Can Tamil Brahmins be bold to disclose their identity in public? is the question and title of this thread. Who else than a brahmin have the guts to do that? Please read this: Recently there had been a news item that a few of the assassins of Rajiv Gandhi are to be hanged soon as per the judgment handed down by Courts. There was an orchestrated political campaign by a section of the people to save them from the gallows. While the common man thinks that there is no reason to reduce the punishment to any of the assassins, the media were fairely dominated by the save assassins group and they presented their case with much gusto. While every one who thought that the assassins did not deserve any remission like any other killer in the country they were not coming out with their views for obvious reasons. This included all the dravidian daredevils and 'courageous' and 'bold' tamil leaders in Congress etc parties, who are not brahmins. Their voice was muted. But there came a brahmin by name Subramanian swamy who boldly and courageously expressed his views that were challenging the vociferous partisan outfits. Is he not bold? This is just one example. Subramanian swamy's views may not be agreeable to some people here. But the fact that he expressed them is what is important. I can give many other examples of courageous brahmins if any one asks for them. When I read Swamy's views as a news item I recalled these lines of Rudyard Kipling:
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream and not make dreams your master;
If you can think and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you have spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to , broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn out tools;
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If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings-nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you will be a Man, my son!
who else will pat the brahmin's back but brahmins themselves ....
