I HAVE A DREAM...

[Guest guest]

Dear Furum:

40 years back on the same date (Aug 28, 1963) Dr. Luther King Jr's

speech on 'I HAVE A DREAM' in Washington DC transformed the United States and

lead to several civil rights movement and human rights acheivement, not

only in US but across the world...On the same day I am paraphrasing some of his

words and articulating my dream as an Indian Citizen and as a person living

with HIV, for Indian AIDS Movement and to India itself. YES, THIS IS MY DREAM

FOR ALL THOSE INFECTED AND AFFECTED BY HIV, AS WELL AS THOSE WHO ARE AT RISK

AND MARGINALIZED IN INDIA...

BEFORE GOING INTO MY DREAM I WOULD LIKE TO WRITE A SPECIAL THANKS TO MARTIN

LUTHER KING'S JR.S WIFE AND HIS FAMILY WHO GENEROUSLY GAVE ME PERMISSION TO

QUOTE DR. MARTIN LUTHER KINGS WORDS TO PARAPHRASE IT TOWARDS HIV/AIDS...(I HAVE

SEND THIS MSG IN BCC TO DR. KING'S FAMILY AS WELL AS CC TO PRESIDENT OF INDIA)

Sincerely

Surendra

Cambridge CB1 1EG

UK

*****************************

Fifty five years ago, a great Indian whom we now call as Father of the Nation,

Mahatma Gandhi, led our country to be free from British Colony. His momentous

struggle and dedication should be a great beacon light of hope and light to

millions of Indians living with HIV/AIDS who had been seared in the flames of

withering injustice. After nearly two decades of HIV epidemic, and personally

with 17 years of living with HIV/AIDS, I am writing to you that we as a nation

must face the tragic fact that the People with HIV/AIDS in India is still not

free.

Still 55 years years after Independence, the life of an average Indian living

with HIV/AIDS is still sadly crippled by the manacles of prejudice and the

chains of discrimination. Still 20 years into the Indian HIV Epidemic, the

People with HIV in India lives on a lonely island of poverty, prejudice,

discrimnation and in fear in a free country. Fifty Three Years later after the

Independence, the average Indian with HIV/AIDS is still languishing in the

corners of Indian society and finds himself an exile in his own land.

So I am writing to you today to dramatize people with HIV/AIDS and those

affected by the epidemic's appalling condition. When the architects of our

republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of

Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every

Indian was to fall heir.

This note was a promise that all men would be guaranteed the inalienable rights

of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It is obvious today that India

has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens with HIV/AIDS

and those at risk are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation,

India has given People with HIV/AIDS, a bad cheque which has come back marked

" insufficient funds. " But I refuse to believe that the bank of justice is

bankrupt. I refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great

vaults of opportunity of our nation.

So I am writing to you all of you in this forum and those who are fighting to

cash this cheque -- a cheque that will give us upon demand the riches of

freedom and the security of justice. I am writing to all of you to urge India

to remind this with the fierce urgency now. This is no time to engage in the

luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is

the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of discrimnation, inaction

and prejudice to the sunlit path of equity and justice for all including those

infected and affected with HIV/AIDS. Now is the time to open the doors of

opportunity to all . Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of

injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. which Mahatma Gandhi and Nehru had

always fought for and dreamed for...

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment and to

underestimate the needs of People with HIV/AIDS, their families, drug users,

gays and or sex workers.. This sweltering summer of the marginalized

legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of

freedom and equality. 2003 is not an end, but a end of a begining. Those who

hope that People with HIV/AIDS, Gays, Sex Workers, Drug Users needed to blow

off steam, should soon be content with a rude awakening if they try to do

business as usual. There will be neither rest nor tranquility in India until

the People with HIV/AIDS and those at risk and disenfranchised is granted his

citizenship rights.

But there is something that I must say to every one in this forum and those who

are fighting for equity...in the process of gaining our rightful place we must

not be guilty of wrongful deeds, we must not engage in infighting, personal

attacks or fight over ever shrinking Donor funds.... Let us not seek to satisfy

our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We

must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline.

Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting of state

sponsored persecution by diplomacy and through negotiations for policy change.

The movement of People with HIV/AIDS and those at risk has engulfed the

marginalized community must not lead us to distrust of all policy makers , for

many of our policy makers, as evidenced by our present President, and by our

recent parlimentarians meeting, on HIV/AIDS, they have come to realize that

their destiny is tied up with the destiny of people with HIV/AIDS and their

freedom is inextricably bound to the disenfranchized community's freedom.

We cannot walk alone. And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall

march ahead. We cannot turn back. Some of you who wrote to me personally and

asked me, " When will you be satisfied? " . To you my friend, you know who you

are, I will not and shall never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with

the fatigue and ravaged by disease , cannot gain an admission in Hospitals or

not been able to access the essential life saving medicine. We cannot be

satisfied as long as the Sex Workers and other marginalized commnity mobility

is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as

drug user in Manipur cannot get treated without getting arrested and a Person

with HIV/AIDS in New Delhi and Bombay and Chennai believes he has nothing to

live for.. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until

justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.

I am not unmindful that some of People with HIV/AIDS has faced and continue to

face great trials and tribulations. I am not unmindful that there are

dedicated NGOs where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of

persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have

been the veterans of creative suffering. Let's continue to work with the faith

that unmerited suffering is redemptive.

Lets go back to Manipur, lets go back to Ahmedabad, lets go back to Bangalore,

lets go back to Bombay, lets go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern

cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. Let us not

wallow in the valley of despair. I say to you today, my friends, that in spite

of the difficulties and frustrations of the moment, I still have a dream. It is

a dream deeply rooted in the Indian dream, a dream that was envisioned and

championed by Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru.

I have a dream that one day that Indian Government will rise up and live out

the true meaning of its Constitution on equity and justice for all.. I have a

dream that one day sex workers from Bombay and the former pimps and the

police will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood with out

been feared of been trapped or been arrested. I have a dream that one day even

the state of India, sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will

be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice for people with HIV/AIDS

and other marginalized communities. . I have a dream that soon enough that

people with HIV/AIDS and those at risk with live in an Indian nation where they

will not be judged by the sex, sexuality or disease status but by the content

of their character. Yes, I have a dream.

This is my dream and my hope. Hope, the faith with which I may be able to

return to India without the fear or fervor of been persecuted, discriminated or

prejudiced or brutalized.. With this faith I will be able to hew out of the

mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to

transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of

brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to

pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for

freedom together, knowing that

we will be free one day.

That day be the day when we will be able to realize the meaning of Gandhi's

dream and struggle for a free India " And if India is to be a great nation, this

must become true.

Let's work towards this freedom.

Surendra

E-mail: <surendra@...>

[Guest guest]

Dear Surendra,

This is surely a great dream. Let all the e- forum members have the

same dream and let thousands of Indians all over the world be inspired by the

wonderful dream and the thoughts related to that.

Let us hope that some aspects of the dream will come true at least with in next

40 years.

Yes, Surendra, your dream will surely make some sparks in the minds of at least

some people and spread the same to new horizons. Your Dream will live.

Rev. Abraham Mathew.

Singapore.

E-mail: fatherabrahamm@...