Superheros and our fight against graft
Old habits die hard! Whenever we are in trouble, we believe some messiah will come and provide salvation. Our mythology supports this assumption with succession of god incarnates, our movies support the same belief with one hero single handedly bashing up all the bad guys while hundreds watch like mannequins, our politics reflects the same problem with successive generations of a particular family raising public expectations, though not fulfilling them and we keep swinging in the cycle of despair and hope and despair endlessly. This wait for some one to come and deliver us is a phenomenon which is probably as old as humanity. Permit me to look at last twenty years for elaboration of my submission. And let us keep the focus on people who showed lot of promise in fighting systemic corruption, graft, malpractices. Many of us will remember G K Khairnar, erstwhile Mumbai Deputy Municipal Commissioner who fought land mafia of Mumbai and began a drive against unauthorized construction. Wi...