Go Beyond Lighting A Candle!!

A candlelight vigil , as described by Wikipedia, is an outdoor assembly of people carrying candles, held after sunlight. And this is in vogue.

There was this unfortunate terror attack in Mumbai and we all saw public outcry and their angst against political establishment. Every citizen of this country started wanting to do something for his country. But what can an individual do? Oh wait; there is this novel idea of a candlelight vigil. A symbolic solidarity for victims - of Mumbai terror attack or Jessica Lal. So we lit a candle, join people in-mass and that’s it. Our part is done. We feel content. At least we joined the peace march. We did our bit. Then we, The people of India, go to hibernation till something else happens.

All this is good. At least we still have some feelings left of our country and countrymen. But this is not it. We need to go beyond just lighting a candle. Otherwise that is just hypocrisy.

Or what else you say when you see people not bothering to even stop when there is some accident. It personally happened with me. I was pillion rider with a friend. He somehow lost the balanced, bike skidded and both of us fell down. By the time we got up at least 5-6 people on their bike crossed the site but none of them stopped to help us. And no, there were not aam junta. This happened very near to my office and all of them must be working one or other IT company in the IT Park nearby. I am not denying that in general people don’t help but there have been many cases when they pretend not to see anything. God forbid, but had there been any casualty these very people would have participated in a candlelight vigil shouting slogan against govt's negligence to maintain proper road. Hypocrisy, I say.

Or what else you say when you see people not following a queue. And then complaining about slow working of government officials? The other day I asked this lady if she mind coming in the queue. Instead doing so we snapped on me saying that that is how she get canteen coupon daily and no body objected. And mind it this happened again in the canteen of the IT park. Hypocrisy, I say.

Or what else do you say when people refuse to follow traffic signals and lane rules . I was waiting at a red signal and this gentleman behind me was honking continuously for I refused to give way to him to cross the red signal. Hypocrisy, I say.

Or what else do you say when people, including me (I even don’t have a voter Id card and I am past ten years the voting age. Shame on me.) don’t exercise their franchise but keep cribbing about the govt and its policies. Hypocrisy, I say.

Armchair intellectualism is good for discussions but that does no good. Now is the time to stop talking and start doing. Lets go beyond just lighting a candle. Lets be change at root level and the bigger changes would follow suit.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Hey here's an idea
http://satyameva-jayate.org/2009/01/25/help/
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