These thoughts are neither random nor nostalgic.
Rather they are daunting and haunting me for the last few days.
My generation is lucky enough not to have experienced
any national adversities in life. We were born in an independent India which
was growing and fast building her national assets. Though limited, there were opportunities
for education and livelihood. However, our parents were not that lucky enough.
They had to go through the bitter experiences and the after effects of the wars
India fought. One of the major impacts of the same was always on the lunch
table. We children were proscribed from wasting food. We were taught अन्नम् परब्रह्म (Food is God) and “Not even a grain
of food should be left out in your plate“ was the fiat!
Though we teach our children not to waste food, we are
not as forceful as our parents. The reason is simple, we have not experienced
the scarcity of food. “Master chef” papa (Please read my earlier blog For the Foodie at Home) locked
down within the four walls of home would otherwise have been an opportunity for
my teenager to gorge on sumptuous recipes. Not this time. It is the time of pure
austerity. Prayers, simple life and just eat to survive for who knows how many
in this world are starving today?
Till last fortnight, from the comfort of my AC car, I
used to ‘curse’ the aimlessly criss-crossing pedestrians, the ”all traffic rule
flouting” autorickshaw drivers and the crowd on street. Unlike us who migrated
to this city for better career opportunities or to realise our dreams, many of
them probably migrated for a livelihood. I find them all along, the drivers,
hawkers, salesmen, attendants and all those who toil just to make both ends
meet. The frail woman with a baby, selling cloth bags down the Bandra flyover, the
guy who sells peanuts, the book seller at traffic signal, all dared the sun,
rain and pollution and survived in this otherwise normal metropolis.
The lockdown was the proverbial bolt from the blue. I
am paid for working from (for?) home, what about those who call the street
their home? As if someone pushed the switch and they are all gone. The roads,
shops, markets, temples, churches, mosques are all abandoned. Does someone know
where they all have gone? Does someone know who feeds them? If really food is God,
then probably the God knows whom needs to be fed!
I checked my door bell which has not been ringing for
the last one week. It indeed is working for a door bell can chime only if someone
pushes the switch from outside! Occasionally I rush to the balcony to see the
world outside, but to my disappointment it is still.
All of them whom I “cursed”
while on the road are not to be seen. I wish I could meet them today just to
ask a simple question भैय्या / बेहन आज खाना खाया क्या? (Brother
/ Sister did you have food today?)
