Progress of modernism
Anybody coming to the Indian sub-continent will see that Indians are very much the same; surprisingly common things are so much, one can forget where you are in this vast land. However, once you are in, slowly, you will see the differences. Person arriving from Delhi to Colombo and on the road from Colombo to Kandy may thank the Gods for having allowed this break from the bitter cold of Delhi into such a lush paradise of warmth and water and throat-searing food. But we have to be careful because many say it is also a bit disorienting to be in this country.It feels like Indian, the landscape is especially so and yet there is something that is distinctly different. One does not get this kind of disorientation in a patently different land — Japan or Sweden for example; there everything is new and different and modern so one is clearly an outsider. And within greater India, even in places far away from one's usual place of residence there are reminders of the larger country one claims citizenship of the SAARC — Hindi film music wafting out of narrow lanes, life-sized posters of unpleasant politicians wishing someone or being wished by someone.
So, how are Sri Lankans different from greater Indians? of course there are all the text book stuff on Sri Lanka that was rammed down throats in classes on development in college — the remarkable literacy rates (virtually universal), the excellent health (infant mortality, maternal mortality and life expectancy levels that rival Western Europe's), the fantastic public services for health and education that persist in the face of a neo-liberal economy. Also everybody knows that this country has seen more than two decades of brutal violence, which appears to have finally ended or at least paused due to a period of even more brutal violence. But these are not things that one notes visually and emotionally disturbed enough to account for one's feeling of disorientation. Then what are these more obviously visible unique features of life in Sri Lanka? One media person answers 'I think that three startling differences make up the root cause of my disorientation. Maybe they are related, but maybe they are not — they are quite distinct and don't automatically accompany economic growth.'
First of all (and dearest to any democrat) is the ease and joy with which women traverse public spaces. In the densest crowds, such as in the packed public buses they ride in Colombo and in the heaving masses pay their New Year's respects in the Temple of the Tooth Relic in Kandy. Apparently if this had been India (and especially if this had been Delhi), there would have been few women daring enough to actually be present as well as to smile pleasantly at strangers. In Sri Lanka women smile at even male strangers, as male media people happily discover. Instead in India they would be fearful of being groped and mauled if young (or even middle-aged) and pushed roughly aside if old and weak. The second reason for feeling out of place in Sri Lanka, we are told, is that public spaces are unreasonably clean. Neither in Colombo nor on the road to Kandy did they see the mounds of filth-encrusted plastic bags and other forms of smelly or environment-contaminating waste that even the most expensive parts of Indian cities and towns revel in. Nor were public buildings and roadsides ungrudging receptacles for fiery red spit. We know this is an achievement in the last few decades due to the progress of modernism.
The third striking absence, according to them, was of the kind of degrading poverty one sees in such abundance in any place in India. One media person said "I don't think their poor and homeless get hidden from view as ours reportedly were in Delhi during the Commonwealth Games and, yet, even the one apparent beggar I saw on the street, and tried to give some change to, turned out to have a sheaf of lottery tickets she pressed upon me in return."
