We Shall Overcome….

Fear

Hats off to Anuradha and Sabrina who overcame all fears and bravely fought against the mighty, for their friend (Ruchika) and sister (Jessica).

Social relations have lost their warmth and people live just for themselves. In such a scenario, Anuradha rose above all hurdles and fought the case of her long dead friend – Ruchika, when Ruchika’s own family had given up. Same for Sabrina, who bravely maintained her patience and did not give up to the influential forces, till she got justice for her slained sister, Jessica Lal. We should question ourselves. How many among us can fight like this? How many of us can stand before the wrong doers? How many of us feel real anger seething within us? Anger we do feel, but how many times do we react?

We feel frustrated, we feel angry, but we are too overburdened with fear and selfishness to react to the wrong doers of society! We don’t feel the need to do anything, till it hurts us directly.

Why has fear overwhelmed us so much that we do not bother even for our neighbors?
I am myself perturbed by this question, as in the last few months one after the other, such situations posed before me, where when I should have reacted as a human, I retreated into my shell. First was a case of road rage. I was driving to my son’s school to pick him up. Just in front of me an auto was trying to overtake from the wrong (left) side. At the same time, another bike behind me, coming at full speed from the wrong side, was about to overtake the auto, when they almost crashed. The auto too was wrong, but because it was slow, accident was averted. But……., the youth on the bike who was doubly wrong, overtaking from the left & speeding, had to show his strength! The auto didn’t even touch his bike, but he stopped & began abusing and slapping the lean & thin autowalla, least bothered about the traffic jam he had created. He had such a sinister look on his face, had the auto driver reacted a little more, he would have been stabbed. Everyone, including me watched! I did feel like stepping out of my car and stopping the youth, but I didn’t. First, the strongly built biker frightened me, and second, I was more concerned about reaching my son’s school on time. Fear and self-centeredness! What if the auto driver was really stabbed (quite common on Delhi roads) in front of my eyes? Could I have forgiven myself for not reacting, even when I clearly saw it coming?

A friend of mine, living in her own house, is terrified of her neighbor, a tenant. Fed up with their irritating ways and abusive language, they complained to the police. But they could not match the foul language and threats that followed after the complaint, and are now quietly waiting for the landlord to evacuate those non rent paying tenants.

Why do we live in such fear? Even when we see someone in distress, someone bleeding on the road, we do not stop to help! Even a policemen in uniform lay on the road bleeding to death, with no one offering help. What has happened to our sensitivity? Is it the stress of modern life? Or is it due to the poor reputation of the police and judiciary? Why do we keep quiet when we see something wrong happening?

We say that the world is bad! But if we look around us we’ll find that ninety percent people on earth are good, law abiding people. But they are the quite ones too. The smaller proportion of the wrong doers are always more vocal, and they gain strength from our meek silence. We, the right, the law abiding, educated people have to overcome our fear and raise our voice against injustice. We need many more Anuradhas and Sabrinas to make the society free of wrongdoers and injustice!!!!