The other day a discussion with few classmates ogled at the notorious tweet messages floated by our respected Minister of State for External Affairs, Mr. Shashi Tharoor. The chit-chat amongst us was as intriguing as the statements put forward by Mr.Tharoor.
One of us was of the opinion that both his tweets were in right light and conveyed a symbolic meaning that can be interpreted only with a good intellect. This was no doubt acceptable but a half of us argued that if you assume a public position where masses look up to you, there is a high degree of responsibility associated while making statements. Especially when someone like Mr. Tharror who’s been a diplomat for most of his life knows the subtleties involved in statements’ formation and execution.
On retrospection, I thought probably, he could have put a disclaimer that all opinions are entirely personal without representation to any ministry or government body. But then, realized that conventional wisdom is always as individual’s take and if you are no-nonsense individual (with a professional representation), you better legitimate your wisdom with public sentiments.
The tweet for replacing Gandhi Ji’s birth Anniversary (Gandhi Jayanti) on 2nd October with a working day was the most astonishing thing to have come across in recent times. This raises few blatant questions which I would certainly want Mr.Tharoor to answer in continuation of his tweeting obsession:
What levels of productivity do you expect to achieve after working for 365 days a year (excluding Sundays and other holidays)? Do you really expect it to improve? One really don’t need to put on thinking caps to realize that a continuous working culture leads to stress and lower levels of productivity rather. The maximum number of deaths in a less populated country like Japan arises out of work stress, are there any lessons to be learnt here?
If productivity is so important, equally important is efficiency i.e. using the minimum inputs to get the maximum output possible. This is where Austerity in truest form comes into picture dear Sir with devoting less time to cyber public (in form of tweets) and more time for real, striving individuals in state and the country.
As rightly pointed out by a reader of The Hindu newspaper, if working on Gandhi Jayanti is so important to uphold the Father’s principles, how many of us really consider “work is worship” principle of his during our life time when we work on every working day. Isn’t the application of this principle of Mahatma Gandhi important when all other arguments are important as you pointed out Mr.Tharoor?
The greatest anomaly with Mr.Tharoor’s tweets lies in the fact that even if we start working pan country from next year on Gandhi Jayanti, soon the day would come when people would start bypassing this day as any hackneyed day of the year, which in very long run, rather than remembering Gandhiji’s idols & philosophies would only convert into twinge of selective memories long forgotten.
Through this article, I only wish to bring to the fore the message that when you assume power, there comes great responsibility with it (as said in Spiderman movie).And when you are a public figure, you rather weigh every alphabet of your speech before making any statements be it personal or official. All views expressed here are entirely personal with no intentions to hurt anybody’s feelings or opinions.
