Wednesday, November 25, 2009

India - Not a free society

This post is rather about how governments and their legislation and stuff are full of unnecessary vulnerabilities. I must say this before I begin:

I hereby declare that all this information is entirely true. I shall not be responsible if this causes and stupid wars or something. All I am doing is speaking the fucking truth. If you cannot admit and accept the truth, you'd better not read this. I have a right to freedom of speech, and you or anyone else cannot blame me for using that right.

All I am trying to do here, is open people's eyes, not blind them.

So, it happens that a few days back, I happen to smoke a cigarette after dinner on the roof with a neighbor (a guy from another college). All of a sudden, there's a fucking blast, and a house nearby seems to be on fire. We both run on towards the railing of the roof to see whatever was going on. Turns out that a bike is going towards the end of the street. The building is on fire. A drain right in front of it is on fire, which clearly tells that some kind of fuel was used. We stood in awe, and noticed that the door is on fire. I thought it was a good idea to go tell someone so that the situation could be brought under control. I told the other guy, "Hey man, let's go tell someone. The fire might spread." To that, he says, "Let's just finish the cigarette first." I thought that was quite reasonable, 'cause the fire was already going high. How much could it increase in about a couple of minutes?

I could not hold on that long. The fire seemed pretty annihilating. I threw more than half the cigarette and went down to tell someone. Then people gathered around and tried putting out the fucking fire. Then it turns out that the house was a shop, that remains closed most of the time. The fire brigade came, and then came the cops (Yeah, someone did call 'em up). So, I got dragged as the witness. Of course, all I'd seen was the taillight of the bike. I just told 'em what I'd seen. Meanwhile, the other guy, with whom I was smoking, hid his coward little ass in his room. So, I reckoned it was better not to utter the fact that I wasn't the only one to see that shit.

A few days later the cops come again to get some more information. I told the same thing again. Of course, there wasn't anything else to be told.

Today, that same guy (the cop that came the other day) comes up again and tells me that there won't be no hearing for that case, 'cause the shop owner hadn't any financial information about that little shop of his. I felt a bit relaxed, mostly because I had this exam going on (not because I had to testify, for I was ready to do that, but wasn't ready to hamper the exam for that). We talked about how the student life was with me. He told that he had caught a few guys from my college going around drunk at 3 at nights. We were on the same page with me telling that stuffs should be up to a certain limit (you have to say stuffs to socialize right?). He told how he had to spend a lot of money for his son, who is now a doctor. He told how he'd ran our from home and stayed in Kolkata for a few years (after coming to know that it's where my home is). All in all, it was a nice talk. Then he went away.

After a few minutes, I went out with a friend of mine, to have some tea and a smoke or two. He came on another friend's bike. As we were going back towards my place (he was dropping me), some cops stopped us (the police station is on the way). I looked at the guy wh0 was in front of us. I was relieved to see that the guy was the same cop who came to my house about a few minutes ago. I thought he won't bother me, 'cause he knows me. He gave me a smile, and told my friend (who was driving) to show him the license and the papers of the bike. The papers were supposed to be under the seat. We tried to open it up for about five minutes. Not having done so earlier, took us quite some time. Then we didn't find it, the bike owner had kept it somewhere else in his house. Now we were in deep shit. The cop now says that we'd have to pay a fine. The other way out is to give him a bribe of 100 bucks. I was astonished to see, that the guy was telling that. Just a few minutes ago, he was such a good person. And now, he was just another "Indian" cop.

Sooner or later, we had to give up. The bike wasn't ours. We had to give the fucking money. I didn't quite like the idea of bribing him. There was no slip or something. All the money went in his pocket. Now, the point is (about which I came to know later), that they are not traffic police. So, they can't just stop a vehicle in the road and ask for money. Another guy got caught and although he had all the papers, was being asked to pay a 100 bucks (bribe of course) by the same man. He, on the other hand used his tactics to get out of the situation.

They say India will be a developed nation by 2020. But honestly, I don't see a fucking chance. India, as I see from the inside, is not a developing country. Ironically, it can't be labeled an underdeveloped country either. I'd label India as (and probably I might be inventing a new word), an UNDERDEVELOPING country. While the rest of the world is going forward, India is going backwards. Many people will say stuffs against this, but again, it is them who are the cause for this. And this is not the only incident because of which I'm so much pissed off. I live here, and I see shit happening every single day. After all, this country, or any goddamn country is not made of soil and water and trees and flowers and mountains! We, the fucking people, the inhabitants make the country. But, I reckon, the people of this country will never learn this. I do not really feel enraged any more. I feel sorry for this country.

2 comments:

Minnie said...

Dont loose hope pal,things will change with time...Have faith in the balance of nature...

Sudipto Sarkar (Xtreme) said...

Ironically, it's not nature that's playing the role here. It's people. I think I should rather try and be a bit more optimistic.