I look out of the window of my jerky bus and see torrential rain. I also see beautiful trees… green and beautiful. The fruits are bountiful. I also smell a stench…powerful and guttural. A little looking around and I zero in on garbage dumped in a quiet corner - Invisible to the careless eye but prominently conspicuous to the sensitive nose. The scenario was beautiful and appalling at the same time.
Is emergent India being epitomized through this visage of nature? It’s a pertinent question and one with many justifications. Yes it rained…is still raining elephants and horses if you please. The bull was, at one point in time, running through the bear’s china shop and the people were cheering it on. Flyovers and highways are still coming up left, right and centre. Multiples and malls are becoming the order of the day. People are earning more; people are spending more and people are saving more. The bankers are not complaining nor are the customers. The rich are getting richer…yeah damn right they are. But what of the poor? They are definitely nose-diving into the throes of poverty.
What of the ordinary farmer in Maharashtra? A certain Mr. Minister would ask, “Yes, what of him?” -Well, its not been raining in his backyard for sure. The poor blokes realized that they had been shortchanged by their weather god and the self-assumed god (politician). With no help from any quarter and a speedy descent into the quagmire called debt, they decided to cut through the very fabric of their lives. Can you feel the stench? Is it the rotting corpse of a very dead farmer?
The air is suddenly dense with a suffocating stench. The scents are many and different. But its characteristic foulness is common. The rain suddenly does not seem so enchanting anymore; the greenery starts moving to the background and the offal comes into full view. Can it be that when its rains it also pains? Can it be that we have become so monomaniacal and unidirectional in our pursuit of economic excellence that we have forgotten to use all our senses in conjunction with each other? Are we eschewing our responsibilities towards each other by looking through blinkers?
I look outside again – And it rains again.
