Sickened to the stomach ….

I struggled with the title of this blog because am angry, numb and sick, all at the same time. For the past few days every time the Ryan school murder case comes up, I am shocked at the casualness of the whole incident. 

A little boy goes to school and in fifteen minutes is found bleeding outside the washroom. He dies even before he is taken to the hospital. His throat had been slit. The bus conductor is arrested almost instantly and suddenly it appears as though the Haryana police was super quick in solving the murder. Because the parents of the murdered child were insistent and they were educated, had a good standing in the society, the case went to CBI. CBI finds out that a class XI student, a senior of this child is the real culprit and not the bus conductor. The class XI boy confessed to his crime and now they have found an accomplice too. 

There are just too many things that are sickening in this Ryan school case – Where did a 16 year old Class XI child get this idea of killing another child just to avoid an exam or the parent teacher meeting ? Are parents and teachers so busy that they can’t watch the violent streak in a child ? Am sure this 16 year old must have displayed a streak of violence when he was younger too and it either went unnoticed or maybe even unknowingly encouraged. The movies are all violent, the TV soaps are all about revenge and scheming in-laws, exes, politics is about violence, movie stars like Salman Khan and Sanjay Dutt show how stardom helps them to be above the law while earning crores, the video games are violent e.g blue whale and parents have no time as they are climbing the corporate ladder or the social status ladder. Every time I see a maid pushing a pram in our condominium complex I cringe… that baby is not learning the right values, not because the maid isn’t a good person, but because the child’s mother or father or grandparents have no time for it. So the first value the child learns is to pursue material success at all costs. Am not saying this – science has proven that a child picks up its values by the time it is 5 years old. Most of the maids are young girls who are busy on the phone with their boyfriends or girlfriends and they couldn’t be talking about Gandhiji. 

Parents lamenting about children growing up without values must first look within and see who influenced their child’s growing years. A Charles Sobhraj is an aberration, all of us are a result of our upbringing and schooling. My teachers spoke of values and morals and were involved in my growth as a person. Here’s what my English teacher from 7th standard wrote in my autograph book – “be satisfied with what you have, but never with who you are”… well, what do you think influenced ShikshaDaan ? Or my father- in-law’s insistence on making efforts in teaching students where academically weaker and helping them become stronger – what a great influence on Krishnan as he was growing up and what a huge inspiration to all those students to succeed. 

The Haryana police’s blunder in arresting the bus conductor is yet another sickening aspect of society today – the poor have no voice. If you are a criminal, be a rich criminal. You can rape and plunder if you are the TERI ex-chief or Tarun Tejpal and you can mow down pavement dwellers if you are a superstar, otherwise don’t expect justice. Am not even going to the Sahara Chief, Sharad Pawar, Sasikala, Karunanidhi, Mulayam Singh Yadav, the first family, Mallya, Ambanis ….. they are beyond my reach. Hopefully the present government treats them as equals in front of the law. 

I don’t know what to wish for – justice for the bus conductor ? Severe punishment for the 16 year old ? an overhaul of the school system that allows Bible reading to be mandatory in a secular country ? For responsible parenting ? Or all of the above ?

Sad and sickened…. because I just read that 5 year old girls have been used in a fashion show for Victoria Secret. God save the world. http://humansarefree.com/2017/08/victoria-secret-debuts-5-year-old-girls.html.