INDIA'S PEOPLE ARE FINALLY SHOWING THEIR ANGER
Authoritarian, inefficient governments, with a devious agenda, who do not work for the good of their people, will not remain in power for too long. We are out on the streets in the hundreds of thousands, in every corner of the country, because this government has destroyed the economy, it has taken away our freedoms one by one, and it is now trying to divide us on the basis of religion. This evil citizenship act needs to be repealed immediately. I stand with all the courageous men and women in my country who have risen up in anger to peacefully protest (their behaviour is unlike that of the murderous mobs that have lynched and killed innocents these past few years) this latest attack on our rights and all the attacks that have preceded it. History teaches us that governments that muzzle their people, governments that destroy their people's dreams, governments that lie to their people, governments that impoverish their people, governments that do not listen to their people, such governments will soon be history -- and their passing will not be mourned. To show my solidarity with all those who are protesting I reproduce below one of the most famous protest poems in contemporary literature.
I Am the People, the Mob
I am the people—the mob—the crowd—the mass.
Do you know that all the great work of the world is done through me?
I am the workingman, the inventor, the maker of the world’s food and clothes.
I am the audience that witnesses history. The Napoleons come from me and the Lincolns. They die. And then I send forth more Napoleons and Lincolns.
I am the seed ground. I am a prairie that will stand for much plowing. Terrible storms pass over me. I forget. The best of me is sucked out and wasted. I forget. Everything but Death comes to me and makes me work and give up what I have. And I forget.
Sometimes I growl, shake myself and spatter a few red drops for history to remember. Then—I forget.
When I, the People, learn to remember, when I, the People, use the lessons of yesterday and no longer forget who robbed me last year, who played me for a fool—then there will be no speaker in all the world say the name: “The People,” with any fleck of a sneer in his voice or any far-off smile of derision.
The mob—the crowd—the mass—will arrive then.