A day to celebrate the efforts of all peace harbingers and to
re-instill the feeling of ‘World Peace’ is the objective which I de-code from
the occasion of International Day of Peace. From spreading the message of ‘Peace
is Possible’ and awareness amongst the people drives millions of ‘ignorant’, ‘war
mongers’ to take on the white flag than guns and ammunitions.
I won’t shy away from sharing that I was not aware about the
fact that we have a day especially for PEACE and we have a PEACE BELL made of
coins donated by children of every country except Africa, which is rung at UN
Headquarters in NYC giving a boost to the Peace aspirants. The bell is a reminder
of the human cost of war and the inscription on its side reads, "Long live
absolute world peace”). Isn’t it a beautiful manner of making each person understand
how much does a war takes toll over human life?
Coming to this month’s theme i.e. how does we can keep the
Peace Process between India and Pakistan alive- I believe amidst the hatred spewed by the people
on the both sides, there exists deep rooted- distorted history, naïve misunderstandings,
and deliberate misrepresentations which we can’t just change within seconds.
There has to be a constant sweeping away of the implanted news and the
information along with the destruction of the multiple interpretations of much
debated history. (On a lighter note, after seeing historians and parliamentarians
fight over what actually is correct history, I realize this is the same reason why
I scored badly in this subject.)
Also, it might sound very mindless but why we are so hinged
upon our history. No doubt, it is a source of reference and it gives us insight
into how, what and why the people of a country reacts and grows but then again,
are we going to keep our grudges to what has happened in past and not welcome
the extended arms from the other side?
Extended Arms? It seems like I have lost it as there has
been no such action taken by the governments in the recent past. But, wait they
had! Prime Minster – Nawaz Shariff accepted the invitation sent out by Prime
Minister- Narendra Modi for the latter’s swearing in ceremony. Also, Mr. Modi
gifted Mr. Sharif a saree and had a decent talk though small but
effective. Isn’t it a manner of
extending arm? The problem lies with expecting way to beyond than what is
possible. Indians would wait to Sharif to hand over the terrorist and
Pakistanis would expect India to hand over Kashmir. We never see a silver lining
in small but constructive dialogue and that is where we transgress from the aim
of ours i.e. peaceful co-extistence.
Appologise for myself getting de-railed from the centric
theme! Coming back to the means that we could apply to have peace songs across
the borders are as follows:
- A change from ‘ME’ to ‘WE’ i.e. let’s not look at Indo-Pak problem from the prism of one’s hatred but let’s plunge out of the prism and see the search for peace in the eyes of masses.
- Putting a stop to the blame game and flow out a carpet of Understanding i.e. be considerate to the others problem and be patient enough to acknowledge the reason behind any failed talks, cancelled meet from the either side.
- Move ahead from Hostility to Friendliness+ Anger to Happiness which would mean to shift the agenda from mocking and demeaning the member of neighbouring country to accepting the flaws and helping him/her to rectify it.
- Placing the Pride beneath the Love. I am not asking you to not to feel proud of your motherland but before the love for your country comes love for mankind.
- Replace Jealousy with Co-happiness. Rather than wasting time to demolish the achieved product of one country, we can use the said time for productive sharing of knowledge and grow together.
- Emphasize more on being humble than powerful. I think this quote will explain this point- “Do you wish people to think well of you? Don't speak well of yourself- Blaise Pascal”.
- Be sympathetic to each other’s losses than to be cold. We both lose our men and resources by spending it on each other, while we can put both man force along with means to a better work.
- Intolerance to Tolerance, I am not again asking you to tolerate if any armed men from our side intrudes into yours but we can be tolerant enough to the harsh words spoken by those in power and not react impulsively which would make us repent later.
- Switch from self-denial to self-acceptance. It is funny to see actually when in the age of technology, the state representatives defending the act of their men when their act is in public domain.
- A drive from Social In-acceptance to Social Acceptance i.e. to treat people of both sides irrespective of their affiliation. At the end we share same culture and lifestyle.
These are few of the many methods
in which we can build up our relations and help the animosity fade away.
Also, though Fatiq is unavailable
for a while to continue our monthly chat because of his prior commitments, it
doesn’t mean that I will cut off and call our peace process an end. Similarly,
it is the manner in which the governments of India and Pakistan should work;
more maturely, more sensibly and giving a cooling off period to each other. Not
every time is apt to continue the talk but it doesn’t mean we will stop the dialogue
mechanism as a whole.Further, we might have one leader
from Pakistan who claims to get hold of whole Kashmir and gift it to the awalm
of Pakistan or a leader trying to embed the bogus idea of ‘Love Jihad in India,
but they won’t succeed as people belonging to both nations are not living under
the period of ignorance at present.
We might have thousands war
mongers but we also have millions like us who strive for a peaceful
tomorrow. It (Peace Day) is not a one
day affair and it is also not a utopian practice, in fact it is the day when we
commit to ourselves that we shall bring Peace to this globe.
Dear Pessimists, we know it is not
an easy task to replace bombs with hugs, but we are a bunch of silly stubborn
souls who loves to take difficult task on our platter and successfully achieve the
objective.
At the end I don’t know what would
constitute an ideal peace process for India and Pakistan as I am still learning
what it takes to be Peace Builder. As I have mentioned above, I am at stage
first, I hope to get hold of the issue as time passes and from my co-peace
builders.
Till then, PEACE !
