Tragedy brings out the best and worst of human beings. They take
away the veneer of sophistication and morality stands in its nakedness for all
to see. Nepal had one of the worst earthquake of the century, with thousands
dead. Tragedies of such magnitude have in them the capability to unclothe us of
all the pretensions of larger human good that we have.
We are all fair-weather gentlemen (and ladies) when things are going good. It
is easier to adhere to gracious dignity when you are fed well and your life is
not in jeopardy. Even more important is the well-being of those around you. You
do not take advantage of people when you are not in a position to take
advantage of them, or rather they are not in a position to allow you to take
advantage of them. That is what defines morality. When we are kind to people
who we cannot afford to be unkind to that is nothing but animal
self-protection. It is when we are kind to people with whom we have no reason
to be kind, people who cannot hit us back; that is divine decency.
Among the dead are roaming the religious people of various hues
moving around not to protect and serve them, but to convert their faith. They
know out of their homes, having lost their loved ones, these children of broken
Earth are at the edge of their fractured belief. How can one continue to
believe in a God which sits there on a judgment chair, presiding over the
deaths of children, so young that they aren’t yet corrupted by life? How can
someone explain to a believer that the tectonics plates shifted without the mother
earth pausing to hear the cries of despair of her own children? Although,
thanks to the atheist communist philosophy, Nepal is not a Hindu nation
anymore. The last bastion of arguably the third largest religion in world is no
longer that constitutionally. Beguiled by the developed nations, where heads of
state still swear oath to the God and Holy Spirits, Nepal had embraced
secularism, but the ethos and the faith of its people is still is Hindu. This
tragedy saw people in droves coming in telling them not to restore the citadels
of what they call ‘pagan’ belief, the temples and all and rather come to the
only savior, the Jesus Christ or to the Religion of Peace which is currently
causing big trouble to world peace on account of fanatic believers. They
propose to serve the troubled with shamelessly undisguised appeal to join their
religion in return to earn their right to their service.
I wonder whatever happened to the sense of humanity. Why this
quid pro quo? Why can they not stick to their already shaken belief and still
be served? When days are bleak and everything that you know as way of life is
lost by the enormity of nature in face of which humanity is next to nothing, it
is faith, however fractured, kinship with fellow human beings, however distant
and hope in future, however disfigured which keeps life going. It is our
capacity to keep on hoping which separates us from other life forms, and
elevates us. On the same count, it is our ability to spiral into the deep, dark
abyss of hopelessness which again separates us from any other human being. A
time of disaster is the time to help our brethren to hold on to that holy hope.
The roads are dust filled, debris of a devious, devastating nature is spread
around, but life holds hope. The Dharahara Tower came down in 1834, and came
up, it went down again in 1934 and again came up. It is the proud head of
unbeatable human spirit. Let us fill those audacious wings, through broken and
tired at the moment, with our prayers, whichever God we may pray to and see
them soar high towards the Sun. We are all one in tragedy. The hope will rise
from those broken crevices of the earth on the street of Nepal and make a new
nation, of people defiant of the cruelty of nature. All they need is little
time and faith, for their faith to heal up. They do not need a new faith.
They need to know that we, who haven’t seen them, breathe for
them and pray for them to our Gods which might be different for theirs. It is
just a coincidence, a stroke of luck that we are not in the news that we watch
and luck, as we know is pretty capricious. Let them be with their faith and be
loved as human souls. Let us not deprive them of whatever of faith is left with
them, ashen, dust-filled it may be, it is theirs. Let us not hit the people
when they are down. No religion can keep
those tectonic plates from moving, or the volcano from erupting in Christian Europe
or Tsunami from hitting Indonesia. Religion can help survive these disasters
and help us keep the hope alive. I am not a religious person and I do not know
if God exists. As Jules Renards once famously quipped, “I do not know if God exists, but it would be better for His reputation
if He didn’t”, my sad despair shakes head in agreement in the face of such
large-scale, heart-wrenching disaster, but then I also agree with Voltaire in
the interest of my best reasons, which I would call hope, that “If God did not exist, it would be necessary
to invent him”.
It would be
necessary to restore faith, not to exchange it with a new one as those people
that Internet defines as soul vultures, who would scout troubled grounds for
religious conversion. I have spent years and years in sales. I still remember
when I had been to Nepal for a sales meeting with a prospective customer. The
morning when I landed, I got a call from the customer asking if I have reached
safely and to further surprise me, asking if he needed to send a car to pick me
for the meeting. When was the last time it happened to me that a customer
proposed to send conveyance for me for a meeting- Never. Not in India, only
Nepal could do that, pamper you as a guest and disarms you as a friend with
complete trust. A nation like that needs to be preserved with its faith and philosophy.
It would do well for the rest of humanity to preserve such a nation without
attempting to scavenge over its dead, to make such a sweet soul subservient. Let
us stand by Nepal and preserve the old in the new we build. When the Tectonics moved centuries back, a glorious mountain came into being. A glorious nation will emerge this time as well, glorious, defiant and brave.
(I hope Rubesh Jha and his family, Deepak Shreshtha (who wanted to send that car) and all the Subishu Staff and their families are safe in this disaster. I hope, my pen-friend, who I lost track of years back, Rhicha Maharjan who ran a book shop in Thamel is fine. You are all loved and thought of, and prayed for. God bless you all.)
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