important to me if not anyone else! And the generous offer to pay for my ticket to Delhi is not the way I want to fight this battle in any case. I want to do whatever I can where I can within my means. If that means not shaking the Home Ministers hand and watching the plan be sealed, so be it. Did I fight for and get a legislation passed that I believed our country needed? Yes. Then I can go home and sleep in peace at night and let someone else take the baton and win the race. None of us are indispensable. Each of us has a role along a path, and you will know how far you can go along that path if you trust your instinct and know your motives. There is a point beyond which you can keep quiet no longer, there is also a point which, your destiny will find a way to take you, if that is where you are meant to be. Whatever will be will be, with or without you and me. That was what the Gita meant when it said act without thought for the fruit of your action. Whatever you do, ACT though. All of us are not meant to be glorious in war and garlanded and awarded medals. Some are meant to be the little guys. Don’t go all the way if you can’t. Every push helps.

I’m not an activist person and don't want to be seen as that loon in my colony who keeps protesting and getting arrested. I’m normal. I just want to lead my life.
Answer: Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit this earth. You don’t have to be militant and lead a rally to create change. You just have to want it badly enough and fear the alternative badly enough. A colleague a year away from retirement was describing the freedom fighters of his era. How fearless and honest and highly educated they were. Why aren't we like that I thought. The discussion naturally went to how corrupt politicians are. Is it just them? A speaker at the rally for the action plan spoke of creating a police force that people were proud to work for. Why do we expect from others what we cannot do ourselves? I know of journalists who have received cars and trips abroad for covering certain films, boosting box office ratings, I know that teachers in schools, once so instrumental in being guiding lights for student political movements, spend less time teaching at schools so they can take tuitions at home and make a quick extra buck. Do you really think we as a people can garner the enthusiasm of the youth for change anymore? We've all slipped a bribe to a cop for crossing a red light, and we've all bought movie tickets in black and reservations on trains and flights with 'influence'. You cannot call for integrity if you don't have it yourself. Society cannot find integrity in the upholders of its law, that is so blatantly and commonly flouted by its people.
Solution: This is not a societal change that will right itself in a few months. If you want the man in charge of the coastguard's boat surveying the Rann of Kutch to be the kind of man who does not allow militants to slip across borders for a few bucks, you have to be a society where such a thing is a crying shame. As a student in Kodai one kid in the Kotagiri Public School in Ooty was caught copying for an exam, and it was talk of the Hills for MONTHS! Every kid in those two towns knew his name! In the 9th grade I shifted to Bombay, and at our school's unit test the teacher sat on the desk as chits were being passed around simply saying 'Children don't copy." I was shocked! But I got used to it. It's not enough to get one's work done and move on anymore and blame someone else. When doctors push medicine's they're paid a commission to push, when journalists get bribes to push films or companies, when it's okay for teachers to make private gains, when your kids in South Delhi are drunk driving under legal age limit, why are policemen and politicians the harbingers of social change? Don’t want to be involved? Darling, you're already involved. You're either involved in taking it the other way, or pushing it in the right direction. Let he who is without blame cast the first stone.

Agendas cloud the issue, attention-seekers are a pain, and nothing changes anyway
Solution: Water finds its own level eventually. You can’t fake your way through an agenda for ever. Eventually attention seekers drop off, find something else that gives them more flashing light bulbs, and eventually those who are ploughing through are the only ones left ploughing through. When funds and publicity dry up, if you’ll still be there, you’ll find others willing to merge agendas and push through. Change is on its way. Maybe not immediately. Maybe not in this lifetime even. But change happens. That is the constant. When there is great evil, there must come a time of great good. I want to be there when that final swing pushes the world on its axis. And when change comes along, I want to be part of the people who make it happen. Sure that’s seeking self-importance, but if that’s something that propels me to stick on till the end, then that’ the reason I’m sticking with.

There, I'm done convincing myself. What about you?

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