My dirty cheap life

The biggest villain of Indian mythology must be having identity crisis when the world heard of some 5 or 7 headed cobras.

I seriously hoped of bumping into some alien during his regular visit to our planet. At the same time I started wondering about the dumb ass scientists at all the space centres of the world that why don’t they make a flying saucer for their space missions? Why rocket?

Let me tell you, I didn’t step out the whole day when the sun was most fierce and ready to hunt me down with its deadliest ultraviolet rays on a particular day.

I religiously followed and spent a fortune on further medical treatment when I tried hundreds of sure shot homemade remedies to lose weight and constipation. It almost made me a doctor now and seriously thinking of recover my money by giving a consultancy.

I didn’t know that I was working hard to help all the other economies but India.

I didn’t know all the celebrities have so much time to draft a very long letter to me about our culture, dangers of the society and many other.

I almost believed that the new 2000 and 500 rupees currency notes have a GPS chip. I was so hoping to hand them over to some of my defaulter clients so that the government could catch them. Alas!

I was seriously scared to take shit after eating Kurkure. What if the toilet pipe got jammed due to its plastic contents.

And I had to scrap my newly written script with a heavy heart in which the heroine took her revenge by giving Frooti to her rapists. Because I got inspired by the news of the soft beverage containing of HIV positive blood.

I started sweeping the floor in my office hoping that someday I would also become the prime minister when I saw a particular b/w picture of NaMo sweeping the floor. It’s true, no big dreams or good morphing artists for the middle class.

I didn’t eat and let anyone at home eat Chinese food for one whole week when NaMo himself appealed to ban Chinese. I read his signature too. It’s different that I had to eat it on next 5 weekends as a part of my son’s revenge on me when I found out that the PM gave a statement about that letter which was not a fake one.

I started admiring the hotshot leaders at the G-20 Summit being carefully listened by other big shot leaders only to be found out later that almost every country has its version of its respective leader in the middle and all others are listening to him or her.

I also mourned on the death of many actors and famous personalities for several days and later found them attending the TV shows or an award function.

I have been signing for more than 30 times to make our national anthem as the best anthem of the world. I am wondering when I still see it’s coming back to me for voting.

I was about to file a petition to form a force by combining all the God-men together so that our army could be given some well deserve break. These God-men and women could outpower the bombings, deadliest weapons and radio signal systems by sitting in their luxurious dens or having a private satsangs with their shishyagans.

I have seen the deadliest animals caring the weakest ones, part animal-part human, the golden temple in Amritsar lit with the lanterns, a shark on the streets during a hurricane and what not. I have learnt new and amusing facts in my 10 years life on social media.

I recently came to know how delicate our sentiments are and how people can kill over a simple message.

People!! Wake up!! They are making fools out of us and we are feeding their evil wills.

Nobody’s going to die for not forwarding a message. There are no aliens visiting the earth, no 5 headed snakes or no prime minister (no matter how powerful they are) could outrightly ban something and definitely on social media.

It’s called hoax and we Indians are the biggest victims.

Guys, internet is full of such fake news. Check Google and you’ll come to know the facts about it. Don’t spread any hoax news and don’t be a part of a big scams. We are a country with different cultures seamlessly weaved together. Let’s not destroy it. Nobody hates anybody so much that we are compelled to believe. Try and check the fact before sharing anything.

There are people who are putting Facebook and WhatsApp for good and productive use. Let’s not become someone who’s using the social media for some destructive cause.

Cheap internet doesn’t mean cheap mentality. Don’t get your hands dirty with such horrible game of fake news.

Please keep in mind that not everyone is as smart to identify the hoax news from real news. Please help them understand. People are dying because of such fake news. This is really getting serious. Nobody’s ego or purpose is bigger than someone’s life. Please don’t become a medium to spread such false message and create chaos.

We have lawmakers and law keepers at place. You are not the only one who’s responsibility to save this country. The leaders today are competent enough and so were the yesteryears’. They all must to follow a system that has been set by our constitution. The country is not run on our whims and fancies. They have better think tanks and data analysts than we are. Let alone the politics. Let’s accept that the country has progressed in these years of independence.

And who’s giving you this gyan? Those who keep on sending about honesty find every single occasion to jump the signals? Those who advice about taking care of their parents leave them at the old age homes? Or those who curse the independence day because it’s a dry day? Don’t let your social life affected by the Social media. Use it wisely. Use it carefully.

Above all our ancient culture, religious sentiments, all the gods, saints and the historic personalities are and were great. They are not so vulnerable that could be hurt or be maligned by mere words by some lunatics. You don’t be a vehicle to transcend some idiotic messages. They could act as as a wildfire.

Let’s be united and fight the grave danger of social media. Let’s be a great nation beyond hatred, castism, communal differences and politics.

Laxmi’s Padgiri

“Thak thak thak thak.... thak thak thak thak...”

Something was punching in my ears in my dreams, I thought for a moment. There was again that irritating thumps penetrated into my head. I thought I was still feeling the sound that was deafening me in the back of the tempo I had travelled the last evening. It took a while to realise that it was not a hallucination or dream.

“thak thak thak thak.... thak thak thak thak...”

The sound bounced in a desperate loop. It was someone on the door. I had heard of peculiar ways of treating people in Pune, but definately did not expect this fashion. So, that’s how we were greeted on our first morning in Pune. But that wasn’t it as something more weird was ready to welcome us in the then emerging metro.

We had shifted our belongings a night ago and yet to place them. That was hardly a space to live as compared to our previous house. But that was it. We were dog tired and crashed out like ice bears the last night. So, it took a couple of moments for both of us to figure out what exactly was going on.

