Every life matter

"Shibu woli hrii ikhrii pralole ana emei hriiwoli ovu kali thithili hriitho pule moe" translated as "if it was a tree it could regrow again but us men once we are dead we won't resurrect up again". This I remember reading in highschool in Maola textbook. The context here is that our life is sacred and precious which must be treasure and taken care of.

As someone who identify himself as a human being and a humanist, it pain me to see the various unfolding in the present time. For one the murder of George Flyod which for positive reason caught the major limelight despite been under pandemic situation. And driving home to our country, the plight of migrant workers is no different and something we all had a part in. Before going any further, my deep appreciation and gratitude to those numerous selfless people who despite under such distress time took our their time to help them. Be it providing needs for them or raising the voice for their cause in any media. Though this might appear to be a totally different situations, when one look further into them there are several similarities and connecting dots between the two. 

Firstly, causality of this two incidents has been due to Covid-19. The fall in demand due to lockdown has led to scaling down and even closure of many enterprise leading to ends of livelihoods for numerous individuals. This partly explain the compulsion of migrants to walk to their native home and also the reason a person may indulge in crime. It must be noted here that I don't condone such activities but as Bhagat Singh rightly pointed out that in matter of life and death vs principalities, the drive to opt for the former even to a matter of subjugation of latter is very high.

Secondly, the agent is government and its mechanism. It is rather easy to see that in case of George Flyod murder was due to the action of the police officers as capture on camera. While in the case of migrant workers one might argue the government has no role in it, however as pointed out by various panels the huge migrant crisis is due to the flauty steps taken by the government. Several persons has lamented on how the decision of lockdown has been force upon the citizen and especially the migrants workers before the impact on them were even considered. The minimal time between announcement and enforcement of lockdown is one such flauty steps taken by the government. However, not to totally ignored the logic behind such but a rather well thought government could have analyse the expected outcomes and placed from beforehand such measures to minimize such outcomes. In a country where a large majority of population live on day to day basis lockdown for such period without putting a beforehand contingency plan and scheme is purely an out of touch move.

Thirdly, we as a society are equally responsible for them. Be it racial discrimination or social and economic divide, we as a society is responsible for it. In a fairly equitable society such issues can't hold on for any longer period, any idea and values needs a suitable ground for breeding and am sorry we as a society has been a good breeding ground for such ills. One needs not be reminded again of slavery and slave trade or the exploitation of peasant by zamindars and money lenders. Slavery has long been abolished (1863 read as in US) and UN Declaration of Human Rights (1948) are way past enough to bear fruits. Further, the ideals of fraternity was envisioned by our freedom fighters to be treasured and practice by all citizens and enshrined in the preamble. Also the oppressive zamindari system was abolished in 1951 by the very 1st ammendment of our Indian constitution. Thus, now a pertinent question to us who takes pride in our legendary leaders is: "Are we really subscribing to the ideals they stand for or just paying a lip service?". 

It is rightly said that hard time shows ones real character and this pandemic has lay bare our character as individuals, society, country and as human beings.By now you may be left wondering the content with respect to tittle "every life matters", given am focusing only on two groups. But the point here is every life matter even those of whom we often neglect and discriminated. As a civil servants aspirant it really sadden me the manner how this two incidents has unfolded, the kind of blame game been toss around by those in power putting real justice in the backseat. This should open up our eyes to the flaws we live in and as responsible human we should strive to bring change into the system. Political party need to go beyond electoral politics in such case and come together to bring effective solution. Administrators and law enforcing agencies should raise above pleasing those in power and work for humanity as whole. There is also a need to revise the manner of how our public authorities are train, this two incidents seems to indicate the failure of such programs to instill the ideals of compassion in them. There is a further need to develop a system of training which help the officers to raise beyond their own prejudice in the execution of their duty.

It is rather an irony that such incidents happens to occur in the world oldest and largest democracy. We as a society has to bear responsibility of failure for as Abraham Lincoln once said democracy is a govt. of the people, by the people, for the people. As public what can learn from incident such as this is to elect person who are responsible to welfare of every citizen. We need to raise beyond our caste, religious affiliation, class etc. especially when it comes to election. There is also a need to strengthen our various civil societies so that they can hold our re representative responsible. However, we should also be careful in formation of such societies in that may may run counter productive to their mission and become a tool for serving some individuals or groups interest. We should also purge our societies of such grouping which doesn't work in the best interest of the community noting that nothing here implies the silencing of different voices.

Tough situation don't last but tough people do, let's keep our hope burning for brighter days. And as Marcus Aurelius in his Meditation states "And you can commit injustice by doing nothing", let's join our hand and contribute what we can when injustice is perpetrated. Every life matters and we are but as good as the very least of our society are.