Let X be an arbitrary character representing all of us, at
some or the other stage of our life.
Now let us have a look at X’s life:
X is born. His cradle is surrounded by distant relatives who
all claim that his features resemble their own. X’s mother is lying peacefully
on the bed beside his cradle. She starts knitting strings of dreams for her
little baby.
X will be a doctor one
day
X will make me proud
one day
X will get married and
give me grandchildren one day
The parents start a slideshow of dreams for little poor X
who has just entered the Universe and has completely no idea he has landed in a
world so peculiar that from now on his life will be like a Drawing Room TV set
whose remote control arguably shifts from one hand to the other.
X is 4 now. (No, he’s not Tobias Eaton). He is climbing the
steps of his school bus and crying his way on the first day to a place where he
will receive everything except education. He will be taught all kinds of
complex stuff but will never be taught why it is important to learn them. He
would be expected to mug up dates and formulae which will have no direct or
indirect connection to increasing his intellect. Rightly in the words of the
great Albert Einstein:
"Education is what remains after one has forgotten what one has learned
in school."
X turns 10. He is celebrating his birthday at home and the
huge gathering is clapping and singing the birthday song for him. He is dressed
in a glittering and sequined Nicker-Shirt outfit. He blows the candles and cuts
the cake. All the aunties adjust the palloos
of their red-pink-orange-green Sarees and jump forward to leave their lipstick
imprints on X’s cheek. He is only rubbing the gloss off his cheek when he
is suddenly carried up to the shoulders of a heavily-built uncle who starts
dancing with X’s legs hanging down from either side of his bald head. Startled
with all the noise and commotion X bursts crying. To make matters worse, all his
relatives start consoling him with sentences that are far from providing any
consolation.
“Oh this kid is so sensitive”
“Why are you crying like girls?” (As if boys don’t have tear
ducts. Du-uh)
“Le beta ro mat. Campa peele” (Don’t cry son, take this soft
drink)
Tired of all the melodrama, little X goes back to his room
and pretends to sleep. He wishes this day would have been a somber affair with
only his family but he still can’t do anything to shoo away his irritating guests
who are still munching on a plate stuffed with wafers, cake, toffees and a
samosa. And of course, the Campa.
X is now 16. He is scrolling down his Facebook home screen
and his mother is peering down on his computer from behind his back. Realizing
the presence of his mother, X instinctively changes the tab and stares blankly
at the Google search box. Not that he’s doing anything wrong, but he still
doesn't like to be spied upon. Just when his mother is about to head to the
kitchen, X’s phone hung to the charging point starts to ring. And just when he
is about to hurry to it....There. His mother answers the call. He stands frozen
when his mother angrily puts down the phone without uttering a word.
“The advertising perverts”. And she heads to the kitchen.
X
heaves a sigh of relief.
The doorbell rings and X goes down to open the gate.
Her mother’s friend glares at him with a sugary smile.
“OMG beta you've grown so big!”
Does anyone also grow small, aunty?
As the lady rests her hips on the sofa, X’s mother appears
out of the kitchen. X is about to head back to his room when the aunty babbles up
again.
“So which stream are you planning to take after class X
results?”
There you go.
“I am not sure, aunty. Humanities would be the preference
most probably”
“Arts!? Arts lekar kya karoge!?” (What will you do after taking Arts?)
And then there was no stopping at all.
“Beta Science leke Engineering karo. 4 saal ki mehnat hai
fir aish hi aish.” (Take Science and pursue Engineering. Just 4 year's hard work and then sheer luxury)
X is now 23. He is done with the 4 saal ki mehnat and is
nowhere near to aish. It is a very busy Monday as he hops from one interview to
the other. By the evening when it is all over, he is hell tired, more of his
life than of his daily routine. He imagines what life would have been had he
listened to his heart and pursued his dreams. Then the auto stops outside his house
and he sighs over what life had become, rather.
X is now 27. After changing multiple jobs, he has finally
got a decent one. He has endless working hours and sleepless nights. He starts thinking of his past. The only girl he ever loved had been married off to somebody else
because her parents thought that X was an aimless poor guy who will never be
able to keep their daughter happy. X is also going to be married soon to a girl
he doesn't know as yet. It doesn't matter anyway, he thought. Mom is happy.
And the rest, we all know, is the life of a common human
being. 90 per cent of “common” people live this kind of a life. And the rest 10
per cent become their idols.
We will all die one day and blah blah. Nobody is going to
give a damn what job we had, whom we got married to and how much we earned. Then
whom do we do this all for? Why don’t we let our lives be our own? We become
what we become not because of our talent or our education, but because of our
choices. One choice can make all the difference.
P.S: As the #KissOfLove campaign emerges as a breakthrough
of sorts, I read a newspaper article where a JNU student was quoted as saying:
“Ye log rape aur crime se nahi, chumme se darte hain” (These people are not afraid of rapes and crimes, but of kisses)
What happens to people’s moral policing when they see girls
being teased and children being harassed? They keep quiet when all that happens
and mind their own business. But they have all the time in the world to hit and
abuse couples walking on the road? Such double standards exist to ruin the
society. They again and again prove the harsh reality that your life is not
yours.
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