Ye Mera Vikas Hai

• By Dr. Shweta Awasthi / 01 Sep 2020

The ongoing debate on  vikas among different political leaders revived a memory from my school days. There was a tradition of displaying the photographs of achievers and extra ordinary performers on the bulletin board. Undoubtedly the purpose was to motivate students but the impact was more evident on the faces of the parents. Although most of the parents exercised patience and control in their expression of admiration for their ward, one mother was unique in her expression. She used to stop in front of the board and with a finger pointing to her son's photograph she would exclaim loudly, 'ye mera Vikas hai'. After leaving school and getting busy with my own 'vikas' I totally forgot vikas of my school days until I came across PM Modi's campaign slogan 'sabka saath sabka vikas'. The moment he took oath and started cutting ribbons of several 'vikas Yojnas'  there issued a clamour in the political arena with Congress leaders yelling on top of their voice that it was their ' vikas' which Modi was claming as his own. This gave rise to a debate as to who were the biological parents of much acclaimed 'vikas'. While reading Vandana Shiva and other environmentalists I found that "vikas" Who was "aakhon ka tara"for almost all political parties was a fraud who had robbed us of our resources and devoured our ecosystem. I am waiting if someone would turn up claiming this fraudulent vikas and would say ' ye mera vikas hai'hai'.