Compulsory for Everyone

“I think Parrikar should make compulsory military tenure for persons between 18 and 24 years of age,” I said, one very wet afternoon, to no one in particular. I didn’t mean anything by it; it was a ‘just like that’ sentence, meant to go by in a flash. But in my house, things get from awful to horrid in seconds.

“You’ve started thinking,” Shri Husband growled, the usual trace of meanness detected in his voice. “Why?”

I immediately confessed, stuttering: “Not my idea at all. Countries which have compulsory military training do well economically and on most parameters like health, sports, education…”  

          Shri Husband and Bai Goanna pounced (not literally, we’re civilized like that) on me about anything compulsory other than basic education and health being a bad idea.

          “Where do you pick up such ideas?” Shri Husband wanted to know. I wondered what I’d said wrong. “How does running around with heavy boots and knapsacks and camouflage gear get reflected in good commerce or better universities?”

          “Just something she read from a magazine,” quoth Bai Goanna soothingly, kind of taking my side. Then to me she snapped: “Read the entire paragraph, please, and don’t say something out of context.”

          Shri Husband added: “Give examples and details. This sounds like t-shirt single-line philosophy.” I didn’t know what was wrong with t-shirt single-line philosophy, but didn’t want to start a side-drama.

          Bai Goanna, turning towards him, asked: “Who’s she comparing our democracy with?”

          Both looked at me expecting an answer. No matter what I’d say, there’d be a retort. I knew that, so I shut up.

          “Say, say,” Bai Goanna coaxed. “Talk, talk. You said that compulsory military training will help our country. You read it somewhere, didn’t you? Is that not true?”

          “Yes,” I said, the good ‘shut up’ sense of a few seconds ago giving way to impulse and an instinct to prove myself right.

          Bai Goanna: “How? Why is compulsory military training good for us?”

          Me: “It will inculcate some discipline in us, teach us to stand in queues, get us to be physically fit, help us catch trains and buses and cling to their windows and doors without falling out, also teach us to live with people from other states and castes without having hang-ups about eating, playing, praying, working together. It will teach us about honour, integrity, finishing a task, being properly groomed at all times, less sensitive, more professional…”

          Shri Husband’s interruption: “… and to make and handle firearms? In times like these? You are naïve. What if the government sends us to fight our own people and tell us to shoot pellets when we’re hit with stones? And do the duties of the cops and disaster management teams when there are riots and floods? Maybe there should be compulsory training for citizens in the Police academies and for dealing with natural and other calamities. There are other ways to teach how to stand in queues and pay your bills on time. Even then, wonder whether our citizens will accept the compulsion. People will object. We’re a democracy. The debates on television will go on and on.”

He took a breath, then continued: “These days, it’s the tv channels that run the country. They decide what foreign policy to follow, how to run educational institutions, and decide who’s murdered whom even before the judges get to see the evidence…no, before even the FIR is filed… or earlier, before the cops get to the scene their reporters and camerapersons are at the site, getting interviews of family-members, neighbours... This country has a long way to go. Compulsory military training you say? Naa.”

          Negative outlook, I thought.

          “But,” he said. “We could have something similar to the National Cadet Corp. Instead of the NCC, we could have an MCC.”

          “What on earth,” Bai Goanna and I said in unison, “is MCC”?

Sounded like a cricket thingy to me. As always, I was wrong.

          Loftily Shri Husband said: “Municipal Compulsory Curriculum.”

          Lecture-baazi shuru, guessing his mood, and I was correct.

          “We must think out of the box,” Shri Husband said. “Prime Minister Modi gives Monkey Baths to the country on certain Sundays. We citizens should present him with ideas that will benefit India.”

          Only Shri Husband and heaven knew what he was talking about: Bai Goanna and I raised our brows, rolled our eyes, shook our heads and did an invisible palm-forehead gesture.

          “This,” he said like he was addressing a crowd at Shivaji Park, “is my Monkey Bath. I’m going to write to NaMo about it. I have the link to the mygov website which has on it information about how citizens can participate in the governance of India.”

          “I thought that had competitions to design postage stamps on dead VIPs, write slogans to declare how smart your city is and to create posters on how tobacco/dowry is bad,” I said.

          Bai Goanna nudged me with her elbow. No point getting Shri Husband into a worse mood, she warned. I shut up again.     

“If we have a compulsory MCC from ages 18 to 24 as you said, the Swatccha Bharat campaign might really get successful.” Shri Husband goes off at a tangent sometimes.

Nil comprehendo. More silence.

Then began lecture-baazi Phase Two: “Young men and women must be forced to clean up their homes, neighbourhoods, localities, villages, talukas. They must handle garbage, the different kinds of waste and learn to manage it. They must enforce, military style, the mantra Reduce-Reuse-Recycle and be empowered to fine spit-urine law-breakers. No matter how many treatment plants are constructed, no matter how reputed the consultants or how much money the government spends, no matter how many photographs are taken on and banners put up for swatchh-events, the stink and litter piles will increase, as will disease…”

He inhaled and fidgeted. We left the room before lecture-baazi Phase Three began. His day-dreaming can be a heavy load to bear.         

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