Why are most hindus so utterly slavish towards their heroes?

Indians have heroes, who must be honoured, whether they do good or bad.
I think that Right/Wrong have a definitive value but most Indians act otherwise.  They believe that right/wrong does NOT have a definitive value. Instead, whatever their hero does is RIGHT and what he does not do, is WRONG. They find a person who has a raja image and then whatever that person does, becomes the definition of 'good'.
Let's take an example.
They select an MP/MLA, who obviously believes in the ideology of the party he belongs to. Suddenly, the MP/MLA switches to the political party with an opposite ideology. Common sense directs that the followers would ditch him because but that does not happen. They remain his committed followers whether he professes right wing politics or left wing politics.
Left wing or Right wing politics is not the follower cares about. He cares about his hero. Whatever he does, WHATEVER absolutely, is the definition of 'right'.
Not only can the hero change his political ideology, he can also commit murder/rape etc but won't lose even one follower. We have numerous examples in India, where people follow those convicted of such crimes.
The follower has no concept of right/wrong on his own. Whatever his hero does is right, what others do is wrong.
Observation of this phenomenon over about 15 years set me analysing possible reasons.  Soon, I traced it back to our (hindu) mythology.
In Hindu mythology, there are two events which should be a matter of great shame to anyone, but us.
One. Lord Rama threw out his pregnant wife to the woods, just because one of his lacs of praja cast a weak aspersion on her and that too in a private conversation. Now any man banishing his wife to jungles, so that he could win over a dhobi, must be an truly evil ( and power-loving) man. But Indians do not think so. Their logic is - Ram is our hero. If he banishes his wife, he is not to be blamed. However, others doing so ARE to be blamed. Whatever my hero does IS NOT TO BE QUESTIONED.
Second. Lord Shiva found his son, Ganesh, dead. Now, like all good Indians, he did not take the view that the guy had only these many days of life, so why lament. Take it in your stride. No way. He ordered to his army - find me the head of someone which I can implant on my dead son. The guys went around and found a cute little baby elephant. They (must have) told Lord Shiva, 'Sir, the baby is alive'. The Lord ( must have) ordered,' Don't argue. Who pays you - I or the elephant? Just cut of his head and bring to me, pronto'. The sychophants complied.
Now Indians don't find anything wrong with this act of Lord Shiva either. He is the Lord - whatever he does IS RIGHT.
That DNA has brought us today to - Whatever my PM/MP/MLA/filmstar/boss does is the definition of right.
Ours is not to question our heroes. Of course, we will question your heroes. After all, we are hindus.
Does that explain what we are today?

What's wrong with our star PM, Modi?

Can something possibly be wrong with the darling of crowds from Delhi to the US, one of the 20 most powerful men in the world, one who announces one hugely successful scheme every month (or is it every week)? Yes, of course.

You see, fan following and election results do not mean that the guy was right. Had majority approval indicated sagacity, Congress government in the centre and the Communists in Kolkata must be treated as highly sagacious people, for most part of India's history. But the voters of today say something else. And so will those of tomorrow. Let's leave TRPs for Arnab Goswami.

So, despite his highly impressive popularity rating, what's wrong with N Modi?

If one must start with a summary, it is this - He simply loves the stage too much and avoids cleaning up the attic. He is just not getting down to what really ails India, because doing that may not be glamorous enough.

Swacchta abhiyaan, Pradhan mantri jan dhan yojna, Make-in-India, Look global-connect local (or whatever), Yoga day, visit to Siachen, Man ki Baat etc are good things. I mean it. But dirty streets, poor not having a bank account, outsiders not manufacturing in India, relations with Australia & Japan, not doing enough Yoga etc are NOT what is wrong with India.

So, what IS wrong?

Saw it on TV recently that a child dies of diarrhoea in India every 10 minutes and 15 die of malnutrition every hour. A road accident victim dies every 4 minutes. We have ghastly figures of rapes, non action by police force, no teachers in government schools, unacceptably polluted air in our cities, government doctors cutting up females for tubectomy faster than a butcher cuts up goats, people waiting for 30 years to get justice, others being kept in jails for 15 years for terrorism and then released by Supreme court for 'No case'. That's what's wrong with India.

