Lessons we must learn from history

The only and main purpose of history is to draw lessons in various facets of life from politics to art and craft including literature. What lesson our political history gives  us is a matter to be pondered even by our politicians who claim to know everything in politics and history but seldom draw lessons from it. Let us draw one instance, the late Bapu Mahatma Gandhi in his last days, just after the freedom spoke his conscience. He said in one of the meetings of the Indian National Congress that now as our goal of freedom is achieved so we should dissolve this organization. In its place, we should form a Lok Sewak Sangh and all the erstwhile Congressmen should dedicate himself or herself to  community works leaving the political field to new and younger elements. If we analyze the implications of this sane advice it would be crystal clear that Mahatma Gandhi wanted fresh blood to be infused into the body politik of the nation. At that same time, he foresaw the impending danger of power politics which has the general tendency of being corrupted. The dictum goes :  power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. The great Mahatma was a great  visionary  and hence he gave this advice. But unfortunately, his advice was not heeded by the then top leadership of the Indian National Congress. The result is today for all of us to see. The whole system of governance is corrupted from top to bottom. Who is responsible for this mess? For the sixty four years of freedom, the Congress party has been at  the helm for most of the time. Hence, the onus of responsibility lies mostly with this national party. Although, the other national parties are also to be blamed for this rot, But surely Congress has to take the lion’s share of blame on herself. During barely six years of rule by the Atal Behari Bajpai government at the center the nation felt the pulse of a new, vibrant  and democratic style of functioning which gave a different image to the NDA govt. But, then the people had trust on Atalji which was missing in other leaders personalities. Besides other weaknesses, corruption has been the bane of the Congress governments. From the very onset, this party has followed the policy of caste and religious equations, thus weakening the very concept of the India nationhood. Citizens were not looked as equal citizens but as members of such and such caste and class which created the vote banks. This vote bank political culture has done more harm to the nationhood than good. Muslims and Christians for example were not looked as equal partners in the nation making but as minority beings who were mostly made to feel insecure against the majority community. The process of assimilation was never followed and the same policy is persued in case of other backward and scheduled caste and tribe communities. It is not surprising that the regional parties are  gaining  ground at the cost of the national parties. Even the BJP which was considered as a nationalist party even if in a bit narrow sense, with the passage of time to find a short cut to power began to follow in the footsteps of Congress and thus has lost the nationwide appeal which it once commanded. Please Advaniji! people of India are now more conscious than you all expected and hence they have lost faith in your style of politics. Please come with something concrete and nationalistic issues than trying to copy Atalji’s secular credentials.