It was after years that I went inside the store. It was a swank showroom displaying the latest models of anything electronic from computers to cameras, television sets to fridges. It took me some time to meet the owner of the store as he was busy in a meeting with some Japanese businessmen. I was having a look around and discussing the advances in the latest iPhone, which costs more than a lakh of rupees. I felt happy that there were people in Assam and the Northeast to afford a high end mobile phone with a price tag of a lakh plus. Waiting to meet the owner, I strolled around the store conversing with the floor assistants and educating myself on the benefits of a smart TV and a smart fridge. Not only have the people of Assam become smart, but even TVs and fridges have become smart these days. As a show of intimacy with the owner, I told the young shop assistants how their boss, fresh from a semi-township in Jorhat, had started out from a small room and a scooter, selling and delivering desktops and computer accessories in the offices and homes of Guwahati and how steadily not only sold computers but also introduced the people of the city to digital technology. I was proudly regaling them with anecdotes, especially about the one about the Congress minister who kept a computer monitor prominently displayed on the office table, which had no connection to a CPU! He’d put the monitor on display, as their leader Rajiv Gandhi had insisted that computer literacy in India begin from the top. The CPU came a good six months later when the minister heard that you could play cards with the computer.
The owner took a good 45 minutes to make his appearance after I was treated to two cups of coffee by the secretary, who wouldn’t let me leave as per orders of the boss. He was very apologetic and took me to his room and again ordered for another round of coffee. We got talking about the present state of affairs of Assam and the economy of the country. Although a non-Assamese by birth, the entrepreneur had studied in the Assamese medium and was familiar with Assamese literature and litterateurs. Then the topic came to motivational books. Motivational books now form the bulk of non-fiction books sold worldwide. Not only are they taught in business schools, these books and their authors are heard in paid lectures in the developed world. Economically, those countries did not have the dire need to study or discuss these books, but were read to stay ahead of competition. China, Japan and Korea and even the Russians get the popular English motivational writings translated into their languages within a month of hosting the charts. This has a multiplier effect in their societies, in a sense that it keeps them updated with the latest thoughts and concepts and also keeps the youth motivated for higher levels of personal successes and thereby the nation as a whole. Yet in Assam motivational literature was not available in Assamese in original or in translation. A Steven Covey or Shiv Khera or Yuval Noah Harari is not a familiar name among the youth of Assam. Years ago Homen Borgohain probably wrote the only such motivational book Uchchaakankshya . Assam’s current motivational heroes are Zubeen Garg, Samujjal Bhattacharya, Himanta Biswa Sarma and we’ve seen how they have led the youth force in Assam. The saving grace among the youth motivators are probably limited to the sportspersons like Hima Das or the moviemaker Rima Das, innovator Uddhav Bharali who have been examples of positive thinking and ambition. As for the entrepreneurs and innovators, not many get to hear about them as the mindset of the media is rooted to politics in the headlines. My store owner friend rued the absence of motivational literature in Assamese and how that had negatively affected the thinking of the youth of Assam into a quick money culture. The surfeit of fiction of all shades have not been able to addpositivity into the State, rather it’s left us emotionally surcharged, with no positive outcomes.
The third cup of coffee over, I had to leave in deep thought of this deficiency. Our publishers and translators must take this up in right earnest and haste. Literature in economics and commerce are also limited to textbooks. Updated books on these subjects or being Assam specific are not available easily or at all. How can we expect the society to think modern and move with times if motivational reading, monitoring the Sensex, economic news of the day, technological advances are not a part of the daily life of the youth? Opposing the CAA is ok but choosing to limit oneself to the mundane is not the answer.
Motivational books apart, even books and magazines in Assamese on economics, commerce, science is a rarity. It’s imperative that developments in these fields get discussed in drawing rooms and student common rooms. The Assam Science Society had started a monthly magazine on popular science in the early 60s, but in the absence of required government support, the magazine never took off. The Government on its own had
never tried to install a scientific temper in the educational environment. Assamese textbooks have a bias towards history, harping on the golden days of the past. How golden it was is debatable. Our kingdoms were small ones without much economic power. The monuments, that have lived to see modern days, give us an indication of the state of the financial status of the kingdoms. No temple or monument is grand on an international scale nor landmark achievements in technology or aesthetics. But they are our own and we have to take care of it. Economics has never been given its due importance, not even in the 21st century, when the world talks of GDP, strength of the currency, volatility of the stock market, trade balances, world market share. The Prime Minister has not been able to transfer this commercial bent of mind into our ministry, who feel that building MGNREGA and PMGSY roads and doling out largesse are great achievements. Without economics percolating into the society, Assam will languish in being obsessed with refugees and infiltrators Even in other aspects of social activity we definitely need to raise our standards.
The poor standards of political banter are an indication of the low level of discourse in the State. Ministers and youth icons speak in a language that will put fish market conversations into embarrassment. A spiritually-biased government, if it goes into street fighter’s lingo, does not speak well of the prevailing standards nor augurs well for the future. Restraint should be the guiding factor, not a mood of ‘eye for eye, tooth for tooth’. No security in the world is unreachable and violence or repression does not get to the final goal anywhere. What applies to the government applies equally to its opponents. In a nation of youth, the 40 pluses would better do to suggest than lead. If it’s a student’s fight, it’s better left to be fought out by the students. The State must intervene in the event of violence only. Living in the past serves no purpose. The Government would do well to instil an atmosphere of intellectual debate and discourse, so that modern ideas reach every open window in the State. This brooks no delay.
<Swapnanil Barua>
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