Tuesday, February 1, 2011

The great Indian dream

We denizens of third world developing countries have often heard about the great American dream. You know, the pursuit of happiness and all that jazz. I often wonder what the great Indian dream is. Is it to become a business magnate like the Ambanis and Birlas? Is it to become a malicious politician with enough clout to mess with each and every law in the country? Is it to become a Bollywood star and shimmy your way to international fame? The answer, obviously, is a big, fat NO.

The great dream of the Indian Pappu is, putting it simply, to get to America and become American. Or get to the UK and become English. Or to Australia or New Zealand or Canada or Ireland or Germany or whatever developed country and become a citizen. As soon as we are a considerable number in the foreign land, we try to create a mini Punjab, Andhra or Tamil Nadu- Punjabi unions, Tamil committee, Telugu association, Tamil Brahmin cultural congregation and so on and so forth. The "Gelf" is akin to motherland for the Mallus, the US is Telugu and Tamil territory and "Kaneda" is infested with Punjabis.

Our hypocrisy is so ingrained that we keep struggling to get a citizenship in the developed countries while singing praises about "Indian culture" and shouting "Bharat Mata ki Jai". Personally, I find nothing wrong with being a bit of a hypocrite. I mean, it is getting FDI into our country and it is helping the emigrants get beautiful wives and enough dowry. So what could be wrong? Moreover, most PG students in the US are foreign nationals wanting to escape their own third world country. So why single out the Indians?

In a recent news report, Telugu students of one bogus "Tri-Valley university" have been tagged with radio trackers on their ankles. The news reports say that the students were conned and are not guilty of illegal immigration. I reckon that the news report is trying to con its readers. We all know that Telugu people have an irrepressible determination to live in America. It is a popular pastime in gongura-land to eat huge quantities of rice with ghee and lentils, while plotting how to migrate to America. After migrating to America, they join the local Telugu union. Then they eat huge quantities of rice with ghee and lentils while plotting how to get an American citizenship. Basically, anybody who has interacted with Andhraites can tell that they can give their right arm, go gay and even give up their gongura pachadi for a year in order to live in the US.

Besides, one look at the website of the university and any idiot can understand that it is a sub-standard degree factory. There is no possibility that anyone was tricked into getting admission into that university. The fact that 95% of its students were Telugu is enough to understand that they were getting into the sham knowingly.

What is funny is, why is this being made into a big issue? We have been doing this for years, one way or the other. Only difference is, that this time we were caught doing hanky-panky in a large group. If two people are caught having sex in public, it becomes a joke. If it is an orgy, it becomes a scandal.

Everyone knows that many Indian and Paki students get admits to universities in the UK and then go to work without a work permit. The same thing happens in America. Many Punjabis stage marriages complete with Patiala pegs and chicken-shikan to get to developed countries on spouse visas. So what's the big deal? All roads lead to Rome, and if you stop us from traveling on one road, we'll take a detour and reach the land of dreams via another. Ha! How smart we are.

Currently, our foreign minister Krishna is making the right noises in the media. The US has conceded to a 'case to case' investigation to ascertain whether the students are guilty or not. Unless the students are deported, they will definitely find their way into another institute and continue living the great Indian dream.

And the radio tags? Oh, those are the unfortunate few who caught the eyes of the investigators. In all possibility, they are coming back to the land of the Tirupati laddoo.

Meanwhile in Hyderabad, in an baffling display of extreme levels of human pigheadeness, the All India Student's Federation protested against the Tri-valley university. This shows that we Indians only need an excuse to protest. I mean, protest against a sham university that is about to be closed down? WTF!