Not many people are lucky to share a friendly and interactive relation with their faculty, but in my Law College, it was amazing. I would even have discussions with them over a cup of tea, in a stall somewhere near campus. It was exactly in such a situation when I had a discussion with two of my faculty members, and realized a wrong perception that many people had that needed to change. Till that day, even I lived in the hallucination of how my duties end with one act, but now I know better, and I believe that my worthy readers should know about it too.
Well, my first post in the blog was about voting, and how we had a right 'not to vote'. I remember how after 26/11 people said that we chose the government, and its their responsibility to take care of us now. I argued the exactly same stand with my professors, and he laughed at me and said. "You really think that by casting your vote, you are done with your responsibilities?" I argued for sometime on my preconceived notion that voting was the optimum duty I could do, and thus shift the burden to the shoulders of the people I would choose to represent me. I am sure many of you think the same too. However, is it true?
Well, the Constitution of the country guarantees a very important right under Article 19 (1)(a), it being the 'right to freedom of speech and expression'. Wrongly thought to be a rephrasing of the 'freedom of press', it is arguably the mos prominent of rights when it comes to assuring appropriate governance in the country.
This freedom includes the freedom of press, but it is more importantly a freedom that asks us to act and react to the situations around us. Many a times, we see problems around us, but how many times to we actually do anything about it? I remember complaining about the road conditions in Bangalore, but I never bothered to voice my opinion in public. I never bothered to find out how I can make the authorities know about the condition of certain lanes in my area, but I somehow never failed to complain about them.
Go to any government website, and there is a link to lodge your concerns. I remember looking into the website of Bangalore University, finding out the mail addresses of the important people there, and when I sent mails to them, all the mails failed. I know this must be the situation all around in many of the sites. The best part is we see the failing mails, and then leave it there. The truth is that when we end our efforts there, we are failing in our duty. There are other channels to find out better medium of informing the concerned authorities about your grievance.
NGOs do a very credible job of voicing people's concerns, and that can also be used. M C Mehta, the most prominent lawyer in environmental matters takes to the Supreme Court any matters that need the expertise of the Courts to settle them. (http://mcmef.org/) Public Interest Litigations are an important tool in our hands, where the voice of the common man can reach the apex court and be heard.
However, with all of this, I want to highlight how the whole idea of completing our responsibilities by casting a vote is misplaced. Our responsibilities are much more deep rooted. We need to realize how we should exercise our freedoms to channelize our problems and make them travel to the ears of the concerned authorities. We have the rights which assure us that privilege, but we do not react. That is the moment when we fail to do our duties, and thus loose our right to complain too. It is important that we do our part first with due diligence, and then point fingers at our representatives and the executives in the government.
For my worthy readers, I would like to provide some links where it is shown the importance of the freedom I was talking about:
http://www.rtiindia.org/forum/54357-city-based-techie-uses-right-information-act-bring-about-change-society.html : The power of RTI, a facet of the right I was talking about.
http://www.pucl.org/from-archives/Media/freedom.htm : A good reading material about freedom of speech and expression.
http://sanjukta.wordpress.com/2009/02/24/welcome-decision-by-sc-restricting-the-freedom-of-speech-often-absued-by-bloggers/ : Without any doubt, it is an amazing blog written by the writer, much better than what I have reproduced. It would be really interesting to read it...
Well, with all this I just hope to instill a sense of responsibility in my readers as to what the should do instead of tease India and its governance across the 'coffee table'...
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