Skip to main content

Irom Sharmila’s Disillusionment


Irom Sharmila in Santhi Gramam
Sixteen years of youth is the price that Irom Sharmila paid for learning the lesson that politics is not meant for idealists.  She has reasons to feel disillusioned and dejected.  She has reasons to seek shelter in Santhi Gramam in Kerala. 

“Politics is dirty by nature,” she learnt the hard way.  There’s no place for idealists in politics.  The age of the Mahatma and his hunger strikes are fairy tales today.  We live in a world of hardcore pragmatism of the kind espoused by none other than Lord Krishna in Kurukshetra.  Politics is war.  Strategies matter, not idealism. 

“Dharma is subtle,” the great idealist can only philosophise. And perish for that Dharma. 

Ms Sharmila blamed money power and muscle power.  It’s much more than that, dear Ms Sharmila.  It’s brain power.  And there’s divine power too.  There is a whole pantheon of gods involved in this war called politics today in our country.  It’s a war to redeem Bharat from all kinds of mlecchas.  Money is just one of the many strategies.  Each time you hear great concepts like ‘development’ the idealist in you may be reawakened.  Development is a strategy too. 

Irom Sharmila seems to have understood that.  She has decided to quit politics.  Right decision.  Politics is for those who are “made of sterner stuff.”  Mr Sharmila has reached the right place, in the company of Uma Preman of Santhi Gramam.  Ms Preman knows how to combine idealism with humane pragmatism.  Humane, not Machiavellian politics. And pragmatic, not effete idealism. 

Best wishes to you, Ms Sharmila.




Labels:

Comments

  1. जितेन्द्र माथुरMarch 15, 2017 at 10:12 AM

    I completely endorse your views. The unscrupulous and mean politics of India got better of the idealism of the Iron Lady who fought relentlessly for truth and justice. She has learnt the hard way that in today's era (in fact, any era) truth and justice have to lose out to untruth and injustice because duals are always decided not by ideal but by might.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalMarch 15, 2017 at 3:23 PM

      Perhaps 16 years is too long a period for one to learn one lesson. I think Ms Sharmila should have realised the futility of her strategy long ago. Anyway, her idealism and naive optimism are far preferable to the venal strategies our political parties resort to.

      Delete
  2. VijayMarch 15, 2017 at 11:55 AM

    Maybe Akhilesh is a good and youthful leader. Sharmila regardless of the votes she won is a different genus- adopted a lifestyle of hardship - relentless fighting against atrocity of soldiers against hapless people of this country. When a soldier die in a fight to protect the country we salute them - when they do atrocities - government will never protect people - Sharmila did not agree the silence of government and people.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalMarch 15, 2017 at 3:27 PM

      As I mentioned in a response above, Sharmila's hardships went in vain. Strategies are important in politics. She failed to learn that. Now she remains disillusioned, feeling betrayed by her own people. We can't blame the people either. They have suffered much already.

      Delete
  3. Tomichan MatheikalMarch 15, 2017 at 3:25 PM

    As Vijay says below, Akhilesh and Sharmila have no comparison. Akhilesh will learn the lessons soon and become a successful politician. But Sharmila may never succeed as a politician.

    ReplyDelete
  4. UnknownMarch 16, 2017 at 10:36 AM

    Portable Water Filter Shop Best Chrome Faucet Diverter Valve, Replacement inline RO filter, Heavy Duty Water Counter Portable Water Filter Systems Los Angeles, US.

    Buy Best Quality with Latest Technology used Titan Water Heavy Duty Counter Top , 5 Stage water filter, Replacement Inline Filter, Reverse Osmosis & Membrane Portable Water Filter in Los Angeles, US.

    For more information you can check it out here : http://titanwaterpro.3dcartstores.com/Reverse-Osmosis-Portable-Water-Filter-System-_c_7.html

    ReplyDelete
  5. Durga Prasad DashMarch 17, 2017 at 4:34 PM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Durga Prasad DashMarch 17, 2017 at 4:35 PM

    First of all why do people like Sharmila think of entering Indian politics knowing full well the state of Indian political scenario. Same thing goes for Arvind Kejriwal. He started with bang. But by all indications, the party is turning out to be just another party out to grab the so called secular votes. His fellow party members have thrown all sense of ethics and morality to the wind. He himself seems just another power hungry politician seeking power and glory for its own ends.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalMarch 17, 2017 at 6:24 PM

      I think Sharmila thought that she could do something more meaningful by entering politics. Now the election experience seems to have taught her the necessary lesson.

