The photo below is of another sunbird perching on flowers while waiting to feed on nectar!
The eight photos of one sunbird perching in different surfaces in our garden fascinated me. On one occasion, it was seen perched on a slender rose stem gripping it with one foot and balancing vertically! The eight photo of resting on a leaf to feed on nectar with the leaf sustaining its weight was fascinating to watch !
Sunbird's ability to adapt and perch confidently according to its need is an intriguing bird behaviour!
The weight of a female garden sunbird is between 6 and 10 grams. So its presence is not 'weighty' on any surface!
An infant cries to indicate his or her need. When the need is attended to, most infants settle down and return to his or her regular activity. It is when an infant is not attended to or delay attention, the cry becomes louder and prolonged!
The voice of protest in the New Delhi streets during this week by young people, has become louder, stronger and disturbing. They were not heard for a while when they expressed concerns about questions related question paper leaks just before examinations, suspicion of merit being by-passed or when they found their names or members of the family or their neighbours removed from the voter's list and non existing people appearing in the voter's list who managed to vote or cast multiple votes by one person in different voting booths. Now, the young people took to streets to protest because they were not heard and attended to !
The protests in the streets become the democratic expression of the voice of hurting people! The way the police and the policy makers who oversee them, do not sense the grief and anger that pushed the youth to the streets and inflict injury by forcible physical action is distressing to watch, read and hear!
The rulers are called upon to rule to bring welfare to people! The democratic ethos is an interface between the electors and the elected. The electors give the right to the elected to govern! The elector-elected contract involves an obligation- the elected are accountable to the electors!
If the elected exerts a 'weighty presence' and disregards the needs of the electors, it is autocracy and not democracy.
I heard someone in a video referring to the 'dance of democracy' (the governance) which consists of a hand shake between the electors and the elected!
I feel that handshake is no more a reality between the electors and the elected in the parliamentary democracy in India now.
In this situation of chaos in the street, I heard a politician who is a leading voice, referring to the protest as resistance movement to seek for truth, justice, equality and fraternity! He even articulated the virtue of love and forgiveness, although many are hurt and 'taken into custody'! That highlighted the spiritual ethos of the protest!
A sunbird is present lightly, and perceptively!
That is the call to all the elected representatives, because they do not have anything more than what was given by the electors! What can the electors do when their voice is not heard or ignored? They become visible, loud and organised to tell the elected that they are chosen to carry the mantle of service and not cause injury to the already hurt electors!
Even while I have the above thoughts, deep within me there is an urge and hope that the leadership of the government and the opposition parties and youth organisations will be brought to a dialogue mood by peace initiators fairly soon. A mature democracy like that of india with 76 years of heritage does not have to be confrontational on matters of divergent views. I wish there will be an attitude of openness to engage the acts of omission and commission with a resolution to step back to restore the voting rights of 13 core people whose names have been deleted from the voter's list. The on going revision process of voter's list is not flawless. Therefore it needs attention and resolution.
When Alternate Dispute Resolution Practice was introduced in India about 30 years ago, we thought that the adversarial approach in times of conflict would give way to dialogue based negotiation process. That did not happen any where near to the aspirations of the court, advocates and disputants.
So here we are, we engage each other with suspicion or motivation blaming each other for partisan mindset. While that is on one side of, peace, conciliation and harmony are the aspirations of many!
The government ought to be the legitimate initiator for such a step of finding an alternative to conflicts and polarisation. A democratic government is 'of the people, by the people and for the people' !
I live in the hope, that we will find each other as neighbours in a common journey, to bring to the thirty percent of our population, who still live below the minimum rights or comfort of life, and inspire them with a hope to see a different future for themselves!
Let me suggest that the government is the facilitator to help the civil society to grow into an altruistic journey as a nation!
M.C.Mathew (text and photo)
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