Tuesday, December 2, 2008

quit spitting blames !!

Terrorism. So much has already been said, written and argued about in the past few days on the subject that I don’t think I would be able to add any more original lines. I feel terrible knowing that one fine day while walking down the road someone armed with an AK-47 can gun me down. It’s sad that human mind can be so twisted. Glued to the television, I prayed for things to calm down. However more than the terror incidents it’s the approach of most of us to the scene which disturbed me. I consider myself at a position where I have a bird’s eye view of the things that happened the last few weeks. And since I’m in that perspective of vision I wouldn’t know if Vilasrao and Ritesh Deshmukh going to Taj with Ram Gopal Verma was a mistake of the extent to which it was shown on the media. I didn’t know people couldn’t carry on with their lives because of an unfortunate and unexpected incident which killed hundreds. I mean if he had probably taken up the issue and sacrificed his life fighting for us, would we remember him? I have heard fellow mates degrading someone like Gandhiji, a father figure supposedly, of our country, but except for the Gandhi Jayanti that promises a holiday, I don’t think of him and I know most of us feel the same way, but yes, I wouldn’t badmouth him if my life depended on it. If I die tomorrow I would expect people close to me to mourn, I wouldn’t expect the whole city to stop living their lives... probably if a person I didn’t personally know would even think in his mind that what happened to me was unfair and say a prayer for me, genuinely, I think that would be enough. And another incident which was given much publicity was that of Major Sandeep’s dad shouting at the Kerala chief minister calling him a dog and ousting him from their house. Personally I believe that it is an act of utter ignorance. If someone turned from a mere village tailor into one of the most powerful political figures in South India today I think he would have done some good somewhere and he should be better than the rest of us in some ways at least, and abusing a leader is not taken. I completely understand that their loss is inconsolable but there are thousands who lay their lives on the borders protecting us, dying unnoticed, the loss of those families is not smaller. And so much crap has been shown on the media against the Government in the past few days that it feels like a waste to even watch television, I mean be honest to yourself, can u think of putting your whole life in something as competent and massive enough as politics, and if you can’t why ask people who are the Govt to take responsibility for the terror strikes. It’s not that they are super humans. They are just one of us put on the hot seat by all of us.

If being a citizen of the country
- I do not pay my taxes on time
- bribe to get licenses done outside the License authority through agencies
- being a rich businessman show myself to be economically backward to avoid taxes
- show myself as part of a socially backward community when I have enough and more money to pay my college, school fees and others
- claim to have a seat in government institutions because of the same when I can very well afford an equally good private institution and thus deprive the real needy of an opportunity to be well educated
- show my property to be worth less to avoid property tax and registration money
- bribe cops when I break rules
do all this and when I can’t even take the effort to vote even when most offices declare during election times a half day to encourage people to vote ,then I should very well just shut up and stop blaming the Govt. And well, if you are so fed up of everything why wait for others to take the good step forward, why don’t you go ahead and spend your entire life creating a political party for the good and well being of the following generations. Calling the Govt freaks and arguing and blaming the ruling parties is very easy cos you don’t even break a nail doing it.

Forget all this... how about another part of the story. How many of you who are in Mumbai went out of your houses to donate blood to the needy? Being a heavily populated city, the blood banks were exhausted as happens in the wake of such catastrophes, and people living even close by were not ready to come down to the hospitals because of the hulla outside. I being in Hyderabad at least cared to call the blood bank and ask if they needed my blood group, but I reached them too late because of the totally jammed network, and believe me if they had said yes, I would have taken the next train to Mumbai. Some NGOs had been there just before and they said they had enough stock but would get back to me if required. How many of you will care to think of the fate of those who became handicapped in the mishap. Would you do anything for them? Most of us will forget the incident and move on with our lives. And yes, if I can do anything against terrorism it is to move on with my life, not to be scared till death, be unafraid. And in times of need, be unafraid to help. The main aim of terrorism it to spark fear, fear to live. Our fight is against this fear. And yes, be a good citizen as far as you can help it. Instead of blaming each other and cribbing against the odds we must stand united and help each other in times of such crisis.

10 comments:

Anil Sawan said...

a very powerful msg there.

i am happy to see atleast one person trying to analyze what happened with the CM of Kerala.

happy to know u athi. trust my words.

amit nambiar >> said...

totally agreeing to the above, but not ignoring the feelings of a father who lost his only son, how do you expect him to react knowing the political state of the country, that too in a situation like this. Poor guy, he would have been way too helpless to even think.

Good post though.

athi said...

