I was very gleefully welcomed till I buy my ticket but the moment I stepped into the theater I was left to my fate. Worst of all the experiences is the way I was let out of the cinema theater. I was made to pass through numerous tunnels, while the whole lot of people were literally compressed and pushed through small vestibule with no windows what so ever, walking endlessly till we reach a few abandoned looking steps passing stinking toilets. Yet I was so relieved to find them as they are gateways to my freedom. The hell I passed through almost reminded me gas chambers of holocaust days. While walking through those narrow paths I was wondering what if there was a fire accident or some other kind of panic. Without an iota of doubt hundreds die out of stampede and chaos.
When a four story building had collapsed in my neighborhood day before, I grieved the dead and thanked my god for preventing me from getting tempted for while to buy that " direct ticket to heaven or hell" , on the first floor, despite vigorous persuasion by the same builder who went absconding after it crash killing 13 people working in it.
Just a day before that neighborhood building went down with a thud, a supposed hospital caught fire killing three nurses and many injured. All these huge mistakes were followed by frantic fault finding missions, suspensions, and FIRs. Up to that point it is OK. These things make news for a day or two. Later all of us forget about the incident and we don't even have a glimpse of an idea as to what has happened to the accused. It is ridiculous to talk about fire safety norms when all the constructions in the city or towns go on with gross violation of norms. Pathetically schools and collages are instituted in two bed room apartments with narrow spiral staircases and horrible ventilation. Junior colleges come up on the banks of stinking Nalahs with swarming mosquitoes, yet severely competed for seats by the parents. When a horrible accident takes place authorities talk about so many rules and regulations as if every thing is in place. Take a sigh of relief if your close kith and kin are not involved, let alone bothering about the invisible norms. We should wonder if it is the failure of an individual, if it is the failure of the system it is a matter of habitual malfunctioning. It would have been a if a solace at least if our rescue system is thoughtful. In most of the cases debris is removed with bare hands for hours before any crane or mover reaches out. Fire fighters fall short of either ladders or water. Crowd management becomes a herculean task. Obviously in all the cases we end with chaos.
While living in precarious apartments, passing through mad traffic, yearning for entertainment, consuming contaminated water and food, tasting spurious liquor, we are in close encounter with death which we may not anticipate in the normal circumstances. Yes we Indians can live anywhere as Rahul Gandhi said as we dangle between life and death on every single day and somehow manage to survive.
Encounter defined by the Indian police could be an unavoidable killing when an offender tries to escape or attack the police. In nuxal torn areas encounter is obviously killing of a Maoist by the police whether legitimately or illegitimately. When acid was poured on a girls causing their death people were happy with police encountering the offenders. We demand the same kind of 'encounter' for killers of little Vaishnavi. We forgot to believe in our legal system. We are quite contended with revengeful punishments meted out to the criminal even before they are questioned. This society has made us so insensitive that we want eye for an eye. In the process we forget to stop a while and think whether we are getting back to the medieval justice delivery systems? Should we choose take law into hands than opting for systemic cleansing? Or are we trying to derive sadistic pleasure in punishing people by attacking them than bringing them to justice? In that case why not we revert back to our epic style "Kumbhipakam etc..etc.."
No comments:
Post a Comment