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If the Holocaust was the biggest tragedy free food, simple dal-khichdi that could
for the Jews, then the Partition was provide warmth in the stomach, water to
India’s biggest tragedy. Now we are drink and a place to rest before moving
watching lakhs and lakhs of migrants on or even a pair of shoes to walk home.
walking all the way home, wherever their What you see in this mass of humanity
home is. To me this is India’s biggest is an explosion of cooperation, where
tragedy after the Partition. It is the the poor have walked through this cruel
mother of all road shows; now the whole journey together with their friends,
world knows the face of the real India and brothers, families and children. Each
also Indians themselves. one has cared for the other. This kind of
For about over a month we have seen empathy is a quality of the poor.
images and stories of lakhs and lakhs of
migrant workers trudging thousands of No one’s people
miles across the length and breadth of The tragedy of 16 people crushed to
this country. Watching a sea of humanity death on the tracks near Aurangabad
walk from one place to the other; young should hurt us and prick our collective
able-bodied men and women begging conscience. Where are the netas who
for food, standing in long queues from promise the world when they come to
6 in the morning hoping that at 12 noon seek votes? May be a few of them should
when their turn comes, they would be do the 500-mile trek across the country
able to get some food. During this trudge, to understand what real hardship is. Can
many may have died, parents could have India see its own poverty? Does it make
abandoned their little kids because they you feel sad? For a moment, get out of
no longer could feed them. The migrants yourself and look at your face in the face
have one compulsive emotion and that of the poor to understand what poverty is.
is the need to get back to their family – Do their lives have any meaning? What do
parents, wife and kids. This is extreme words like social distancing, self-esteem,
cruelty. Human suffering at its worst. dignity mean to this mass of invisible
Why did this happen? Who subjected labourers who are no one’s people. Do
these people to such extreme cruelty? their lives have any meaning? What
Why didn’t someone take over the would happen once they get home? Are
dhabas on the way and give these people they carrying the virus back with them
amongst all their burdens? What kind of a
life will they go back to?
It is cruel to see and hear statisticians,
political analysts, economists, social
activists and a whole bunch of people who
appear on television mouthing platitudes
on the poverty line, the GDP per capita,
all the schemes that the government is
implementing to make life better… soon
a lot of armchair spokespersons whose
The young and the helpless – is this India’s future job is to speak will make PowerPoint
SENIORS TODAY | ISSUE #11 | MAY 2020 7
