On February 2, 1905, in St. Petersburg, the philosopher and writer Alissa Zinovievna, better known to the world of letters as Ayn Rand, was born.
She famously said, “When you realise that to produce, you must obtain permission from those who produce nothing; when you see that money flows to those who deal not in goods but in favours; when you notice that many become rich through bribery and influence rather than by their work, and that the laws do not protect you from them but, instead, they are protected from you; when you discover that corruption is rewarded and honesty becomes a form of self-sacrifice, then you can confidently say, without fear of being wrong, that your society is doomed.”
Her words, which touch on themes of power, corruption, and inequality, continue to resonate as a chilling prediction about the potential decline of society under certain conditions... and India is in its death throes.
