Freedom at Midnight (from Tax!)

India got freedom at midnight of 15^th August 1947. It was an epoch making occasion in the life of a nation which cannot be compared to any other event and celebration in the Central hall of Parliament at that time was perfectly justified as the whole Nation was awake when the Union jack was lowered and tricoluor flattered.

But the celebration at midnight in central hall of parliament on  1st July 2017 defies all logic. On that day a new unified tax regime was floated which was supposed to be business community friendly. The actual impact will have to be assessed after a year. The celebration was therefore highly improper and clearly highly politically motivated to reap electoral benefit in future.

There were few occasions in the life of our nation after independence which had a deep impact across the length and breadth of our country and across all spectrums of our countrymen raising head of our people high before the International Community. I am quoting two instances-

1.       The 1971 war with Pakistan: India conclusively defeated Pakistan taking 93000 thousand soldiers and paramilitary personnel as Prisoners of War. Pakistan was broken into two pieces. Bagladesh was born from the Debris of East Pakistan. The war was fought with such surgical precision that the war was over in 13 days flat, starting on 3rd December and ending on 16 December 1971 with Lt. General A A K Niyaji of Pakistan Army surrendering to Lt. General Jagjit Singh Arora, the GOC in C Eastern Command of Indian Army. After a disastrous defeat at the hands of China in 1962 war, India retrieved lost international prestige and the war was won in spite of strong opposition from the US. The Prime Minister was Indira Gandhi.

2.       Detonation of First Atom Bomb: Outside the five nuclear club members and permanent security council members, India was first to detonate a nuclear bomb on 8^th May 1974, neutralizing the Chinese logistic advantage (China became nuclear power in 1964) over India. The Prime Minister again was Indira Gandhi.

3. Assimilation of Sikkim In India: Because of clever political manipulations of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, Sikkim joined Indian union and became its 22nd state on 16th May 1975 through a referendum of the people of Sikkim which overwhelmingly voted to join Indian Union. In fact this master stoke prevented China from annexing Sikkim which was claiming Sikkim to be a part of Tibet.

Forget all other Indian Prime Ministers, even a hundred Prime Ministers of Upcoming generations will not be able to match the performance the Iron Lady Indira Gandhi of Indian politics.

In spite of these  epoch making events of Post-Independence era, there were no special celebrations at midnight in the central hall of Parliament for either  of the above three historic events.

The three events were epoch making in Indian History and compared to these events, the GST is nothing more than a hullabaloo which is being marketed by the clever PM and his party to get political gains. The PM is marketing the GST lunch as ‘One India One Tax’ (!) as if all the other Taxes have vanished.