Wish to Introduction a Foreigner to 'Incredible India'
Atithi Devo Bhava' means that the guest is like the God and when a foreigner should be introduced to 'Incredible India' then this aspect of our culture where the host clean the feet of the guests with their own hands should be emphasized. Rather than showing him/her the buildings and the monuments which constitute the national wealth of our country, he should be shown the inner force that lends life to these buildings and monuments. He must know that India is not a place of buildings and memoirs but of live soul and heart that makes this country what it is. The incredibility of India resides not in the buildings and roads but in the heart and soul of each Indian.
Keeping in mind this aspect of India and Indian ness, he would be taken to those places that are symbolic of this aspect of India. He should not be taken to Delhi. Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai and other such famous places, not to the remote rural places that give a picture of dearth and shortage, rather he should be taken to those places where India is being made today, everyday. Cities are the finished products. they are hardly Indian any more, they are the mixture of western art and Indian architecture, western style and Indian materials. The villages are the places where development has hardly started. They often give a negative image of our country to the foreigners. A foreigner should be taken to the developing towns and semi urban places where he can see the making of the incredible India. We would start from an unknown station in an unknown part of the country, a place that does not chart on the maps of the tour guides or the internet. A place like Barrack pore may be a starting point. He can be shown the schools and colleges there, the stations (both bus and train), for half of India spends half its time in travelling. One of the best places to understand India is in its stations. We might then move on to Jamshedpur, the steel city, which lends India its iron and its strength. We might then go on to the various towns and suburban places in Uttar Pradesh and see the various peculiarities of India, after all, any country is built by its eccentricities and not by its synchronic movements.
Thus, in this manner despite having no real plan for the visit, we will be following a great man's saying that 'the best traveler is one who doesn't know where to go'.
