Lessons from Chile

Thumbs up to the spirit that saved Chile miners

It is indeed a triumph of humanity. The rescue of Chilean miners also show that nothing is insurmountable if we work together, bound by a single thread of humanity and love, untainted by all those dirty xenophobic, boundaries-bound parochialism. Nothing stopped Chile to seek to the help of NASA and the President reached out to the world in its hour of crisis.

This triumph of humanity shows the simple truth that human beings needn’t necessarily die on this tiny earth for want of material or technology. The world has got everything. What is needed is a benign mind and a heart of gold. Making the world a better place to live for everyone isn't a big thing.

There are too many lessons for India to learn from the whole episode. How the Chile’s government and its entire people stood in unison sans any blame game; the determination, unflinching grit and unity. There was no blame game or shifting of responsibility.

When it comes to the behavior of the media at the disaster site in Chile, the Indian media has something to learn from it. No scribe was seen thrusting his microphone and asked the idiotic now-how-do-you-feel question to the miners who emerged from the mine through the specially made capsule. I dread to imagine the Indian media’s reaction if it happened here. Our English television actors would go berserk, acting it out day and night. The reportages would be plain operas, dipped in self-indulgence and shameless treacle. Because it has got all the ingredients of a Bollywood masala; suspense, fantasy, romance and adventure.

And the crisis management would have been given to some Kalmadi and news stories will follow on how the whole thing was messed up. And a hundred enquiries will follow to find out how money meant for the crisis management was swindled away.