Today morning, while walking to my colony gate where the office cab comes to pick me up faithfully everyday, I saw a group of children, dressed in all their finery, gathered around a house.
With yesterday and today being days for Kanjak, the Puja wherein pre-pubescent girls are ceremoniously worshipped, their feet washed, and they are offered sweets, gifts, and money, I wasn’t too surprised at the sight.
Smiling at them, I walked on.
And then there was a booming sound.
I froze dead in my tracks, my mind racing to the slew of bomb blasts that had the length and breadth of the country shivering in mute terror.
My first thought was of the children who were chattering excitedly among themselves.
Hoping for the best, fear writ large over my face, I swung around.
Where I saw a boy, aged no more than 10 years, circled by the admiring group of children, beams resplendent on their rosy cheeks.
Apparently, he had lit a firecracker, much to the delight of his friends.
An innocuous firecracker had succeeded in driving fear into the innermost chamber of my heart.
With the festival of lights - Diwali, fast approaching, I can't help but shudder thinking of the times when a firecracker would fizzle and then burst, causing nearby people to freeze in whatever they were doing, the dread of blasts uppermost in everyone’s minds. Chaos is inevitable, a stampede more than a possibility.
Or worse, in the eventuality of an actual blast, people might continue milling around, carrying on with their routine chores, misconstruing it for a display of loud pyrotechnics. Putting themselves and others in grave danger.
Both cases chill me to the very core…
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