Public outrage, instant amnesia

Power corrupts and absolute powercorrupts absolutely, they say. And absolute is a very loose interpretation of the kind of power that our politicians pocket around. It is the kind of power that automatically permeates to their kith and kin. And then we have the children of these high and mighty of our society constantly reiterating the same.

So today we have this major hullabaloo about the gun culture amongst VIP kids, their involvement in scuffles and drunken brawls, their lawlessness and their ability to get away with the same. And all this commotion matches the one that arose when last year the nephew of a Haryana MLA following an altercation with a security guard in a Cinema, allegedly got his gunman to shoot at the man. Or probably the kind of disgusted public antipathy that the Tandoor case in which Youth Congress leader Sushil Sharma brutally murdered his wife, hacked her body and tried to burn it away in a tandoor.

But every incident seems to have a lifespan of its own, and a very short one at that. But essentially, they allfollow a cycle of occurrence, analysis, reaction, decline and death. So that after that initial loathing is through, we forget the crime as well as its perpetrator.

Because each one of these oh-so scummy and sensational incidents gets replaced by even more thought provoking, shocking and abominable ones. So even as we are reeling with shock over Manu Sharma8217;s actions, voila, here comes another one to pick up where the former left off. And we have this lesser known DSP8217;s son who shoots in an ice-cream parlor in Lucknow. Very shortly followed by the son of a UP minister who beats up and drives his domestic help to suicide.

You8217;re disgusted. You wonder if these high society blokes ever learn or perhaps it is some kind of a sadistic, masochistic way of proving their affinity to their fraternity. And even as you do so, you know that you8217;re well on the way to the process of being desensitised to these acts. While we are on our way to rationalising all this, the fire is already dying down.

The papers are readyto provide our minds with a new kind of preoccupation. The focus has already shifted to the Indo-Pak military operations at Kargil and the fear of an impending war. And it8217;s so significant and so overpowering an occurrence that it has shoved all the Jessica Lalls and what became of them into obscurity.

Someone once said time is not only a great healer, it is also the biggest whitewasher. And in our society, it is not how big or small the crime is that matters: it is how much you can take and for how long because the biggest headlines eventually dock themselves into small, easily forgettable niches in public memory.

It is important to understand that these names that are making news today may not be guilty of any crime, but it is our joint responsibility to ensure the stories are followed up and we get to know what became of whom. So that justice is eventually done and the truth revealed. We have to learn not to check our curiosity, anger, disgust and loathing at these incidents that are against the veryprinciple of living. It8217;s time we learnt to demand answers.