Today, I'm forced to question my existence, my own identity...
Series of incidents:
Terror Attacks in Mumbai...
I'm not a Mumbaikar, but have spent close to an year in the city and I absolutely loved every minute of my stay there, I do have a few distant relatives and yes, some of my friends do live there. When the terror attacks happened, I phoned them all, and confirmed if they were all ok or not, thankfully, they were all safe... so do I still worry... do I still need to bother about the entire episode, turns out that's exactly how half a billion population in India and millions living outside associate with the attacks... then why am I so restless... it's not my city that's in flames, neither my property or belongings being messed around with... then why am I so restless...
I am currently residing in a different country, I was glued to the laptop 24*7 watching the news, hadn't slept for more than 36hrs straight... blood shot eyes... at the end of it... I'm left feeling ashamed of my existence and my identity.
Politics...
Let me begin with our "Puppet King", the prime minister, the speech he gave on the Thursday night addressing the country, was so bloody lame, no emotions, no sternness, felt more like a nursery kid who's forced to recite the alphabets, by the teacher, screw you Mr. Prime Minister, where is the rage, the aggression... the comforting words...Like I said, this was just the beginning from the Congress, as I mentioned, I was following the news, being streamed on the internet, the IBNlive.com, there was this flash ad which kept appearing hovering over the headlines section asking for votes by Shiela Dixit .
Mr. Advani, started of saying big words, we stand united and everything else, sounding sensible for the first time, only to contradict and to use this to his political advantage, and all this within 12 hours of his first statement of standing in unison, add to this a letter by our previous PM, Mr. vajpayee, do you need to summon the country at this hour and that too with your political agenda. Mr.Narendra Modi, I don't even want to spare a thought for your actions and reactions, I really think you need psychiatric help.
Then the claims from BJP party leaders, nothing of this sort happened in your regime, blah blah blah... for god’s sake, someone knock some sense into them, terror attacks are not planned periodically or based on who the leader is/ which government is ruling or not...
Also, the most annoying thing, at the time of the siege, there were these prime important people, including, the above mentioned, i.e, Puppet King (Mr.Manmohan Singh), Mr.Advani, Sonia Gandhi etc. making visits to the location, as if what was happening there was not enough, these guys had to add to the pandemonium, the concerns for their security and all, and added burden, more lives at risk. On being questioned there then there were believers of the fact that they should be there to console people and to instill strength & courage... Yeah right!!!, the right answer for why they were there, "It's election time, how can I miss a golden chance to earn brownie points"... how I wished for one mistimed bullet... and never again...
Nonetheless, this was just the beginning, Mr.Vilasrao Deshmukh takes the cake on stupidity and insensitivity... on Friday, Mr. Deshmukh had expressed is disappointment, that the Stock Exchange remained closed, and that people in Mumbai are letting this "so-called small" incident, affect their lives... this is not all, in one of the press conferences yesterday, I heard him say, we have written a letter to the Central Govt. to develop an NSG of our own state, for our own state... what shocked me is even now he doesn't want to strengthen the existing security measures, he is still not focusing up on cleaning up the system cause of which that kind of access of our country is being levied to the terrorist, what is wanted is to kill the disease from the birth and not focus on the medicines for remedy.
Oh yes... how can I forget during all this, Mr.Lalit Modi, wants Cricket to be on...
People...
To be honest, I am not mad at the politicians as much as I am with the people, they are the same dirty lot wherever you see, there is no one absolutely no one whom you can call as the ideal one, for me to compare and complain. I feel disgraced by the people more. There were some elite mumbaikars on the panel of discussions, then the cameramen were covering up some common people, they were all cheering for the "Spirit of Mumbai", i.e., people will not let this episode affect their regular lives
To start with, I really can't relate to the fact that people can go back to being regular, to pretend as if nothing ever happened... and I also can't somehow accept the camouflage of so called, "spirit of Mumbai" that Mumbaikars wear, just to cover up the fact that, it is not the willingness of people that forces them to bring them to go to work again, but in reality a fact of life, the horrors of their life, that unless they work, they can't survive... they do not have the luxury of time, the luxury of sitting back, growing out of the fear and into the comfort zone before walking out again. As I mentioned, I currently reside outside India, I was on social networking site, with most people in my network (mostly Indians) are more bothered about how to spend the weekend off... or how they are waiting for the next couple of days off... off from work, so they cans it back and relax... yeah people may say, matter of personal choice... but yes... in my opinion disgraceful...
The worst bit...
There was an SMS spread amongst the Indians for a Candle Vigil at the Indian Consulate, for all the brave ones and the ones who suffered in this inhumane act of terror... I wanted to be a part of it... as I reached the Consulate, and enquired with the security guard, he said he has no clue of any such thing, I strolled around the corner in anxiousness and saw ten odd people, still trying to light the candles... we reached there and counted heads, there were just 12 others, i.e., 3 families and us... in a country full of Indians, only 12 of us had the time for this...
Ironically, the Indian Consulate was hosting a play or something and there were people who were walking by us, to go and see the "show"... but no one absolutely no one, even bothered to enquire of what the candles were about... or even stopped a second to pay homage...
For Chirst sakes... 200 + people have lost their lives…
The Worst is yet to begin, the bunch of people who were there had already left and it was just me and the other friend of mine, who decided to sit there for sometime and pray for the lost souls.
It struck me that we were the only two people who were sitting there, both of us are not mumbaikar's, neither of us lost anyone in the attacks, but we still wanted to sit there, for we were sad, it was aching inside, for we felt that this attack was Personal, we take offense of any wrong doing on our Nation...
