Life I thought was a gift that we as humans are supposed to treasure and that includes the lives of everyone around us…But in the Stock Market of human values somewhere down the line the very stock of morals has plunged to a level from where recovery seems unlikely….

Lately there has been the case of a toll plaza attendant Umesh Kumar Pandey’s murder just for a mere sum of Rs.27…!! Is that what the cost of life is to us these days??The poor fellow was just doing his job when he was shot at point blank range by some tanked up monster…How very ridiculous !! This is not the first time that an innocent has been murdered or raped or beaten by some inebriated moron for absolutely preposterous reasons…and more often than not the culprit is the progeny of overindulgent parents…

Priyadarshini Mattoo and Jessica Lal are just some of the famous examples of such heinous crimes…But there as so many that go unnoticed or are just in the papers for a day or two till the next one happens…Innocent People are murdered over trivial issues and to top it all more often than not the offender goes Scot free…The perverse approach of our investigating agencies and shocked judicial conscience further augment the collapse of the social security of an individual which is already in doldrums….Gun culture combined with arrogant individuals have brought this downfall of our society…

It’s not the bullet with my name on it that worries me. It’s the one that says “To whom it may concern.”
Question is how do we avoid such instances…?How do I prevent myself from being at the receiving end…?Why are people who stand up for something or who just want to do their jobs ending up in such situations?

Problem lies in our society which is hypocritical to the core…!!Our society lives on diktats made by some uneducated idiot who is long gone but we still follow them like Neanderthals…We murder our daughters for falling in love,we murder the weak or the poor for daring to question or even stop the affluent,we murder for our archaic religious beliefs,we murder and rape women for daring to stand up to men,we murder the honest,we murder the innocent….and the list goes on…
“There is a great streak of violence in every human being. If it is not channeled and understood, it will break out in war or in madness.”

So killings such as these will not stop till we enlighten ourselves from within,till we give priority to human life instead of social status or dogmas…Let us all promise to ourselves that we will never be overcome by rage or any emotion that causes us to take away something that we can never give back…Let us all say it out loud:“We challenge the culture of violence when we ourselves act in the certainty that violence is no longer acceptable, that it’s tired and outdated no matter how many cling to it in the stubborn belief that it still works and that it’s still valid.”