When u decide to become part of the armed or other paramilitary forces.. its as good as saying that you are ready to give up your life for the country. I'm not saying that because of this reason, parents shouldn't grieve the loss of their sons but what I'm trying to put forth here is the CM of Kerala was definitely not responsible for their son's death. For him, coming there and giving his condolences was part of his duty, of what is expected of him, even if it is a formality. If he hadn't done the same, that would have become another issue.Whatever might be the reason, abusing somebody is not a way to vent out your anger or frustration. And the political state of our country is like this cos we let it be.

Ken John Koshy said...

just a clarification, the commandos dad didnt call the chief minister a dog, the CM said something about "not even a dog going to the house was it not for his son. I am not a communist and just for the record I believe that the ideology should be exterminated from India. But I do agree that the whole incident was completely blown out of proportion. As a CM, which is a post of authority, he shouldnt have said that, but this much fuss in ridiculous. I agree with u on the entire issue of blaming the politicians. What we see on TV does not even represent even 2% of Indias population. I do believe that the media has over hyped the entire public anger angle and the people holding marches and stuff are not really the real activist kind. These protests and all are just a phase. Remember the whole youth for equality thing when Arjun Singh brought in reservation for OBC's....any 1 hearing anything from them now? The people coming out are people who at this present moment of time is responding in an emotional manner. After a while, willingly or unwillingly all of them would have to get back to their lives. This thing will die down soon. I am saddened to c the kind of mockery that is going on in the media. Suggestions like AK 47 rifles for the police, war on Pakistan, use nuclear weapons, etc. These kinds of remarks in the media will just add fuel to the fire.
I really hope the government doesn’t give in to the ridiculous demands of the opposition and the general public. Work needs to be done, it’s a fact, but there is way to go about things, which is impossible to achieve with cluttered and emotional thought. It would have politically been much better for the congress if they had just kept quite and went about solving the problem instead of defending themselves.

Ken John Koshy said...

About people with AK47 coming at u. It can happen in any country and response would have been more or less the same. In fact a similar incident happened in the US were 2 gum men robbed a back with bulletproof armors and AK47's with infinite amount of bullets. the whole thing went on for hours and the police were pretty helpless. Fortunately only the 2 gun men were killed in that incident.
To be perfectly safe we need to be a paranoid society, which is what ppl r saying now. they want CCTV's every where and what not. This is not practical in a country like india and even if its implemented, the same ppl who asked for it would have a 1000 complaints. I hope some sense will be restored.
The problem with india at the present moment is that we dont have a strong leader to take charge of this volatile situation. manmohan singh has send the right message but he doesnt have the charsima make the citizens at ease

Anil Sawan said...

kenny, i more or less agree to your words..

athi said...

@ kenny Agree completely wid wat u sed... what the CM sed was a stupid attempt to cover his hurt pride. I'm not a communist, in fact I have no interest whatsoever in politics,but I believe every man should have a right to shield his dignity.
In India we don't have a political position which people blindly will believe in and which gurantees that man every right to take extreme steps to protect the nation, the very drawback of a multi-party democratic system, but being a country which is so fiercely multi-cultural,multi-lingual ,where every man is same before the law, to enable a One God democratic system like in US is next to impossible.We are a country of 330 million Gods tightly connected to different religions but wrapped by a loose thread.Hence we have millions of local Gods finally electing a supreme God.To coexist and cooperate with such a complicated system, we must pay the price of some minorities always being dissatisfied and hence such extremist outbursts and there will always be people who support such terrorist activities within the country.
A peaceful India is but a distant dream.

jai said...

Extremely well written! I found your post quite genuine. Especially the the bit where you speak about the good citizen. That's one checklist on which everyone one is going to some point or the other right. Very trivial instances but profound impact.

Keep writing!

Cheers,
-J

Jith Thomas said...

and believe me if they had said yes, I would have taken the next train to Mumbai.
Are you sure about it? Or just another over-proportioned irony? Regarding the Kerala CM's comment, there is no mistake commited by Mr. Unnikrishnan, since Achumama's visit was a political manoeuvre. When he called Sandeep's home from Airport itself Unnikrishnan pleaded him to avoid the visit. But they still went there just to satisfy their selfish motives.
And about the Media hyping the entire issue, I think that's the only reason why governement transitioned to active mode from Passive. It was a reflection of capacitated Indian janatha.

Keep blogging......

athi said...

@jith u dun know me.. so well... upto u whether or not to believe me.
Another thing I'm extremely sincere about what I write here..what I don't believe in...I would never put it down on a public forum.