This is a word-for-word copy of a group mail I sent home.
@Amitabha
Thanks for the update. The media could have been more responsible in handling such news. But when the headlines along with 'Agartala Blasts', is "SRK watches Drona premiere', you can imagine how callous we have become towards such things.
Worst of all, we play the blame game. The government for not having more stringent anti-terrorist laws. The police for not being omniscient. And the mainland media for covering blasts in Mehrauli more than in Agartala during prime time because they don't have enough correspondents in the fringing states.
What we don't realize most of the times is the worst effected- the common man - me and you are the most responsible for it ourselves. I understand that during the frenzy of a festive season, it is difficult to be alert. I, personally, seem to be lost in my thoughts most of the times. For those to whom it doesn't come intrinsically- they can excuse themselves.
But the ones who can- specially the young - in body or mind - can volunteer to form core anti-terrorist groups - at least temporarily until the Pujas are over peacefully.
Last afternoon, I was having almost a heart attack (not exaggerating but I stopped breathing for a while) when I read the sms***: 'Hope your folks are all same, there were serial blasts in Agartala." No one ones to see their hometown being ripped apart. What we fail to see is - Mehrauli or Jaipur or Agartala - it is our home. Whether it is religious fanaticism or political agenda- it's equally inexcusable
Without sounding too pedagogic, I'd recommend you to take some time out of your busy schedules and watch , 'Mumbai Meri jaan', which seems to me a realistic depiction of the Mumbai blasts ands its aftermath.
Have a great week ahead. And enjoy the Pujas. My humble wishes.
*** Thanks to Shashi, who tried calling first. I was outdoors when I got the news
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9 comments:
Aparna,
one fine day, my girlfriend called me in germany while i was on my way to a friend´s place and and told me that exact same - hope your folks are all right There were serial blasts in Jaipur today. And you know, i know what you felt. I called my parents in Varanasi to know about it cos i didnt have the courage to know if any of my close folks could be anywhere hurt durinf those blasts. And my heart stopped beating (exactly like yours must have) when the maid at home in Varanasi told me that Uncle and Aunty went to Jaipur this noon! I said to myself that there the worst has happened cos my parents had no plans to go Jaipur (or atleast plans that i knew of).
I had just gotten out of a train that time. I started crying on the train station like a child would do not caring who is watching and who is not. People were looking at me and must be rather amazed to see why this young man suddenly started weeping inconsolably. Well my breath had stopped like you said and i said to myself -i was wrong all this time thinking i wouldn´t be me....ever. People die i know, but i or my family, friends etc will never fall a victim to that. How wrong i felt i was all the while. Any one and i mean anyone can fall a victim to these religious fanatics and fascists one day.
Anyways, words can´t describe how good and rejoiced i felt to know that none of my relatives (i have my blood relatives and tons of them spread in almost every III neighbourhood in Jaipur) was hurt in the serial blasts, which targetted only the hindu population in that that they were mostly carried out near hindu temples (like hanuman temple) and on a tuesday, which is incidently day for hanuman´s worship and templevisit by hindus. Well I got away, but hundreds of others in Delhi, Ahmedabad, Varanasi and now in Agartala were not so lucky. I mean what about this child, who lost seven of his family members in the blast and now has no one to look upto? Why would god be happy to see such a bloodbath. Why would these bombers feel that they are serving god when they spill the blood of hundres of inncocent people. Why do people these terrorists don´t understand that we know that they are merely a frustrated lot, who are sadists enjoying to the fullest on every occasion when they successfully kill the innocent and then brazenfacedly and proudly take the responsibility of the same and give some lame and insane explanation to justify as if anything in this great darn world would be rational enough to justify such a cowardly and abhorrent act.
My sympathies with all those who lost their near and dear ones and at the same time - please don´t bury your head in the sand and do something about it....atleast during such events like Aparna just mentioned. God bless my country, if at all there is one (my apologies to all anti-atheists).
For a moment after I came to know, I felt the fear of losing a loved one ...
I won't pretend!! I do not know such fear, neither do I fancy knowing one anytime in the future. The only fact that I've understood is that mere puppets in the name of religion do the dirty job for someone else. And the ones who get it done have an ulterior motive!! I wonder how we can help the situation apart from being active!!