It was just ten minutes, the roads were deserted, I kept looking here and there, hoping for at least a few more heads to join in, join in this moment, to pray for those affected... suddenly a consulate security comes to us and starts questioning us, on what is this, why are we doing it... he spoke to us, as if we're committing a crime for being there... he took our identities and kept speaking to us in a rude tonality... within the next ten minutes, we were questioned on this by another two officers and again, but this time more questions were being asked, we told them the reason, and we told them that there were a couple of more guys who were attending the cause, but now have left, and that we don't mean no harm, its only prayers that we got... anyways the rude tonality continued, they said, we saw you here, and we hold this against you and that they had called the cops...
The cops... it’s really difficult to deal with the cops in this region, firstly they don't speak your language, they are bloody biased, they won't listen to you, if they don't want to and they can accuse you of any offense...
So during all this, I requested the guards, if I can speak to someone in the consulate, only to learn, there was some kind of celebration happening inside the consulate, some plays and all... which actually was the last straw on the horse's back, until now I was still feeling ok, but once I learned that the consulate was hosting activities, I was broken, I wanted to scream at the top of my lung in remorse, what shushed me was the fact that when the play got over, there were people ( supposedly all were Indians) who walked past us, no one stopped at the vigil... not even for a second, everyone was laughing... and walking away... and there was this one lady dressed in black, who couldn't even refrain clearing of the ash of her cigarette in the candle lit area, not shushed exactly... but silenced for sure.
For this indeed is a "Black Day" for me... I couldn't help but question, how colored and cold have we grown...
In the midst of all this there was just one other family which came to pay homage, but the security guys fleed them away.
Anyways, we stood their in silence, for we waited for the cops to come, just before the cops did come, there was someone from the consulate whom we managed to connect and to come and speak to these guys... in case anything severe happens...
It was best he didn't come... this guy was sloshed, he was drunk beyond limits, and the minute he heard cops are coming he deserted us and skipped.
The Cops came, luckily they spoke to us in a language known, and we explained the cause... they did let us go... but before they did... we were forced to blow off all the candles and clear the place up...
Along with those candles, a soul was burnt, my identity was raped and I felt BURIED...
1 comment:
Read the post, whole of it though it was quite long. It's around 3 at night. I didn't feel like sleeping and wanted to read or write and feel some sort of connection. I was literally searching for something that can have some impact. Read a few blogposts of unknown people randomly (following random links) and reached here. Read this post and then I knew I'd to write something. Let's see what follows.
around 200 people died in Bombay. farmers commit suicide in India. The flood in Kosi devastated lives of thousands. What did I do? Cringed, wrapped myself in another thick layer to keep my inside untouched by the dirt of this world. The realization: or the irony of it: how can we remove the dirt and still stay pure? How can I touch something and still stay untouched?
Clueless, directionless I ventured into an unknown world where the voice again said to me the same words.. stand up, grow up, get out of these days of fairytales and magicworld, and hold them. those millions of people, the orphans, the forlorn, all of them need you.
Everytime it happens, I tell myself: Yeah! I know that. I'm aware, 24 X 7 aware. I know the bigger purpose, I know that it's calling, I know that I'll eventually have to take that first step and initiate the war. If I don't, my soul won't find its peace. However, amid all this, the little girl inside..... what of her? Her dreams? Those dreams and secrets of her world which she has kept so safe, so preserved in her heart for such a long time. What of them? all the wait in vain? Right now, I can feel her, her shivering dreams which she's kept inside her fists unscathed and preserved like her own little child.. i can feel her heartbeat.. so fragile it seems that it fills me with a fear. Will she be able to let go of all her dreams, all her desires for the sake of that purpose?
Right now, I've no clue. It seems just too hard. Just with a bit of self-belief, how far can we go? How far? You look up at the sky and scream, and in return, you find God's silence. Why does God always reply in this unknown language?
.................................
There's so much turmoil at times. Perhaps He speaks through silence. And the silence always tells me that she'll, if she has to find her peace, she'll be able to carve her own path. The soul in her will outdo that girl. The spirit will take her to the level where she can feel herself inside every other individual. When her own world won't exist, because their world will become hers and her own will sink deep inside her. Perhaps during this lifetime, she won't get time for herself, but the wait will continue, in silence, in solitude, in those moments when she will pray or look at the sky, when she will dream of that unknown, or when the infinite amount of love will again oodle inside her tiny heart, she will stay assured, she will know that wherever He is, He would be feeling exactly the way she's feeling. This life is just not for love. This life of ours doesn't belong to us. This life is to let go of all dreams, all desires. This life is to step out of the shackles of "me" and "I". This life is a prayer to God. and like a prayer, it must be kept selfless.
and someday, in some birth, this wait will be over. and that would be in a better world. The world we and the children of this nation will create.
I love that unknown. But I'll keep him off, I've no way to justify this, I just have to. But someday I'll return to him, with all dreams and every bit of love kept preserved as my most precious jewel.
and till then, the purpose, the call, the sacrifice, dumping that little girl and all her dreams in a corner.... everything justified. The purpose. that's it.
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and you, my dear dear friend, when you feel the pinch in your heart, when your soul cringes at the thoughts of terror, when you feel the drops of tears filing your eyes, when your heart cries and soul wants to scream, please do it.
I'll give you some idea: have some friends of yours with you. Make some posters, banners and put them at public places, colleges/CCDs etc. Have some sort of get together and talk, debate, argue, and ignite the fire inside others. Spread the fire around. It's not that tough. And if you cant' do this, then at least discuss it all with people, take this vow that you'll try your best to trigger such sort of discussions amongst your peers. whenever you're out for any lunch/dinner, dont let your friends discuss yuvraj singh or shahrukh's new movie or their other friends or gfs/bfs, discuss with them India, our society, our people, the evils, what's wrong, how it can be rectified etc etc, the list is too long. At least make them "think" so that they may look outside their own cosy world.
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