A TRAVELOGUE
"Liberty will not descend to a people. A people must raise themselves to Liberty. It is a blessing that must be earned before it can be enjoyed"
The bullets have produced everlasting scars in those red bricked wall. They are narrating their not so glorious story of security breach that registered those wounds on them in a December 13 daylight. We stood there picturing how things unfolded that day through the elaboration given to us by our guide.
This is the epicentre of Indian democracy- our Parliament. The voluminous structure built in our imperial past with huge pillars and eye-catching corridors. We were following our guide as a herd following its shepherd. When he was rushing us through things the large pictures that hung on the side walls of the low lit corridor caught my attention. As always was, I stared at them with utmost interest reading every little details given below. The pictures depicted the evolution of Indian civilisation admixed with characters of our epics and puranas. I wondered how much our past is mixed with our beliefs and folklores, to such an extent that one couldn’t be delineated from the other. Making his impatience clear, our otherwise pleasant guide instructed us to move fast as we haven’t till reached our main destination yet.
Yet again the sheer size of the structures around made my jaw drop down. In the first floor we walked through the corridor viewing the outside world between its huge pillars. A mild breeze was flowing right into our face. We were walking through the corridors of this great institution and the very thought filled in me much pride and well being. Before entering the Loksabha we again entered a creepy low lit corridor. The guide knocked the doors and as he went toward it a low beep sound suddenly creaked into the silence. The scanner fitted outside each door read the identity card hung over his chest and made that little beep.
We entered the Loksabha viewers gallery as he lead us and sat in it as the guide started explaining things to us. He explained us about the various seating arrangements, the method of operation, the voting system, so on and so forth. He also told about the two "translator rooms" with all enthusiasm and we were amazed at the sheer work load of those sitting there and interconverting every word that is said on the floor of the house. Then came the "prize question" from our commentator. How will you distinguish the look alike Loksabha and Rajyasabha from each other? We were dumbstruck. Even after being regular ‘viewer’ of the parliamentary proceedings in the television I didn’t notice or think of any difference in the two apart from the title given by doordarshan as to whether we are watching rajyasabha or loksabha proceedings.
" Look at the floorings"
Uttered our guide as he turned out to be the winner .It was green. Now I see it –green, green all over the place. He explained –as the parliament was built on the model of the British one, Loksabha represented the House of commons and the Rajyasabha the House of Lords. Green of Loksabha represented the people and its representatives (the commons) and the Red of rajyasabha represented the royalty (the lords).
The Rajyasabha was definitely looking more royal than Loksabha with its red attractive floorings, its cushion seats and with its entire look. I was amused by such a finding in our "modern democracy". May be it represented our attitude to democracy, our irresistible link with our imperial and feudal past.
Now we descended through a narrow little ladder which our guide aptly introduced as the "secret passage". We entered the common hall for joint house of parliament. A large hall with interesting upturned fans. The pictures of our great leaders, former prime ministers were hung all over the place. A sedately smiling Mahatma stood behind the president’s chair. All our eyes were straying through those photos when my eyes stuck at one. It was hung exactly opposite Gandhi at the far end-of Savarkar. I was caught in the paradox in it. Savarkar an early revolutionary who later turned abruptly into a "hindutva" ideologue was even alleged of links with the assassination of the Father of nation. He was staring right into Gandhiji with a sheepish smile. May be all this are the representations of our "evolving" democracy and nation.
We took ourselves then to the central park with towering statues. All these created amusement and belonging to the visiting tourists in daylight but terrorised the staff around in the night ( in the words of our humorous guide). Finally we were coming to the end of our memorable parliament visit and as we collected our things from the security area and thanked our guide it was already twilight outside.
We walked from outside the parliament to the area of ‘South and North blocks’ and towards the Presidents palace(Rastrapati bhavan). The well built black roads along with beautiful fountains attracted our imagination.
We took our turn in photographing each others. Walking into the Rastapati bhavan we get south and north block on either sides. When we were returning, the awesome sinking sun made us ecstatic. The huge red globe was descending rapidly behind the brownish building giving it an unusual charm. Between the mesmerisation produced by this whole experience my attention got stuck at those few words that are written over a doorway of North block. It said-
"Liberty will not descend to a people. A people must raise themselves to Liberty. It is a blessing that must be earned before it can be enjoyed"
On besides this great institution of our democracy these lines made me think whether we the people of India are ready to earn our Liberty. Has the time come for us to raise ourselves? To free ourselves from the clutches of our ‘coloured lords’ who have taken the baton of power from the ‘white lords’ 60 years earlier. Only time will show us the way.
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