LYNCH is a bad word today, with mobs roaming the country lynching for the smallest reason and the Supreme Court moving in to frame an ant-lynching law. But there’s a choice, would you be a lyncher or linchpin? “Linchpin?” you ask.
Journey with me to yonder village; you hear the rumble of ancient cart, and slowly bull and the cart come into sight. The road is rough, the load heavy, and you wonder how crude wooden wheels are not coming apart, till you look closer and see the linchpin, wedged in through the hub into the axle. The wheels can shake, the cart can totter, but the linchpin sits grim and firm, holding all together.
The linchpin holds no power of its own to move forward, nor strength to carry load, it’s just a fastener used to prevent the wheel from sliding off! When India fought for Independence, Gandhiji often played a linchpin role, binding different leaders with different ideologies together, making them fight for a common goal. Another was Nelson Mandela of South Africa who fostered reconciliation twixt black and white across the nation!
Both were linchpins! Linchpins, not mere cogs! A pin does an important job; it holds together! In describing key individuals, those who are central to the success of an enterprise, we often use words such as backbone, cornerstone, anchor, buttress and pillar, but I like this word too, a ‘linchpin for the nation’ ‘the linchpin of your family’! Could that be a way to describe what you are?
In cricket this key person is often the wicketkeeper, standing there behind the wickets, he encourages and motivates the bowlers, fielders and even a demoralized captain! Today you hear him clearly through the stump mike, quite often cheering his team to victory. The victory of eleven players made up of different men, from different communities, different castes, different creeds and religions, spurred on by a linchpin behind the wickets!
Our country needs linchpins today, not lynchers! You need not be the bull of the cart, nor the driver, nor the cart itself, but just a little ‘holding together’ linchpin! Quiet peacemakers, bringing warring factions together! Calm minds moving beyond a conflict and seeing solutions! Firm men and women, not jostled by circumstances! Those are the linchpins needed today!
Do you hear the rumble of the village cart? Wheels tottering, load swaying, but behold the linchpin, firmly fixed, unmoved, unaffected, untroubled just uniting! Or do you want to join the violent mob and lynch with ropes, stones, or worse with words on WhatsApp groups and social media? To be a lyncher or linchpin, should be a question you should ask yourself..!