This is what keeps India at a disgustingly low 135 number position at the UN Human Development Index (HDI) in a list of just 187 nations. Did you know that nations like Gabon, Samoa and Palau, are ahead of India in that list? Did you even know the names of these countries till now?

Let us accept that Modi has been only a few months and all problems we see noted above are the legacy of the Congress misrule.

But has he taken even the baby steps necessary to correct this? Isn't it better to remind him now while there is still time, than at the end of term?

Cleanliness is best sorted out by penalising those who dirty the streets, by improving the number of safaiwallahs and the equipment they use, by improving drainage and by ensuring that every penny given for these schemes is actually utilised for the purpose. For how long will PM Modi, Amitabh Bacchan, Nita Ambani clean our streets? I suspect that they have other jobs to do as well.

Children education and school conditions have to be improved by putting more money in education and not by getting Coca-cola and NDTV to do what the government should be doing. HRD ministry will have to do more than pass instructions to IITs about unsuitability of non-veg, tamasic food for Indian students. Oh yes, it has happened. Even I didn't believe it initially.

Justice system and police system can easily be improved by increasing the number of judges and correcting the glaring deficiencies of the police force, which have been repeatedly brought out by several committees. Any move in that direction? None.

Anything wrong with Jan-dhan account yojna of the PM? Everything. Government’s decision to extend overdraft facilities without incorporating adequate checks is a potential harbinger of bad loans for a sector already reeling under its worst NPA crisis in years. This “will mean Rs 75,000 crore for 150 million accounts,” columnist Swaminathan Aiyer wrote in the Economic Times . “If these are not repaid, banks will lose Rs 75,000 crore at a time when the PJ Nayak Committee says they need to raise an additional Rs 5.8 lakh crore just to meet the new Basel norms for capital adequacy.”

As an overview, one sees that NO attempt is being made to make the existing system work. ALL effort is towards starting new schemes.

Another objectionable aspect of his policy is the deepening of the hindu-muslim schism and India-Pakistan divide. There is absolutely no doubt about this. All said and done, the UPA did keep a peaceful, war-less, border with the SAME neighbours. We know that a war puts the economy back by 10 years. Building up the economy incrementally and then causing it to slide down radically, doesn't make sense.

Manmohan Singh could have been excused for not taking up these issues because Congress had so few MPs that he just had to do what the allies wanted. That's not much of an excuse for any PM, but with 280 MPs, Modi doesn't have even that fig-leaf. He has enormous power and he knows it well. Remember, how he used the obnoxious ordinance route within days of taking over. For what? Not to do something for the poor but to change service rules so that he gets a Chief/Cabinet secretary of his choice! No one could stop him. So the question is - You know how to rough-ride over others; so how about doing it for the sake of the country! When Superman refuses to act in public interest, we must ask 'why not?'.

It is true that with this majority, no one can stop him. That is what makes his non-action in critical national issues, more worrisome. His is not a 'can not do' case; It is a 'will not do' one.

And what is the legacy he has from BJP? Remember how, with much lesser BJP MPs, Vajpayee came to within a whisker of solving the Kashmir issue. With 280 MPs, Modi can solve the Kashmir issue and all other issues mentioned above, before you finish reading this post. And as for Vajpayee's legacy of ethics, do not forget that he lost his government by just 1 vote, which he could have easily managed. Just asking for voice vote, not a division, would have saved his government. But Vajpayee was an ethical man.

Why don't we give Modi more time? Why not just tell the dying poor of India - 'भूख लगी तो सब्र कर, रोटी नहीं तो क्या हुआ, आजकल दिल्ली मे है, जेरे बहस यह मुदद्आ (If you are hungry, why not have patience? These days they are discussing your very problems in Delhi). The poor may turn around and say - खाक हो जायेंगे हम तुमको खबर होने तक ( At this rate, we'll perish before you get to us).

Is overall shortage of resources the real problem? Let me narrate a story on that. In a flood situation, a rescue boat came around a drowning man. When the boat master refused to pick up more of the drowning on the pretext that picking up more would topple the boat, one drowning man said, 'I agree that you have are overweight as of now. But what if you asked that rich man sitting yonder to throw off his golf clubs?'

Our problem is of governance and administration, not of economy. Nothing works, because no one takes the pains to ensure that it does. It is much easier, and paying, to start a new one instead. No one gets penalised for not doing what he is being paid to do. Indian government is a bottomless pit in which you can pour scheme after scheme, and get no results.

