The Sea-Face

The sea-face was full of people. She was waiting for him at the shore staring at the Bandra-Worli sea link. She remembered the time when it was being built. She used to come at the sea-face with him to see the enormous structure. “By the time the sea link is complete, we will be together. We will buy a car and go for a number of rides through the sea link”, his voice rang in her head. The sea-face was special for them. It was here that he had proposed her. Their first kiss, first argument, all the dreams about the future, all of these memories were cultivated here at the sea-face. It was difficult for her to get out of her house then. She used to lie about a sewing class in the afternoon and meet him. “Come back before the namaaz”, her abba used to say. She obeyed and never missed the namaaz in the evening. He used to live in the very next chawl with his family. After picking her up on the way, he would take her around Mumbai. He was a firm believer in Siddhivinayak Ganpati and used to take her to the temple at Prabhadevi every Thursday. Other days they would mostly spend time at the sea-face.

Today she was sitting at the same spot where they were spotted by her khala which started the catastrophe. She was dragged on the floor towards the only bedroom in their house and was forced to solitary confinement. Her two mothers, three younger brothers and two elder sisters were watching all this as if it was a lesson for them. There was no mode of communication with him. After a couple of days, she was helplessly shouting from the room, “He will be waiting for me, just let me meet him once”, but to no use. She had lost all hope to see him again, but one dreadful meeting was still planned by the destiny. The locality they lived in was communally sensitive. One fateful day, provocative statements by a communal leader led to riots in the area. There were loud knocks at the doors of her house. Everyone including her abba were frightened to open the door. Soon the knocks turned violent. The mob tried to break the door open while the family members resisted by pushing the door with their backs. But it was not long enough that the mob succeeded in getting inside. She was inside the inner room, too scared to say a word. She sat silently through the murder of her father and mothers, through the screams of her sisters while being raped, through the loud cries of her brothers while being mutilated, skinned and killed. Failing to notice another room in the house, the mob left the house with corpses on the floor.

There was complete silence for some time. Then she heard a person enter the house. “Ruksana” – he called out. It was him. She did not know how to react to his call. While she was elated to hear his voice and pleased with the thought that she will get to meet him after so long, she was imagining the horrendous scenes outside the room and feeling the fearsome pain of losing her loved ones. “A-A-Anirudh”, she called out in a broken voice. He broke open the door of the room and took her in his arms. He could smell her hair once again. He kissed her like there is no tomorrow. She did not have the courage to go outside, but he held her hand and took her out. A fierce cry came from her throat on seeing her family destroyed by the mob. The corpses of her siblings and parents lay all around the blood-colored floor. ‘The corpses in riots cannot expect cremation’ she thought to herself and agreed to leave. In order to keep her safe from the fanatics, he took her to his house in the next chawl and asked his mother and younger sister to take care of her. His father was against this but he was too bogged down by the riots to oppose.

While we humans discriminate each other basis race, religion, caste, creed, color, etc. death does not believe in discrimination. It is fair and unfair to all equally. His chawl was attacked by the fanatics of the other community, his house was bugged and the family met a similar fate. The mob detected that she belonged to their community and did not advance at her. But they hurt her with the weapons when she tried to defend his family. She was lying helpless on the floor, wounded, when they cut his father’s head and hanged it at the door near the aakash-kandil. She tried to get up and stop them when they were raping his sister. She was just crying loudly when they tore his mother’s abdomen and took out her intestine on one of the swords. But she could not see him. A few of them had dragged him outside just before the massacre.

The next she woke up was at a hospital bed in a nearby government hospital. All she could hear was loud wails, all she could smell was death, all she could see was corpses. She took a couple of months to recover from the injuries. She saw a lot of politicians visit the hospital in these days, some promised a relief package, some promised a revenge. Today morning she was discharged. She had to visit the sea-face today. The sea-link was to be inaugurated today. She could see a host of VIPs with their convoys at the sea-link. She recollected that the minister who was to inaugurate the sea-link had visited the hospital with a kerchief at her nose. A few days back she had got to know from one of the neighbors who visited her at the hospital that his body was found in pieces at the chawl. But she knew she would find him here. She was waiting for him, to come and hug her and take her for a ride on the sea-link. As it started to turn dark, she saw her hopes setting with the sun. Neither her namaaz nor his Siddhivinayak were able to help them be together in this life. She climbed the rocks at the sea-face and jumped into the sea. She was swimming towards the sea-link. She knew she would meet him there. She swam and swam till she disappeared with the sun.

Is my Bharat still Mahaan?

It used to be a 7AM assembly at the school and the flag hoisitng was a much awaited event. The 2-week preparation prior to the event, the lezim rally, the mallkhamb show, the playing of national anthem by the school band, the sweets distribution, all the volunteers and friends excited enough to come to school on a holiday. As we moved from childhood to adulthood, the importance of the Independce Day went down. We achieve the maturity to understand that it's just another day and any celebration won't solve the mess that the country is currently in.

I consider this a fair argument courtesy my belief that life should be celebrated in moments and not in just days. Celebrating the same day overs the years reduces the importance of the moment that we eventually want to cherish. Rather than that, we should look for more such memorable moments. But then, the same argument holds true for birthdays, anniversaries, world mother day, earth day, etc. And there is a group of self-proaimed intellectuals who derive immense pleasure in taking sarcastic digs at people putting up Indian National Flag as display picture or putting a patriotic quote or a song on social network. These are the same individuals who put posts like 6-month marriage anniversary, first date anniversary, celebrating my birthday, celebrating mother's day by eating maa ke haath ka khana and other types of displays of affection. If all these can be celebrated then why not Independence Day?

Going by my philosophy of live and let live, I do not have any opposition for any of these two categories of individuals. However, the only thing that bothers me is the double standards on both sides. The person who wants to show his love for the country is waiting for an opportunity to move out of the country and settle in US or Europe, and the person who criticizes this by boasting about righteousness basically has never done any action to support the country or to question the other person's show of affection for the nation. We all love to pull each other's legs on such issues and consider our duties for the larger society done. We crib about a near-zero tally at Olympics but want our kids to take education as a priority over sports. We all vouch for removing reservations but never want our kids to marry a person from a lower caste.

This proves that we are not only the world's largest (failed) democracy but also the world's largest hypocrisy. Mera Bharat Mahaan is a baseless self-praising lie that we tell ourselves. We used to be great, but not now. We cannot be mahaan till we have conscienceless hypocritical wars internally. We definitely have the ability to move our country towards greatness but no intent at all, at least in the current circumstances. And blaming this on others will not take us there.

If a difference has to be made, the change has to start from us. As the famous line goes - Don't ask what the country has done for you, think what you have done for the country. Swach Bharat is one such change initiative which has penetrated across the barriers of political affiliation. There should be more such programs which target the larger good. Criticizing it because of the dubious credentials of it's propagator would only slow down the speed of this positive change. We have to accept it at least for it's intent. And this was just one example, whereas we can start many such initiatives with right intent and the nation will follow.

Lastly, if we have to be righteous, we should be  it for ourself and not for our facebook walls or instagram. Every act that we do eventually contributes to the larger society. So being responsible while we act can be a starting step to this change. All we need is a conscience to differentiate right from wrong in the national context. So a better way to celebrate this Independence Day is to change something about ourselves which will have a positive impact on the society. The next Independence Day should be the appraisal for us with the goals set this year (the clichéd simile courtesy the profession of the blogger). Let's take a step towards a better country to make India mahaan again.