      You're right about Kejriwal too. I had high expectations in that man and I voted for his party both the times as I was in Delhi in those days. But he disappointed me.

      Politics is irredeemable. That's why macho men succeed in it. Criminals rule the roost. Sad but what can we do?

      Delete
  7. SureshAugust 18, 2017 at 12:09 PM

    Manipur civil rights activist Irom Sharmila married her long-time partner Desmond Coutinho, a British national, under the Special Marriage Act at the Sub-Registrar's office here this morning.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Randeep the melody

Many people in this pic have made their presence in this A2Z series A phone call came from an unknown number the other day. “Is it okay to talk to you now, Sir?” The caller asked. The typical start of a conversation by an influencer. “What’s it about?” My usual response looking forward to something like: “I am so-and-so from such-and-such business firm…” And I would cut the call. But there was a surprise this time. “I am Randeep…” I recognised him instantly. His voice rang like a gentle music in my heart. Randeep was a student from the last class 12 batch of Sawan. One of my favourites. He is unforgettable. Both Maggie and I taught him at Sawan where he was a student from class 4 to 12. Nine years in a residential school create deep bonds between people, even between staff and students. Randeep was an ideal student. Good at everything yet very humble and spontaneous. He was a top sportsman and a prefect with eminent leadership. He had certain peculiar problems with academics. Ans
25 comments
Read more

Queen of Religion

She looked like Queen Victoria in the latter’s youth but with a snow-white head. She was slim, fair and graceful. She always smiled but the smile had no life. Someone on the campus described it as a “plastic smile.” She was charming by physical appearance. Soon all of us on the Sawan school campus would realise how deceptive appearances were. Queen took over the administration of Sawan school on behalf of her religious cult RSSB [Radha Soami Satsang Beas]. A lot was said about RSSB in the previous post. Its godman Gurinder Singh Dhillon is now 70 years old. I don’t know whether age has mellowed his lust for land and wealth. Even at the age of 64, he was embroiled in a financial scam that led to the fall of two colossal business enterprises, Fortis Healthcare and Religare finance. That was just a couple of years after he had succeeded in making Sawan school vanish without a trace from Delhi which he did for the sake of adding the school’s twenty-odd acres of land to his existing hun
19 comments
Read more

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl
37 comments
Read more

Pranita a perverted genius

Bulldozer begins its work at Sawan Pranita was a perverted genius. She had Machiavelli’s brain, Octavian’s relentlessness, and Levin’s intellectual calibre. She could have worked wonders if she wanted. She could have created a beautiful world around her. She had the potential. Yet she chose to be a ruthless exterminator. She came to Sawan Public School just to kill it. A religious cult called Radha Soami Satsang Beas [RSSB] had taken over the school from its owner who had never visited the school for over 20 years. This owner, a prominent entrepreneur with a gargantuan ego, had come to the conclusion that the morality of the school’s staff was deviating from the wavelengths determined by him. Moreover, his one foot was inching towards the grave. I was also told that there were some domestic noises which were grating against his patriarchal sensibilities. One holy solution for all these was to hand over the school and its enormous campus (nearly 20 acres of land on the outskirts
13 comments
Read more

Sanjay and other loyalists

AI-generated illustration Some people, especially those in politics, behave as if they are too great to have any contact with the ordinary folk. And they can get on with whoever comes to power on top irrespective of their ideologies and principles. Sanjay was one such person. He occupied some high places in Sawan school [see previous posts, especially P and Q ] merely because he knew how to play his cards more dexterously than ordinary politicians. Whoever came as principal, Sanjay would be there in the elite circle. He seemed to hold most people in contempt. His respect was reserved for the gentry. I belonged to the margins of Sawan society, in Sanjay’s assessment. So we hardly talked to each other. Looking back, I find it quite ludicrous to realise that Sanjay and I lived on the same campus 24x7 for a decade and a half without ever talking to each other except for official purposes.      Towards the end of our coexistence, Sawan had become a veritable hell. Power supply to the
12 comments
Read more