What Is The Great Indian Story?

When the U.S Senate confirmed her nomination to the U.S Supreme Court, Judge Sonia Sotoyamor became the first Hispanic to ascend to that high office. What’s great about it? Read a small bit of her life story:

Her Upbringing: Judge Sonia Sotomayor has arguably lived the American dream. She was born to a Puerto Rican family and grew up in a public housing project in the South Bronx. Her father was a factory worker with a third-grade education, and died when Sotomayor was nine years old. Her mother raised Sotomayor while working as a nurse. After her father’s death, Sotomayor reportedly turned to books for solace, and she says it was her love of Nancy Drew books that ultimately led her to the law.

Of course this is just a small part of her life which can be correctly labeled “The Great American Story”. Over many years those of us who have been watching events in the U.S have heard this term The Great American Story/Dream.

To the uninitiated I may state that this story inspires every American no matter how recently he or she has migrated to the U.S from which country professing whatever religion speaking whatever language belonging to any race. It is about the small guy who made it big. This story inspires everyone to believe that ‘Nothing Will Stand In The Way Of A Person However Small To Start With, Becoming Successful As Long As That Person Has The Enterprise And The Willingness To Work Hard’.

From Abraham Lincoln to Obama to Spielberg to Steve Jobs, you can name any sector of legitimate human activity and one can name at least one American — of whatever ethnic origin — who has achieved tremendous success by dint of hard work and the spirit of enterprise ‘With No Initial Advantage and No Family support’.

To be sure there are a large number of successful people who hail from India or were born in the US but their parents or grandparents had migrated to the U.S with few personal belongings. . . There are for example — Kalpana Chawla, Bobby Jindal…

C.K.Prahalad, Vinod Khosla, Amartya Sen, Manoj Shyamalan… to name only a few. I can assure you that there are many Indian origin successes who remain anonymous because they work in fields that are not commonly highlighted in the Indian media. To cite two instances Indians were involved in the teams that developed the Lasik Surgery technique and the external drive which are now household terms but are not necessarily widely discussed. The question I seek an answer to is this: what is the great Indian story/dream? Is there a great Indian story at all?

My preliminary answer – subject to reader’s corrections — is that our story has not yet evolved. We are a young nation though an ancient land. In the years after Independence we have been fighting against immense internal and external challenges and have been trying to arrive at a paradigm on many issues. We are yet to internalize what it means to be an Indian. At a visceral level we feel it in our bones what makes us Indian but we are yet to arrive at a practical manifestation of this Indian-ness other than the negative characteristics. Our priority has been equality rather than quality and here we differ from the U.S which is a meritocratic country. It is meritocracy that will ultimately give us the answer to what the great Indian dream is.

I have asked this question about the great Indian story or dream — to my many friends and acquaintances in India and have found little concrete response But when I attended a Diwali celebration in New Haven in Connecticut many Indian speakers— the willingness to speak at the drop of a hat may be part of our answer to what it means to be an Indian — recalled that they had migrated to the U.S to chase the great American Dream and how most of them had realized this dream. The gleaming cars outside the auditorium told a tale that words cannot tell.

As things stand now we come across several success stories in India but due to the sheer diversity these successes are largely localized. Thus Rajnikant had he been an American would have been a part of the Great American Dream since Americans admire the small guy who made it big no matter what his skin color. Rajni might have been alongside Will Smith, Denzil Washington, Sidney Poitier -all blacks and Hollywood greats— but in India his dark skin makes him a local hero at best who arouses amusement if not downright ridicule elsewhere in India. Language and other barriers prevent the development of pan Indian heroes.

When the film Slumdog Millionaire received Oscars the irony struck me. Here is a Bollywood film made by foreigners filmed with Indian actors, music director and some technicians. The film failed in India but was a roaring success all over the U.S. Why did India give a lukewarm response but the US went into a song and dance about it?

The film reaffirmed the great American story! The story of a slum boy making it big did not resonate with the average Indian viewer. On the other hand most Indian success stories in business, politics, films, etc are seen as beneficiaries of an advantageous family background or scarred by shady behaviour. Not really role models to inspire the down and out.
K.R.RAVI