Hello
You have a good blog
Congrats!
Do visit http://puneet3210.blogspot.com
Regards...
Puneet
You know something...today you are writing this post...tomorrow someone else will...today we have not lost some nea and dear ones ....but someone else has...we are living in a goddamn selfish world where we only shed a tear or two and then move on...and why we should not...in this country of billions ....fellow countrymen is just another jargon....the feeling for being an Indian just emerges when we win another worthless cricket match.
nothing will change...explosions will continue...blood will keep on spilling...families will keep on changing into photoframes...nothing will change till the day 100 billion people pledge that for the next 24 hours no one will rest for even a second till all goddamn blood shedders are brought to justice and yeah brought to justice does not mean another eon long court case...brought to justice means immediate hang to death or shot in public...
also blood shedders does not only include the so called external terrorist but each and every individual who over any kind of fanaticism has killed a felloe being....there is no pardon for killing others....there should simply not be any leniency...
but are we ready to do it...
i bet not...another sun will rise and i will be off to my office and you to your classes and so will be others to their daily chores...and this will remain just another post...
cheers
I wrote this to comment long back... may be i was the first reader of this post... might be rude but then!!!
Something i want to ask you!
Why? Why you dint wrote any post like this when there was bomb blast in Jaipur? Or why not when it was in Bangalore? Or how about Delhi? Or Hyderabad? Or if its more about terrorism then why not same kinda post for bomb blasts that happened/happening day to day in Kashmir or in Srilanka? Or if its really a concern about civilians getting targeted then why not Iraq? Why this post after bomb blast in Agartala? Or is it so that you have been waiting to write such post and after this agartala blast you felt that you cant postpone writing it anymore? All my *WHY's* are not to challenge you. rather if you analyze a bit the answer lies there! Your post almost sounded as if this agartala blast was an eye opener for you, if thats the case then you have failed to look around the world.
@arun
You are not rude. You are just probing. And you are right- it's the whole point- we don't seem to notice until we face the fear of immediate loss. When I was in Delhi - I was supposed to go to Sarojininagar the day it happened- my parents were almost crazy with frenzy.
This time, when it happened, I was in Boston - and just on the eve of my birthday (14th Sept) the blasts took place. I was busy shopping and got the info from a cab driver who was wondering aloud: what's happening in India? He was from a place where people got killed in cyclones. I told him- death of innocent people is meaningless anywhere in the world- whether in the London subway or the WTC towers in New York . And terrorism is worse than natural disasters because I feel more responsible towards it. Science might not have advanced well enough to stop a cyclone form advancing. But humanities has not progressed enough to stop such extremism is what surprises me the most.
It was with much guilt that I wrote :'What we fail to see is - Mehrauli or Jaipur or Agartala - it is our home.' Coz I did not acknowledge the fact either. The other blasts shocked me- but the Agartala blasts made me confront my worst nightmares- of losing my near ones.
Also, the post came a bit later, because I didn't have a chance to voice my thoughts before this. As you can see- it is just a copy paste of something I sent to the google group of Tripura talents.
You have every right to those question marks. I hope I answered them.
Someone said "Charity is not sharing a bone with a dog! It's rather sharing the same bone with a dog when you are as hungry as the dog".
In the same way "Humanity is not shedding 2 drops of tears when things go wrong in our near/dear/immediate circle it's rather shedding the same when things go wrong for someone at the other end of the world"
But is that possible? About war/terrorism/poverty/relational woes/etc etc way back(Comprehensively you can consider that as "Purpose of life"), i have thought so much and at the end i found the answer which is convincing/contending for myself. May be my answers would raise other question for you. So let me not get into that.
Other than that i second Saikat's thought!
i think you are very rihgt to some extent its time for common man to do something against terrorism and in this our media has to support us.sometime we saw on news channel that the news is coming of some our security that ..at any airport media person goes and says that see i came here and no one checks me and all that.....now why the opens our loop holes to the hole world they can told this to govt in private.
now time to do something that nasruddin shah did in "A Wednesday".
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