By Ayush Jain
Here I sit, post the announcement of UPSC CSE results 2020 with a
hot cup of tea, on a comfortable sofa wondering how it will be an
year from now. Today- the ocean of coaching institutes, relatives,
parents, friends – prop up the significance of being among the
“ones” – 8 lakh aspirants and a 100 IAS officers – You know, the
successful ones, the legends of whom we hear – the ones who made
it through hardwork, passion, grit and determination. The ones who
(and to a greater extent their teachers and parents) can smirk as
they console the ones who didn’t make it. What makes this a big
deal? Would it be good enough if 100 people gave it and 95 got
selected? Doesn’t sound big enough, does it?
So what is this success. Fundamentally, a world with limited
resources- money, property, power; too many of us; and each of us
trying to maximise our share. So is this success a consequence of our
countries biggest tragedy, overpopulation?
I have nothing against money, power, property – all wonderful
things; all empowerments. 10 years ago, a smartphone was success –
a smart solution to problems which only a few possessed, today not
such big a deal is it? It takes hardwork, grit, determination to crack
IAS, IPS, IIT – doesn’t it take the same for a maid to wake up
everyday at 4, walk to 10 houses and work over 12 hours a day.
Or it being a part of the exclusive club, of doing only what a few
people can – intellectually, physically, materially.
Would it be success if I did whatever an IAS did, but if everyone
could do it? If I did it and no one knew about it? If no one really
valued it? Isn’t it a disaster that the conception of success is based
on insufficiency of the people around us.
Or is it about what I have become or what I can serve – Of value that
is not comparable, of good that is not recognised, of positions that
are not appreciated. Of losing the person and being what I want to
deliver – a force that moves yet has no separate existence of its own.
The actor who acts but forgets that he is acting, the singer who loses
himself in his music, the engineer whose creation shines for the
wonder it is, the doctor who saves a life, the officers whose name we
never hear while we move towards a prosperous nation.
I think it’s a process of dissolution – of being less of me and more of
being.
By Ayush Jain
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