I am someone who had spent a larger part of my 30s in a country, governed by BJP. Is that a problem? 

Not at all, for it exposed the real problem.

I was raised to be a conformist, meaning conditioned to be a capitalist, casteist, racist, nationalist, religious, and with mother tongue pride. Along with that, was also taught personal values like, respecting all people, being loyal, honoring promises, being kind and caring, acquiring skills, excelling in work, prioritizing savings, doing charity work to an extent, be-all and anything without compromising on family values and ethics. Here, I am made, a perfect Indian daughter with a nearly 98% compliance rate and landed at my 30 having a family promising love, a profession that has been my passion all along, and a lot of friends to have fun and laugh with.

Given the level of adherence, it should have been a happy life, right? It was, till I reached my early 30s. 

The 30s are magical, especially for an Indian woman. Not just that it take that long for you to be comfortable and participate in the decision makings of family affairs, including sex and savings, it also makes you confident enough to engage with society directly and independently. So, when BJP came to govern the country, I was in the early part of my 30s and it didn't bother me at all as I considered the event as an insignificant, regular political thing that has no place in my personal space.

But as the days passed on and as things evolved over years, I could feel the difference and the disastrous effect it made upon not just on my personal relationships with friends and family but a deep internal conflict of consciousness. 

To save space, I am going to discuss only the tiniest, personal, and optional part of our life - WhatsApp groups of family and friends!

It started in one of my school's WhatsApp groups. A friend had shared about the demise of the Prime Minister's niece, of how she was surviving by taking tuitions and doing a tailoring job, of how she was suffering from a heart ailment for long, had financial difficulties and died, of how the PM had not used his power, of how simple this human is,....'. Some had appreciated it with clapping emojis. I don't understand it. We are all part of such family relationships. Of course, he can't be held responsible for his relatives' financial or health struggles, but how can a person be credited over his niece's death? Insane and distasteful content that was. It wasn't the message that concerned me but the friends who appreciated it. The differences of blind party affiliation amongst school friends became visible, with that forwarded message. 

The demonetization messages! Friends were over each other's throats. The funny thing is people who were employees celebrated it to be the masterstroke against the business class, a war against their black money. I am surrounded by such class of people. They all got their receivables which were long pending and even advances in cash overnight. They all properly accounted(!) it and greatly benefited from demonetization. And here, you see people completely believing and celebrating the imaginary results. The differences in pragmatic thinking amongst friends became visible, with that forwarded message.

There was a message of a Samosa seller in trains who don't pay taxes on his sales. There were messages of migrant workers walking miles, carrying their children to their homes. Again there were arguments, for and against. A brutal incident of a 15 years old daughter carrying her father home by cycle, pedaling for 1200 km for 8 days was tagged under lion-hearted. It wasn't the message that bothered me the most but there was a common profile of people taking sides. The differences in class amongst friends became visible, with that forwarded messages.

Each day the messages of love jihad, forcing a Muslim man to chant Jai Shri Ram, videos of naked Dalit boys being beaten, harassing Indians from North East, the anger over the death of tiger and elephant but the silence over the rights of tribals and forest laws, became normal. Who qualifies to be an Indian was redefined. Poor students of Government schools who lack guidance and infrastructures were branded as incompetent. Friends you have grown up with were justifying not just arrests but murders of activists like Gauri Lankesh, journalists, and farmers. The differences in kindness, compassion, respect towards other humans, the caste, and religion amongst friends became visible, with those forwarded messages.

While the engagement in friends groups were altered and damaged this way, it was interesting to observe the family whatsapp groups. It was full of forwarded messages that reinforces the traditional way of life. Nothing wrong, as such. But it started with the 'pride campaign' and transformed into the 'fear campaign' and gradually moved into the 'save your culture, at anybody's cost' campaign. I didn't observe it until the messages became so regressive like a video of a person blaming women's education and financial independence for the cultural decline, a message alleging the conspiracy of particular caste men to 'pollute' other castes through marriage, that justifies the killings of inter-caste married couples, 'knowledgable messages' of how a wife should behave to her husband and in-laws, of how a woman should dress, of prayers and fastings to be followed by a wife with which alone the well being of the family will be protected, of how children are neglected by mothers over greed for career, of how the family system is damaged by the women's rights groups, of how crime against women and children are the result of the modern society, of how diseases are the conspiracy of modern science, of how women's body was damaged by the modern household appliances,...

The differences in gender interests and how women are groomed to be taken to the past within the family became visible, with those forwarded messages.

I was not part of the discussions and arguments in any of those groups. But I observed people. Each one of them. Each side. For a woman who was conditioned for 30 years to comply with the patriarchal structures, there shouldn't be a conflict, naturally. Right? But what changed it?  

I feel it is a unique position,

Of being a woman who was not too young to believe manipulations and not too old to comply and ignore, 

Of being a woman who had experienced the regressive past and who aspire to have a progressive future,

Of being a woman who had evolved to a better frame of mind and thoughts that appreciates differences of perspectives,

Of being a woman who has a dream for the quality of life and opportunity, the women and children of this country deserve,

Of being a woman who understood it is more important for a woman to engage, contribute and build a healthy society, which alone can secure future safety,

Of being a woman who still sees hope for a dignified life, of all living beings,

And most importantly,

Of being a woman who realized there is a serious conflict between the essence of humanity one nurtures inside, and the purposes and delivery of the existing social structures of caste, religion, class, race, and ethnicity.

In my 30s I had this choice, 

to continue to align and conform with the majority and, pretend to be happy. 

OR 

to make effort to seek the truth and be real, to preserve the consciousness. 

I chose the latter. 

It is unfortunate that many students of Karnataka had to go through the same, at such young age because many adults of that part chose the other. Today, the real problem in India is not only the right-wing populist government but Indians who compromised the intrinsic value of love and diversity, this land gifted to its people.