As a journalist, coming home late is so
normal that no time is late anymore per se but by normal standards, yes it was.
And by late, I mean almost midnight.
This was a good day and since I did come
back fast, I hadn’t had anything to eat. So I went to get a vada pav, which in
case you’re wondering is a fried potato patty stuffed inside a bun and heated
on a pan, sometimes with cheese.
The
Incident
I just wanted to get the vada pav and get back
home but no, events have to conspire on the one day I get home fast and that’s
what happened here.
I got to the shop, ordered my cheese vada pav
and then started reading the menu because there really isn’t much you can do
while you wait. By the time I read half of it, my order was done and as I
reached over the counter to take the parcel, I heard the shutters come down. Turning
around, I saw one of the workers signalling all of us customers to be quiet and
loudly whisper – POLICE.
I saw the time and sure enough, it was
12:00 am. The police had obviously come to shut down everything and we had been
unlucky to be inside the place at that time.
It was then that it began. One of the dozen
or so customers asked if the police would beat us if they found us. I thought
he must be joking but turning around I saw that he and his friends were
earnestly discussing this possibility which amused and worried me at the same
time. Then the employees shut the lights off and the murmurs grew louder.
It amused me because I believe that the
police could not beat us up for being there but I was apprehensive because I
didn’t know for sure what the police would do. ‘Could’ and ‘would’ – the difference
between knowing how things ideally work and not knowing how things will
actually take place.
 |
| Image Courtesy: schmidtgs2.wikispaces.com |
After ten minutes or so of this conversation,
an employee got an all-clear phone call from the other side of the shutter and
he opened it just a little and let us out in pairs. It reminded me of a couple
of movies where people are trying to cross international borders.
And
I thought to myself,
“Are things really so bad?”
“Why is there fear even on a normal day in
a busy part of the city?”
“Are these people right in mistrusting the
police?”
“Do we need to fear the very people in
charge of protecting us?”
“Is this paranoia or years of ingrained
reality?”
And
the most important thought,
“Is this the fear of one person creeping into all
in a distressing environment or is this a mutual repressed feeling being triggered
by a mere mention of atrocity?”
The
Implications
The latter thought is scarier than the
former and if true, needs to be addressed by the Ahmedabad City Police at the
earliest because if the people don’t trust their protectors, who are they going
to put their faith into?
The
Next Step
I hope this post reaches the police
department because I figure they should be concerned even if this is an
isolated incident, which isn’t very likely.
No comments:
Post a Comment