We Are Not One Of Them

Ramanjit Singh

We celebrated our 80th anniversary of India's independence. Our 80th anniversary since the partition, the partition of the country, the partition of Punjab, the partition of an ancient land, its history and its future. The partition is seared in our maps, in our hearts and in our minds.

The painful stories are passed down to the next generations as family heirlooms, so that they never forget or forgive how bad the other side was and still is. The continuation of partition has never stopped, it continues in us, in our perception of the other, in the hateful things we casually say about the other. So intoxicated we are in this hate that it has become normal to dehumanize others and this hatred is being kept alive by those who never want the rest of us to forget the past and build a better future for the two countries.

Our common threads that united us no longer unite us. The sufi singers who give life to the poetry of Baba Bulleh Shah at his dargah in Kasur are not being heard in East Punjab. The shabad kirtan sung by ragis at the Darbar Sahib in Amritsar are not being heard in West Punjab. We have lost the essence of what made Punjab so special, the quintessence of Punjabiyat that once existed from Delhi to Peshawar.

Punjab, the land of the Vedas and the Mahabharata, the land of Lord Ram and Sita's Luv and Kush, the land of Shiva's tears, the Punjab that was blessed by Baba Farid and Guru Nanak, the Punjab of Waris Shah's Heer, the Punjab of great warriors like Maharaja Ranjit Singh and Hari Singh Nalwa, the Punjab that gave us freedom fighters like Shaheed Bhagat Singh, the Punjab that united us as one is no longer with us.

But I don't want to give in to this reality. We are not one of them who accept this reality. I am sure there are those among us who believe that, regardless of where we stand today, the shear despondency that makes our situation seem irreconcilable with the past does not reflect the truth. I still believe that some of us, in our hearts, long for that old Punjab, and at least for the idea that there is more that unites us than divides us. The idea that we still care for each other and pray that our children have a better world than what we had in the past.

We are not one of them that go to the border and yell jingoistic slogans. The farcical gesticulation of showing our fake toughness. We are those who stand somewhere far from the maddening crowd and look at the birds freely flying across the border and wonder how beautiful it would be if there is no artificial line dividing us. We look at the children on the other side and wish for their well being and hope that they grow up as good caring human beings. We don't look at the other side thinking how bad they are, in fact we look at our own people and think how far we have fallen.

In a world where people are now amplifying hate, where racism and xenophobia is spreading like a virus, where language is weaponized to constantly divide us, in this reality where cruelty is getting normalized, where our skin color, our religion, our culture is constantly being attacked, in this reality, where our very existence is being regarded as a liability by others, we have no other option but to unite and fight and create a better world for our children. This partition of our minds needs to stop, we have no other option, we have no where else to go. This is the battle for the hearts and minds, there's now a much larger battle we are fighting, battle for our very existence.

We are not one of them that remain silent while others define who we are.

We are not one of them that play second fiddle to anyone.

Borders created by the colonizers continue to divide us, our narrow mindedness continues to divide us, our memories continue to divide us, and in all this we do not realize that we are collectively losing the battle for our very existence. We have drifted from the profound wisdom of our ancestors, who passionately championed the values of tolerance and acceptance, leaving behind a legacy that once united us. They already showed us the way of how we can win this battle.

We have to be better than this, we can do this, we can come together so that we have a fighting chance.

We are not one of them.