When you are too stunned to react...

Getting a seat in a microbus is a big achievement these days. I was going to the office along with Sooman and it was quite late already. Things were fine... as we entered the vehicle, there was this Yash Kumar's 'yo manle timilai nai rojeko chha...' song and the whole thing was okay. I was completely lost in the lyrics of the song...

Then when we reached Babarmahal, a man seated in the front i.e with the driver, started vomiting. The conductor asked the driver to stop and asked one of the man sitting behind to exchange seat with him, so that the sick man feels a little more comfortable. The vehicle stopped and the sick man got off, hoping that he could get a seat somewhere in the back. Noone got up, perhaps everyone was stunned as I was... we were not able to understand what was going on. The sick man, stunned himself, started vomiting again... I was watching him... when noone got up to occupy the seat left by that man, the conductor closed the door and instructed the driver to get going. The man was left there, sick and vomiting.

I could hardly figure out what was happening, or what had just happened. When I realised that a man, helpless as he was, had been deserted just because he was sick, I was too stunned to react. The fact that that man was a Madhesi drew my attention. I wondered if someone other than a Madhesi would be treated that way. In some ways, madhesis revolts seemed reasonable to me...

When I asked Sooman about the whole thing, he said that he has stopped thinking about such things. And I thought, may be even I should not care about such trivial matters. Afterall, just yesterday, we at office had laughed about how the madhesis are ill-treated by everyone in the valley including conductors and drivers... the laughter echoed all over again in my mind, and I felt sort of guilty.

I just wish we all could live in harmony and that there would be no discrimination. I would not want myself to be left out if I were sick!! But then, everyone in the bus was too stunned to react, or say anything to the conductor and the driver including me and Sooman.

At this point, I remember reading Yurgan dai's touching line 'Think and feel globally, act locally.' Therefore, may be by diverting my focus away from the BIG word 'discrimination', I should start on my own to stop judging people by the colour of their skin.

So, there's a commitment from my side, I guess!!