It's the 14th day today.
No, not of my quarantine, of me crying about what's happening to my country and its people. My family, my friends, my clients, their families. Death, despair and tragedy everywhere I turn. I can't switch it off. I feel, that's what I do - what I've always done. How do I now find the superpower to stop? I've spent all of the sanity I saved. Everyone is positive, or knows someone who is, everyone needs a bed, an ICU. oxygen, basically - just a shot at life. They just want to survive.
I have never grappled with the very real possibility that my parents will eventually die. Now, I sit with this thought every single day. I wake up to it. I sleep to it. The nightmares are back. I snap at people, and then catch my tongue because who knows? This could be the last time we speak. I remind myself to hug and kiss my parents everyday because I don't know how long we will be safe. Or alive.
I've seen so much and yet I've seen nothing at all. I type this from the comforts of my house where I have the privilege to work from home, with nutritious home cooked meals, and two people to play Ludo with or build puzzles with. I type with oxygen in my lungs and surroundings - still terrified - what happens when we are next? Can we prevent the inevitable? Will I lose more people this year? Will I witness more than one funeral this summer?
One of my closest friends is set to get married this May. I promised him all my life that rain or shine, I would be there. Failing my promise seems the tiniest possible sacrifice I'll be making this year. I worry for my other friends who are doctors during this manmade horror. I worry, constantly. Gratitude doesn't work. Deep breathing doesn't work. Colouring fucking mandalas doesn't work. Nothing works, goddammit.
If I was a theist at all, I would drop down on my knees and spend my days praying. Maybe that would work? Dear God, if you're listening... I would really like to not lose my parents just yet. I know nobody does but they are all I have. I don't have a partner or a child or siblings. They are literally it. I can't - can't process the thought that this pandemic will take them from me. Call me selfish but I need you to be partial. Save them. Over me. If it comes to it, take me instead.
But why should anyone have to lose their loved ones? Why are so many people dying? Why did we elect this monster Modi? Why, why, why did people not choose dumb over devil in 2014? Why was Hindutva and Ram Mandir so bloody important that we got these villains and criminals back in 2019? Are we as a nation paying for the grave sin of electing someone who orchestrated Godhara 2002? Did we really expect him to change and "develop" India? Were we so fucking naive?
Modi, Shah, Yogi and BJP have done what they do best - elections, rallies, religion and jailing anyone doing anything right from protestors to students to activists to journalists to people helping others through social media. We didn't elect fools, we elected masterminds. We elected our very own version of Nazi India.
I deplore people who still support these soulless monsters. I loathe people who work for the BJP IT Cell. I abhor the news channels that are refusing to call out the government's sheer in competence. And don't you dare give me the "What about when Congress did ---" and "Could Rahul Gandhi have handled this better?" rhetoric. I am fucking done. A five year old could have handled this situation better because s/he would have known when and whom to ask for help, and when and how to admit they're wrong.
You know what perturbs me still? We won't remember these lost lives even till 2024. Our collective attention span is that short. We forgot demonetisation and what hell that unleashed on the economy. We will forget the countless that die without oxygen, outside hospitals, in their homes, on the roads. Hundreds that are being cremated without their families getting to bid them goodbye. Dalits and muslims building pyres and still facing discrimination. Laypersons trying to do CPR because that's how desperate we are.
To say India deserved better is factually incorrect.
India has gotten the leader that India deserved. The one who is better for the "economy" and "markets". The one who wants capitalisation all the way. The one who is BETTER than lord almighty Pakistan. The one that removed 370. The one that is building Ram Mandir during a pandemic. The one who doesn't meet the press once in 7 years. The one that loves Savarnas. The one who single-handedly destroyed supposedly impartial institutions like EC, RBI, CBI, Supreme Court, High Courts, and countless others. The one who uses his mother only for PR gimmicks. The one who makes policies, bills and infrastructure to benefit the rich biggies. The one that refuses to put a halt on Kumbh. The one who doesn't check his leaders when they blame women/jeans/momos for rapes, when they force-feed urine to Dalits, when they burn rape victims, when they murder anyone who comes in their way. The one who doesn't disclose the details of PM Cares Fund. The one who ensures every critic is deemed anti-national. The one who killed women and children. The one who continues to kill everyone around him directly or indirectly every single day.
"Speak up, do something" they urged. "Silence and inaction at this time is no less than burning your country alive."
"Let them burn" he replied, as he carried on practising his pranayam and asans for the upcoming International Yoga Day.
