I had been bearing him for full two minutes. But then I could stand it no longer.
“Why do you have to smoke even inside a bus?” I blurted out to the steam engine who sat beside me. He did not reply. Instead, he gave me a look as if my question was, “Why do you need to blink every few seconds?” These days, who cares for the ‘No Smoking’ tag inside public buses?
At times, we tend to wonder about the use of the ‘Do not lean out’ written on local train doors. After all, what’s the use when a person or two necessarily leans out of nearly every door of the trains even if 50 seats inside the compartment are empty?
And where else are we expected to dump our garbage other than the place with the notice board ‘Do not dump garbage here’?
“What the heck?” You might say. “The people who clear rubbish won’t know where to find it if we dump it elsewhere! Ha! Ha!”
No pals. This ain’t a thing to laugh at. This is what we, the citizens of the “Shining’ India (or has it stopped shining now?) are reduced to.
If Shakespeare were born in India, he would have written:
“All the world’s a urinal…”
In a country where notice boards are not enough to stop people from smoking in public places or leaning out of trains, people cannot be expected to stop relieving themselves anywhere with just notice boards to stop them from doing so. But the authorities seem to be coming out with new ideas to prevent this nuisance – no, don’t think that the ideas go beyond note boards. But some captions on the new boards are a bit more innovative.
Though it is entirely up to the people whether they follow the instructions or not, the government always makes the public aware of these so that they can say they have done their part.
But a few more statutory warnings have become necessary due to the occurrence of certain events, which till date, have not been given.
One such warning that should be given on each and every soft drink bottle is ‘Drinking pesticides is injurious to health (Yes! Even if you are a human being!).” Perhaps then you wouldn’t say “Yeh dil maange more” and grab that second bottle.
Take a few minutes off and think about these little instructions, pals. These are for our own convenience and our own good, aren’t they? They aren’t too hard to follow. Following these will help us do our bit for building a better India.
-Published in The Statesman Voices on July 15, 2004