Bhopal Notes :: 42 :: Diwali Blues - Thumbing Nose at Apex Court

http://www.bagchiblog.blogspot.com

We, in the older part of Bhopal are still trying to catch up with our sleep after the horrendously loud bangs on Diwali night and the night after that. These were terrible nights and the perpetrators of this torture were particularly sadistic. During the earlier part of the night it would be all quiet and nice. The bangs would come later, closer to midnight and would continue up to 3.00 AM. One would be rudely shaken out of sleep if ever one managed to literally steal forty winks. Their mission seemed to have been not to allow sleep in the neighbourhood regardless of age or sickness of those who happened to be around.

These young sadists were thumbing their noses at the Apex Court which had ordered about a couple of years ago that loud noise including that made by fireworks would be restricted up to 10.00 PM. That was a decent hour to collect one’s crackers and go to bed, allowing people, particularly the seniors, a bit of quietude for them to sleep. But no, who is going to do that? Who is going to obey the order which they thought was issued by imbecile judges? Pleasure of self is more important, after all, Diwali comes only once a year. What if all these high decibels cause a little unease, especially to those who are hardly of any use to the society, anyway?

We are progressively becoming a third rate nation where a large chunk of the population revels in not playing by the rules – or, for that matter, laws. According to them laws are to be broken. Things are made easy for them in their lawless pursuits by the lack or absence of effort to enforce them by the law enforcement agencies. Walk out, if you can on the streets, and see the laws being torn to tatters. Encroachments galore, handcarts choking the traffic, which, in any case, doesn’t give a damn for the rules of the roads. These have become death-traps where chaos and mayhem rule. Numerous precious lives have been lost in the mad and undisciplined traffic that rules the streets. Traffic Police treats deviances with kid gloves. There’s no enforcement though the physical presence of the law may be visible. If daily nightmare of anarchic traffic is not being governed who is going to take governance to annual inconveniences of two or three nights of Diwali. This state is, perhaps, the best example of non-governance in almost every department.

 And, the claim is it is the fastest growing state. Do non-governance and economic growth go together? More the non-governance, the greater is the state’s gross domestic product – is that what the government is aiming at regardless of how the citizens are hassled every day. If that is the lot of common men why have a Department of Happiness when people’s unhappiness quotient is being raised  because of the state’s non-governance and mis-governance.

 The night after Diwali a haze hung over the Upper Lake and most of the city. I know since I can see the vast spread of the Lake and a tiny portion of New Bhopal from my windows. Television news channels showed how Delhi was being choked with smog. Isn’t that a lesson for most of the cities, particularly in the up-country? In Delhi, Lucknow, Patna and myriad other towns normal life was impaired, children were choking and they were forced to wear masks. Is this the future that we are leading them to – a life of misery, bronchial allergy, emphysema, impaired respiratory health, asthma, even cancer of lungs? After-effects of Diwali revelry continue lengthening people’s misery. Why cannot air pollution be checked, especially that which is created by fireworks and firecrackers in an episodic manner? The governments have to have the will to curb, even ban such unhealthy and thoughtless activities indulged in by even the majority community for the larger good instead of trying to nurse their vote banks. Okay, forget about the old and the sick; at least, think of your children, the future of the country.

While parting a word about the Apex Court’s decision is necessary. It had come down heavily against noise pollution between 10.00PM and 06.00AM as far back as in 2005. Its orders have been observed more in breach than in compliance. The state governments which have the power to control this kind of pollution are just not bothered and the politicians concerned feel that any action to curb noise pollution caused especially because of religious sentiments would cut into their votes. Hence complete liberty prevails in regard to creating as much noise as one possibly can. The point that needs consideration is why issue orders that one cannot enforce. Such instances of failure of law laid by the Apex Court detracts from its majesty and dignity, especially when its orders are made light of by much lesser men of the state governments.

*Photo from internet

Are we becoming uncivilised?

 http://bagchiblog.blogspot.com/2012/12/are we becoming uncivilised.html

This year it has been an extended Diwali. The fireworks on the night of 28^th – almost 15 days after Diwali – starting off after 10.00 PM, continued well into the night. I couldn’t fathom whether it was because of the Gur-parb, Guru Nanak’s birthday, or because of the Hindu holy day of Kartik Poornima (full noon of the Hindu month of Kartik) or the day on which the Hindu gods and goddesses wake up after months’ of slumber heralding the marriage season.

