LETTERS!!!

an article written by Madhu Trehan.
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She writes regularly for "Outlook" and in this she is replying to a
letter by a reader. Both the letters are shown below.
Hi Madhu,
I have read your articles ever since I was a kid and you were at India
Today. You have often come across as a balanced person not prone to
Gandhi nonsense, until now. I live in a White Nation (the US) and have
never felt like a second class citizen. Only a blind and a deaf
>person can compare the pride of a US citizen with the indignity of
being an India.
A US citizen trusts his government, knows his/her death will never go
unpunished, while an Indian solider is there to die. Elite is a bad word
in India because 95% of our country lives in abject poverty.
Next time ask the waiter in Taj who served you the Rs 400 drink, how
much he makes in a month. The Durban who opens the door for you, ask
him how much he makes? I bet his monthly salary will be around your
dinner bill. Shame on you and journalists like you who have failed
India in the past with colored reporting and are doing so now. They
should feel ashamed. Rather than calling Bush names, maybe we should
hang our heads in shame on PM's like Vajpayee who is too old to walk,
too much of a coward to protect his people.
Maybe, just maybe, the day people like us (the English educated hence
smarter) start feeling ashamed enough we will start making changes in
India rather than just exploiting our servants and labor class. It
anguishes me to read this national character articles. A nation that
cannot feed its people (a la Orissa) has no character, a nation whose
children move around naked (Mumbai) has no reason to feel proud, a
nation whose elected reps call religious riots "opposite reaction"
has no future.

Once again, shame on you and all of India. I am ashamed to be an Indian
and shame on you for suggesting anything else.

Chet (Chaitanya)






Madhu Trehan's response was:

Hello Chet,

I will answer your letter point by point. Your name. You can be Chet
or Jet, stay away from the sun, fake an American accent, but you will
never be able to run away from Chaitanya. He will always be there even
though you hate him today.

Gandhi, whom you hold in such contempt, despite all his controversial
behavior, is largely responsible for the fact that there is no white
boot on a part of your anatomy today. You live in a white nation but
you are not white and never will be. You can fool yourself to believe
that you are not treated as a second class citizen. You choose to
forget the Dot Busters, the Sikh who was killed because he looked
foreign, and rampant racism.

How many times a week does you have to explain where you are from and
spend your time EXPLAINING India to Americans? I cringe to think what
you say to them about India. We do not need spokesman such as you.
You will never be able to share a good desi joke with any of your new
friends. If you can't laugh together; you cannot understand each
other. You will always be an alien.

Yes, we are economically poor compared to US but we do not have to
suffer the highest rate of teenage pregnancies, kids coming into schools
and killing students and teachers, the highest rate of suicide among
college students, alienated parents and children, lonely old people
dumped into old age homes, drugs being offered to eight year olds (as
my daughter was when she was in the UN school in New York), serial
marriages and divorces.

The US had a president who was senile and deaf (Reagan), one who turned
out to be a serial sex offender (Clinton), and now you have one who
didn't know the heads of state of major countries and ignored warnings
of a terrorist attack months before it took place.

The US is responsible for massacres in Vietnam, Cambodia, Iraq, Chile
and the list goes on. Only part of the world views America with the
rose-colored glasses you have been brainwashed by the US media to see
through. And, how much does a waiter in Jean George's restaurant in
Trump International Hotel in New York make compared to the price of the
drink he is serving? The labor class is exploited all over the world.

You seem to very upset that I am pointing out we have a national
character to be ashamed of. This very shame is the reason for you to
live in a country where the only religion is to hang out at malls and
accumulate consumer items you don't really need but have been dictated
by advertising to buy to keep the US economy going.
It is not by accident that Americans are flocking to yoga and meditation
classes to buy happiness. You have done well to leave a country you are
ashamed of. Call yourself an American but sooner or later your disguise
and American Halloween costume will frighten you enough to get rid of
it.

I love America's energy and have good friends there. Its a nice place
to be. New York is a center for an enormous outpouring of creativity and
imaginative thinking. Its the home to economic freedom and pure
meritocracy. It is fine to earn your living away from your country until
you dont forget your roots and culture. Every co untry has its
own problems. If you are so far removed from India, ask yourself why
you are so anguished with my article. Chaitanya is raising his head,
Chet is in trouble.