The very next day of writing Part-I of this article I got a few answers, some harsh, hard hitting answers, please read through and don’t feel that I am off-topic because I’ll be describing this with a small incident that happened with me.
My father took me to the city railways ticket booking counter, we had the need of a ticket for traveling and my father didn’t believe in paying to the agents. He told me to wake up at 4.30 am the other morning and of course I didn’t intend to. I woke up at 5.30 when my father had already left at 5.00 am for the counter (The booking counter opens at 8.00 am while tatkal (urgent) bookings open at 10.00 am. The concept of wasting such time for railway tickets was sort of weird but after all I couldn’t debate with my father. I somehow reach at 7 am and holy God! My poor father was still 4th or 5th in the queue. Later I found out 3 to 4 of them were these ‘agents’ or rather I call them ‘mafia’ from now on.
When the time came for tatkal bookings, just 5-10 minutes before that some 3-4 well built figures appeared and they started to stand right in-front of my father. Startled and confused he said that he was ahead along with another gentleman who came early. The other agents (who were present from the morning) said they were in line from night 1 am but went to have food, and on my father’s protest they laughed and said if he wanted a ticket he should come at 11.00 pm in the night. My father lost his temper and broke the line to come to his true place, on which these muscle men started pushing and abusing him, when I protested he they said ‘make your father understand the way it works, or we would see you, we have every possible way to show you right place for your guts’. As usual the police constable was just watching and silent and on this hustle bustle just came to my father and told him to shut-up and stand wherever they said.
My friends, it is very unfortunate but situational that I felt like beating the hell out of people who tried to push and abuse my father who is in his late 50s and is highly regarded for his clean image and good behaviour in his work. He is a Class I Gazetted Officer and if he can go through this, anyone else can too.
Till the next two days, I had the feeling of ripping apart these so called ‘railway agents’ who are actually goons and mafias, whereas my father made me calm down with his ultra-spiritual talks. No, I do not think violence is the right way, I do not think we should become just animals but who will teach the lesson to these mafias? The Law had been just another onlooker with that constable standing mum. But we didn’t approach to file a police complaint, or any other legal action too, wasn’t that our part to do?
Violence and Non-Violence are very controversial topics and nobody can declare it as wrong or right. Where shedding blood and living with hatred is a curse for humanity on the other side not fighting with the suppressors will be cowardice. It is for you to understand and to make decision when to hold hand of humanity and kindness and when to answer someone with a punch. We’re Social but yes, very animalistic inside, we truly are, we ca but learn, how to not initiate the violence, how not to humiliate someone and make him commit a crime.
A Thought Blog - By Prateek Devta 