An Enemy in My State of Being

Bharat Bandh

Bandh - to close/stop/nullify.

"Is this how you raise a protest? By coercing people?" "Anyone who says that a protest is raised in any other way, is a liar - a big fat one."

Enough has been said. But nothing happens.

My head is hung low and my hand raised high; I am a slave in this soverign, socialist, secular, democratic, republic of India.

Visuals of a man slapping another into submission when he tries getting into a train. We don't slap back. Andheri, one of the most crowded railway stations in the world, is empty. Today is not a Monday. As the French call it, we like "faire le point" - to make an extension. It's Monday; a convenient day to call a bandh. We have three days of a weekend instead of two. What is the price of this convenience? Shame. We don't give a fuck. We are happy being slaves.

Practically, who bears the brunt of this grand gesture? Who pays the price tomorrow for the vegetables and meat rotting in the godowns today? Who has to meet impossible deadlines at work? Who has to lose a job? Who has to lose his life? Not you - that pretend that standing on top a train and posing for cameras is protest. I have to. My father, my mother, my neighbors, my friends. We pay twice the amount of things because of your tyranny.

If this state, which has so vocally called everything to stand-still, really cares for its people that it wants the prices of feul to come down; why does it not bear a loss and take a cut on taxes from its share of the price? Which one of these spineless snails came out to say, we shall work one day extra without a pay, for the govt has cut ten rupees from the overall fuel prices in India. Then too, petrol was still two rupees dearer in Kolkata than any other city. Madras, which has to bear additional transportation costs for fuel still stood at 42, when I shelled out 44 here in the City of Joy. What right does this hypocritical government have to "enforce" an illegal bandh?

You want a bandh. I will tell you how to really get that done. If your problem is with the Lawmakers, Block them in a room; without allowing the margin space to get up and stretch their hands. Twelve hours; refuse use of toilet or access to food and medicines. You want to hurt someone, try starting from the top. You motherfuckers will not dare to. Just like the cry for rebellion will always start and end with gutting of the police constable who has no reason to think he is an "Other"; this so-called excercise on democracy will piss on only those who will open their mouths wide and smile. Mark my words, one of these days, someone is going to do something about this. One random day, one of these people who are so happy to call a bandh as a right to protest will be protested against. Twelve-hours/twenty four, it doesn't matter. They will be shamed when they faint from hunger and collapse in the middle of an unforgiving crowd of self-respecting individuals. Shitting themselves to their real disgusting selves; they will never recover the respect that they pretend they command.

78 BEST buses have been reported to have been damaged in Mumbai. Reported. How many others, we do not know. Throwing stones at a bus is not protest. It is violence against public property. Why should I abstain from throwing a bigger stone back at he who cast the first stone? He has broken the law. Why should I be a better citizen? Why should I stop with stones; what about bullets? Why can I not just set fire to him as he sets fire to the bus that has been bought with the money that my father could have used to buy our household any comfort that we would have enjoyed; but rather paid as taxes.? You break a law and I break your bone. Protest that. I will break your bone again. This is not tyranny. This is a need for justice. If you choose to live under a system, you have to accept its laws. If you want to change them, you have to do that in its own terms. Take to the streets and make a circus; that is because you are not qualified to know any better. Do you not have your best friends in the media to give a full day ego massage to your misdemeanors? The next time you lie down on a railway track, the train will run over you and make you into a faceless pulp that is useless for anything except feeding vultures. At least, those vultures wait until one is dead. You bastards; you eat my liver when I am taking a nap.

My head hung low and hand raised high; I am a slave. Because I do nothing about it.