That was something to remember. Afterall, that was the first knock on our new house. In fact, it was a big thump and not a knock. Well begun is half done! I half opened the door to face a furious female face with a big red bindi and underneath it was a pair of eyes shooting out a truck load of anger at me.

“Where’s your wife?” she shouted.

She was right behind me, my wife. She also was taken aback with the dreadful style of welcoming someone in the neighbourhood. I was a bit relieved as my wife, trying as awake as possible, took the charge from me.

“Yes, what is it?”

“Are you having your periods?”

“What?” We both screamed at once. What a way to break the ice! As if take an aim at the iceberg with an excavating machine and boom... make a tunnel. The entire heap of an iceberg is churned into flakes the next moment.

“Are you on with your periods?” The lady was asking in a Marathi dialect. Still, the content prevented us from understanding the meaning, concern and purpose.

“N..n..No.. why?”

“Then it is ok. Let me tell you that our gods don’t allow us and they’ll punish you if you do.”

“What? What for?”

“Let me finish, you’ll be punished by our gods if you throw that f**** cotton in the trash.”

What cotton? What trash? What gods? Why punishment?

Did we commit a blunder by coming to Pune? Is cotton not allowed here?

“Who are you?” my wife seemed to be sorted and brave than me.

“Laxmi... I am a trash collector for your building. You are not supposed to throw your dirty cotton in the trash. Everyone knows here.”

Now, we realised. Not me of couse. My wife realised it first. The girly talk you know. Laxmi was the garbage collector and she found some ‘dirty cotton’ in her basket. She was referring to a stained sanitary napkin. And someone told her that we were the new ones in the housing society, so she thought it might be us who pushed her towards the sins.

“But it doesn’t seem like if you are telling the truth.” And she stormed out of our baffled faces. I was sure she left us to find the culprit and appeal to her gods.

We looked at eachother after closing the door and then we exploded laughing. What was that? We asked eachother, but quickly realised the horrible feeling of Laxmi, the garbage collector, to pick some other woman’s menstrual blood in her hands to dispose off just because she was poor. This happened almost 17 years ago in a suburb in Pune.

That was my first encounter with this situation of sanitary pads. I didn’t have any sister, so I really never needed to face this issue. And we were living in a small village where this thing was a good taboo. The pads met me only after my marriage. But still, I never realised the grave problem till the time I met Laxmi in Pune. Lakshmi never had to wear this scary Avatar against us as we were threatened enough not to throw the ‘dirty cotton’ in her garbage basket. But then where to throw them? That question stayed with me for many days later on.

Slowly, the struggles of life overpowered the sensitivity towards social issues and I almost forgot that incident till the last year. There was a small effort taken by the Pune Municipal Corporation to add some respect to the profession of a waste collector. It was an initiative in association with an NGO called RED DOT. It was a campaign of the same name. The organisation had asked the women to wrap the used pads in the multiple layers of the newspaper and seal it with the adhesive tape, make a big red dot on it to differentiate. This waste would be collected in a separate baskets by the collectors and the PMC workers would pick and the organisation would dispose them. It was such a great initiative. I don’t know if it’s still on. Then, there are some efforts taken by the BJP led central government where they made it compulsory for the manufacturers to provide a leak proof pouch with every napkin. This at least helped to stop leakages and stains in the garbage. At least they don’t have to see what they are picking though they know that it’s there somewhere in the piles of garbage.

The internet is filled with the dangers of sanitary pads and their disposing problems. I read somewhere that the plastic and the chemicals are so hazardous to the environment that these non-biodegradable materials could stay for 800 years. It’s like leaving our sins to be repaid by our future generations if they survive from the extinction during these years.

There’s hardly any change in the situation of the waste collectors in last 17 years, may it be a female or a male. Many residential societies have male garbage collectors. The modern and educated women, living there, hardly have awareness about this issue. Moreover they also don’t have any choice but to throw the sanitary napkins in the garbage. The problem is still more with the offices where women work.

Definitely, we need to give more and more women access to their basic rights of celebrating womanhood. But still, the problem might remain the same. What about the disposal of the pads?

There are disposable sanitary napkins also available, but they are not in everybody’s reach. And there are a few locally made disposable napkin brands that are not much preferred by the women. The other options like menstrual cups need more awareness in India. It’s a one-time investment. Using cotton cloths like old days is not possible for a working woman in a metro. So, all they can do is to rely on the easily available brands over the counter.

And let’s not forget that it’s not only about sanitary napkins. The same sad story tags the baby and adult diapers. There are not enough facilities to collect them and dispose them properly. That too without causing any harm to the environment.

Today, the celebrities are posting their pictures on the social media holding a new and unused sanitary pad in their hands and tearing the shame out of it. We all know that it’s about the movie PAD MAN. It’s a promotional drive. The movie is based on the inspiring greatness of the real life padman - Arunachalam Muruganantham. This might be a real good entertainer, may be a message driven flick. A few lakhs of deprived women might get their honour and they might start using this hygienic option. The leading actor Akshay Kumar might get another national award for this. The director R. Balki may get praises and Mr. Muruganantham certainly will get the deserved bows. Unfortunately, this will fizzle out, barring the exception of Mr. Arunachalam Muruganantham, with the next big release. People will start with new drives and campaigns and worships.

Mr. Muruganantham is no doubt a pad man. He deserves such honour and acknowledgement. But there are many pad men and women around us who are doing equally great job. They don’t ask for a pat on their backs or an honour with an award. All they need is some respect.

I am not an expert on this who has done all the scientific research to come up with solutions. I am a commoner like you who can think. So, please spread a word and see if someone extra-ordinary among us come up with a respectable solution for our garbage collectors so that no Laxmi needs to wear a mask of false anger to hide her shame.