Youth revisiting cultural roots after globalisation peeped in.

We’ve started to switch off mobile phones once a week now, wanting to go back to the no-communications era. We’ve started to crave home cooked at least on weekends. You know? Busy people, meals on wheels becoming the mantra?  Don’t we all remember the movie Lunchbox? Where Irfan Khan craved for home-cooked food with someone’s company, wanting a break from his monotonous office schedule. He had a longing for some human touch in his life. We want to go on vacations, Get away from these busy schedules. We’ve started to move back to the past when there were no unwanted disturbances, when life was peaceful, without the hassles of mobile phones and offices and paperwork.

We entered an age of individualism. And it seemed its rule will never end. As for religion- it was declined, as for marriage-it was postponed, as for ideologies-they were rejected, as for patriotism-it was abandoned, as for strangers-they were mistrusted. Only pot, selfies, and Facebook abides and the greatest of these probably Facebook. But we’ve created an uproar- Forwarding to the past being the Takiya Kalam of every other individual.  

The government decided to open up our economy to foreign products in the year 1991- the New Economic Policy. But this was not just a one day move. The effects of liberalization and globalization came into being much earlier than that. The workmen in the country took time in getting accustomed to the changes in the economy. There were abundant products barging in through the newly opened trade barriers. As I’ve pointed out earlier films are a reflection of what’s happening in the society. The celluloid saw the rise of the Angry Young man. But there were multiple angry young men in the country unlike only one on the silver screen. This was because of the prevalent unemployment in the country.  People were not earning much. They wanted financial stability. MNC’S made a debut, and lo and behold people were ready to move out of their native places in order to earn more. Though the unemployment levels in the country went from being 7.32% in 1987-1991 to 5.99% in 1991-1993 the migration levels rose. Everyone was ready to sacrifice things of personal interest to be able to work. Joint family setups were slowly breaking away making way for nuclear families. The children of double income couples were devoid of any values and morals that a grandparent would imbibe in them. Bedtime stories took a backseat when office presentations became important. Even couples were readily agreeing to separation and divorce instead of letting go of their individualistic incomes. The nuclear family system had started the idea of individualistic attitude but the world does not work on ‘I’ but ‘WE.’  It was the youth who had to face the brunt of the rampant divorce cases and we’ve now seen a steep fall in the number of divorce cases as compared to the early years of globalization.  

We’ve grown up with music systems belting out nursery rhymes. But so was not the case when globalization had just entered. It was a whole new platform of exposure to the people. The people were so amazed at these new gadgets that everything took a backseat. The western culture had a huge impact on our value system. The traditional Namaste was replaced by the wave of a hand or a hello. Jeans and t-shirts were the new cool quotient! And the traditional sarees? Well they were packed and put away. Offering cokes and fries to people visiting was more impressive and certainly easier than offering them home made lemonade and potato chips.

 I’m reminded of what Pope Francis had said of globalization-
“In many countries globalization has meant a hastened deterioration of their own cultural roots and the invasion of ways of thinking and acting proper to other cultures which are economically advanced but ethically debilitated.”

But things are changing now. Khadi has made comeback and with its inclusion in the Lakme Fashion Week it’s official! Old school IS the new cool! The traditional way of celebrating the festivals was going out and mingling with friends. But these greetings have started to happen through SMS’s. But now we do prefer going out and sharing sweets with people and having a laugh with them and maybe discuss what’s going on their life and we do prefer to light the earthen Diyas instead of those Chinese led lights on Diwali. 

The Oxford dictionary defines values as a set of beliefs and attitudes that people when start sharing is called the value system. Over the years our values have molded us into who we are. But these values keep changing from time to time. Lord Krishna had advised Arjuna to pick up weapons and fight against his own family. That right there was the start of a change in the battlefield of Mahabharat. The change was to give importance to Dharma. The next change we saw was when globalization came into being in India. Today we again see a change again- Revisiting our roots, understanding them, accepting them and living with them. It seems they said it right! Change is the only constant. And the youth of today is surely changing it’s way and retracing it’s steps and going back to their roots.