Pahale Aap

I am writing this after getting inspired by a friend of mine… till now I used to crap about UP, my home state, and then I read a piece my friend wrote. She wrote about Maharashtra, her home state. It really got me thinking, why is it that I talk so badly about my place, overlook so much that is so good, much better than many. I got down to thinking what all have I overlooked just because I hate the politicians there which my people chose or people there are intolerant and that too not for the wrong reasons.
UP, Uttar Pradesh, or Uttam Pradesh as one of the political outfits call it. It really is a state to be in. Be it religion, people, values, natural beauty or gastronomy its right there to make you feel good, feel proud to be associated with it.
Till now I was proud to be from Lucknow, but when it came to my state I had a very bad opinion about it. I forgot what harm I am causing to my self, and undermining so much of value. Let us start right from the beginning. I am a proud Hindu, and the basis, the foundation of Hinduism was laid millennia back on this very land. The land of the holy rivers of Ganga, Yamuna and the mythological Saraswati, their confluence. People keep Ganga Jal with them to purge, a custom we Hindus follow, imagine the land where there is this river…need I say more. We have Gangotri, Yamunotri, Kedarnath, Badrinath, Hardwar, Varanasi, Mathura, Ayodhya, Allahabad and the list can go on, all the temples people come to visit from far off, to kneel before the almighty, offer their prayers, atone for their sins and go back satisfied. It is here that the holy books were written. How can this land of Sant Kaalidas and Kabeer be bad?? I have no answer.
History has it that it was UP where the seeds of the struggle for freedom were sown in 1857 and our valiant queen the Jhansi ki Raani laid down her life to free our country from the shackles of the British tyranny. We have the Taj Mahal, a wonder for the world, a way of expressing love for us. It is here where Nawaab Asafudaullah distributed his wealth to his people by making them work, one group builds the other destroys, when the deadly famine struck Awadh, a way to help people without hurting their self esteem of making them beggars. This is just one of the countless examples we set for all.
We have the seats of learning like at Beneras, the Beneras Hindu University, the first modern university of the country, the one to offer engineering, a first for India. We are the only state to have two IIT’s, at Kanpur and Roorkie (erstwhile College of Engineering Roorkie), an IIM, and various other prestigious institutes churning out the brain power leading this country forward. Name any other state which can claim this. We have research laboratories like CFTRI, CDRI, NBRI and many others to make us proud.
It is our custom, our tehzeeb, to respect anyone and everyone, even your enemy. Our salutations consist of AAP and HUM, respecting others and respecting our self. It runs thick in us and I am proud of it. We have had bad experiences like Ayodhya, but then even roses have thorns.
We are the food bowl, providing wheat in abundance, making India self sufficient and the sweetness that we sow as sugarcane is known right from Kashmir till Kanyakumari. Come to Lucknow and get ready to be enchanted by the gastronome adventure that awaits you. Be it the street food in the form of Chat, chanaa jor and the kebabs that melt in the mouth, to the concept of dastarkhwaan that the five stars and the Mc Milan restaurants follow the world over, we have it all there to bowl you over.
What all I thought, reflected upon cannot be put in here but then the purpose is solved, I respect my state, my people, maybe its not in the good books for reasons but then we were there right on the top and be assured will be back there, its just that we give chance to all, Pahale Aap.