 Whatever the reason this year life was miserable for around a fortnight in our parts. On the night before Diwali somebody close-by decided to try his hand on singing some folksy devotional stuff on the loudspeaker. Clearly a raw hand at the business of singing and that too in front of a microphone, he ended up screaming into mike and that carried through to hit my ears and presumably those of others’ too. Though somewhat hearing-impaired, the loud and jarring music kept me awake during the better part of the night. Worse, he decided to take to the mike well past eleven at night and continued right through until early hours of the morning. Curiously, there is a police station close to where the singer had stationed himself but the policemen, if awake during that hour, were dead to whatever was happening around.

On three succeeding post-Diwali nights also fireworks kept everyone in the neighbourhood awake. The loud reports of crackers and “bombs” continued intermittently until the early hours. Surprisingly, those who are fond of pyrotechnics do not believe in pursuing their activities at a decent hour. Looking for maximum effect of their pursuit they relish the quietude of the advancing night when people normally prepare to retire for the day. The idea is to get the biggest bang for the bucks that they spend in acquiring the explosives so that all the sleepy imbeciles and ninnies are shaken out of their beds. Commencing their activities only after 11.00 PM they would go on until an indecent hour. 

Obviously, the economic slowdown has had no impact on people in the neighbourhood. Annually rising cost of fireworks is not a matter of concern for them at all. Mostly traders, money is never a problem for them. Indulgent as they are with their children, they shop for enormous numbers of crackers and, that too, of the kind that produces the maximum decibels. For them the laws or orders of the Supreme Court are of no consequence. They have no qualms in letting loose their children in the progressing night with sack-loads of loud crackers to torment others. 

 Unmindful, as they are, of the breach of the orders of the Supreme Court or the laws regarding the permissible limits of decibel levels of fireworks, it is futile to expect from them concern for others. They hardly ever think of others; what matters to them is their own pleasure. That their thoughtless activities avoidably cause air and noise pollution is something that never crosses their mind. They expect everyone, young and old, sick and suffering to enthusiastically get into the Diwali spirit and endure the torment that they revel in inflicting on others. As I lay awake through these nights I wondered whether we in this city have progressively become more uncivilized.

The supposedly long arm of the law never reaches anywhere near them as the same, inexplicably, remains cosily retracted and is never extended to prevent the commission of the activities that are  decidedly illegal and uncivil, if not anti-social.  The enforcers of the laws, along with the perpetrators of the uncivil acts, seemingly think that the laws are only for the statute books and should remain buried in them and never exhumed to be used to bring about order and civility in the society.

A somewhat similar attitude becomes evident as soon as one steps on to the city roads. It is like a vibrant and pulsating jungle with anarchic vehicular traffic, whether of two or four wheelers. Everyone seems to be in a big hurry to reach wherever they are headed for and in the process they don’t give two hoots for the traffic rules and the right-of-way of other commuters. Separate carriage ways for up-and-down traffic or the roundabouts have long ceased to have any meaning for them. The proliferating massive, predatory and overbearing SUVs and MUVs driven by half-educated and untrained chauffeurs muscle in by dint of sheer bulk and heft scattering the humble lesser species of vehicles affirming that it is still “might is right” on the city roads. Again, the guardians of the law are either absent or inept if they happen to be present,

 Rules and courtesies of the roads are matters that most either are ignorant about or do not bother about just as they do not care about parking their vehicles in ways that do not inconvenience others. There are markets in the city where it is difficult to shop as two wheelers clog the approaches leaving no space for shoppers even to squeeze through. So what if the shopkeepers lose business?

One wonders where this country is heading for. A couple of decades of economic reforms seems to have put a lot of money into the pockets of many who, unfortunately, are not equipped by education or training to handle their disposable incomes without becoming pests for others. Worse, with the progressively declining influence of the law-enforcers the situation is only likely to get worse. One tends to thank one’s stars that mercifully the economic growth has slowed down quite a bit. Had it continued in the same break-neck pace for another few years breeding many more millions of fresh upstarts small-town India would have become by now a living hell for the law-abiding, decent, sober and sedate as also the elderly.