A foreword from 2024: I originally wrote this article at the height of Covid when the world seemed to be burning down around us. I did not post it due to a myriad of reasons- being fearful of voicing my opinions being one of them. But recent events have made it clear that nothing has changed in the 3 years since. Covid brought only pain and suffering- nothing has improved in the daily life of an Indian. Since then, there have been floods, droughts, landslides, and recently, what has been on everyone's mind is the total disregard for the life beyond the patriarchy- women and especially those from the underserved communities.
Original article from 2021: I saw an article recently discussing the shock of an Australian cricket player at the obscene amount of money spent for the IPL instead of using it to make more hospitals and ensure unbroken O2 supply.
My reaction was instantaneous- a small bitter laugh demonstrating the deep disgust at the one true thing I have come to learn about Indians which explains the shock of the Australian cricket player and many many other things- a total and utter lacking with regards to the value of a life.
It’s not just displayed by politicians holding mega-rallies while the country reels under the load of 400,000 cases per day and several thousand deaths (the real number being 2-10x higher). It’s visible down to the family and individual level in the way we treat those we assume to be lesser than us. Our cook and maid. The guy who delivers us food and groceries. We ask them to risk their lives and come work for us or travel around the city carrying our stuff and taking a chance with their lives. The simple reason is that every Indian, from the time they are children are taught that the lives of those less fortunate than them are meaningless. Middle class families think this of the working class employees in their homes. Rich people think this of the middle classes masses. And politicians think of this about the entire population- treating us like votes rather than actual living, breathing individuals. And when you consider the value of the person to be roughly equal to the 1 vote they provide, their death and the death of a thousand or even a hundred thousand persons suddenly doesn’t seem so bad. Because losing a 100,000 votes is not that bad in a country with 1.3 billion to spare.
It’s easy to blame one party, or one class of society, I.e. politicians or even one religion, caste etc. but this lack of empathy for the lives of others starts at home, in the way we treat those we see as below our station. And the current crisis of no oxygen and no hospital beds and politicians celebrating hollow victories while entire cities die, these are all just the culmination of that single fact.
So I get the shock of the Australian cricket player and the western media in general, where individual lives are held in (at least slightly) higher regard. And I get the pain and helplessness we all feel when we look at the news and at our social media feeds and chats and see people dying like flies outside hospitals and in their homes while the mainstream news list the exit polls and politicians celebrate with no regard for the pandemic.
But in the end, as hard as it might be to swallow, the fault lies with each and every one of us. Until we teach ourselves to value the lives of people who aren’t like us and stop thinking of someone as having less value than us if they are less fortunate we won’t break the chain, and this cycle of helplessness and pain and disgust we feel now will just keep on repeating forever.
It starts, like most things, at the grassroots level. So I don’t know if you can or will, but teach your kid or your family or friends and teach yourself to look at other’s lives with more respect and empathy. And maybe, just maybe, in a couple of decades our politicians won’t be celebrating while the world around them burns to the ground.
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