The aam insaan - frozen in time and space

I live in the city of qilas and makbaras. For Dilliwalas and especially, purani dilli walas, Lal Qila is the most important monument. It stands as the symbol of a romanticized imperial past. It was, afterall, the residence of their beloved emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar and also of their culture. Whenever I look at the Lal Qila...the beautifully-carved halls...the jharokas...the massive Darwaza and the pit outside the Qila which in its heyday, had water with crocodiles, I try to go back in time, trying to imagine how life must have been in those days. While scenes from Jodha Akbar and Mughal-e-Azam would help me in my quest, a smile would flash across my face and I’ll lament, “wo bhi kya din hote honge”. I would imagine if Bahadur Shah would have never been defeated… how things would have been so different… No, wait…DIFFERENT …really??

Even in the time of mughals, if I was what I am now... would the Lal Qila be mine? The grandeur attached with it and with the Badshah…the mehfils… the chaka-chown, in short, the romanticized past…Would I have had a stake in it? No... Because I am just an aam insaan. Whether it is Bahadur Shah or Manmohan Singh… whether it is Lal Qila or the Rashtrapati Bhawan, I am but the aam insaan. I was suppressed in the 18^th century and still am. Whether it is for their Mahals or their swiss bank accounts, it is I who suffers the burden of heavy taxation. I am the mohra in their political games. In their fights, it is I who pays. I am the one who dies when there is a ‘disagreement’ between two rulers. I am the one who dies, gets raped or become orphaned during the communal riots. I am the one who pays the heaviest during an economic crisis.

There have been movements and revolutions which are attributed to the ‘will of the people’. French Revolution…America’s war of Independence and Russian Revolution, they boast about the support of the masses. But little did the masses actually achieve. Even Russian Revolution, ultimately, led to the dictatorship of the rich and the powerful. Infact, when Lenin claimed to established the ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’, the rural proletariat referred to him as the new Tsar! Today, the general political form of existence is democracy or rule by the people(demos) but we know the reality. Our ‘representatives’ have now even established dynastic rule. Their posts are even becoming hereditary.

So why should it matter to me If it is Shah Jahan or Vajpayee on the throne? They are the rulers and I am the one who is always the ruled.