The answer lies in putting a bottom in this bottomless pit. Let us ask Modi not to start anything and put his enormous abilities to make the existing provisions work.

P.S - The first few lines of the book 'Punished by Rewards' (Alfie Kohn) seem to describe well this situation of Modi frenzy -

There is a time to admire the grace and persuasive power of an influential idea and there is a time to fear its hold over us.------------ At the point when the objections are not answered because they are no longer being raised, we are not in control. Then we no longer have the idea. It has us.

Also posted on LinkedIn here  See comments there as well

'Oh, nobody cares for the soldiers' lament

'India does not honour its soldiers. How bad! Let us tell the society how unfair they are being'.
This is the lament of several soldiers and ex soldiers. Not unlike the frustration of the VP marketing of a soap company that people no longer buy their good soap. They shout 'I have a lovely product. It is my clients that are lousy'.
Well, it is for the people to decide what value they wish to assign to us. What interest can we possibly have to 'educate them'. Do we have to sell our soap to them?
We are not a security agency to sell our services to a housing society or a factory at the best possible terms. We are a force created by the will, sanction and resolve of the people to have what they want to have.
Oh, I see. So, their act of assigning low value to us will weaken our motivation which will weaken their own security. Well, let it. Are the armed forces an insurance against external threat or an instrument to boost the security consciousness of the country? let us not assume roles that are not assigned to us.
Who is ultimately responsible for the safety, or anything, of the nation. It is the people themselves. If they decide to live with reduced safety, let them.
And what should be the response of the new generation to taking up these jobs which have lost all attraction. Well, don't join the armed forces. Take up other jobs. There is no conscription in India.
Organisation of retired army officers prepare big fat files, full of copious data about how poorly they are being treated by the government and take these files to whom? The very government that they are complaining about. Proud warriors of yesterday turned pathetic favour seekers.
Instead, they should drag the government to court. And do so scornfully, as an equal contestant.

Should soldiers die for a country?

I recently saw some photos of several Jap ships sunk in the Truk lagoon in Polynesian waters sunk by American bombing in WW2. Saw skulls of soldiers at the bottom of the sea and was nauseated. Everyone dies but - is this the way to die? For what and for whom? For some emperor, some PM, some industrialist who will make money out of the war.

The Jap sailors died this horrible death fighting USA - which is today Japan's biggest ally! Japs went and made friends with those who dropped atom bombs on them. The dollars did came from America, I admit.

The situation is same in India. As a Colonel, I was running around the jungles of Manipur looking for NSCN  crooks (Naga insurgents) , while government of India emissaries were having meetings with their chief abroad to have a treaty with those killers. A treaty which they finally did have. Imagine. Govt of India actually had a formal treaty with those who had been killing Indian soldiers for more than 20 years!

Are such governments worth dying for? 

And let us not say that soldiers die for the nation and not for any government. Nation is an abstract concept. What soldiers die for is a government order, signed by some under-secretary of the Ministry of Defence. If soldiers question that and refuse to go to battle, they would be court-martialled. The penalty of death to a person refusing to honour that order has not been kept there for nothing. That's the reality of nationalism and patriotism.

Does dying for others make sense? If one maintains that this is just one form of employment, I have no problem with it. One takes up a job for money and accept the risks inherent in it.

But to connect he death of soldiers with some concept of national spirit and commitment is dishonest doublespeak. We want them to die so that we ( the bosses in all segments of society ) may continue to live and make more and more money. We glorify the death of soldiers, purely for selfish reasons. If we don;t do that at periodic intervals, there might be no takers. Hence all this drama.
Only dacoits, revenge-seekers and revolutionaries die for a cause. Others die for money. Nothing wrong in it, but at least accept it.
I find my view echoed across time and globe. In the movie' Troy', I find warrior Achilles advising his friend 'Fight for yourself. Don't throw away your life for some fool (or some bum - my words)'.
Our own Ravana ( fictitious account - ASURA, by Anand Neelkantan) ) recounts the reality of death on a battlefield, when he lay dying, ' Bandicoots. Big dark hairy rats. They conquer the battlefields after foolish men have finished their business of killing each other'.
Do also read this one.

And, this too.
This, too, might make sense to you.