Winds of Change

Just the other day, I overheard a guy chiding his friend because he was reluctant to cross the road as a black cat had crossed his path. I was quite amused, and would have forgotten the incident, if not for a chance comment by my younger sister that day. She told me that if I were superstitious, I would hardly ever leave my room. On asking her why, she pointed towards the cats always prowling utside my room. Funny, I thought. But then, not quite an isolated incident.

How many times have we heard the words – we are in the twenty first century….. And India has taken great leaps towards progress…. and so on and so forth. On the first instance, we generally seem to dismiss these words as clichéd, without giving them a second thought. But how many times have we really pondered on the validity of these words. Well I myself never gave it a second thought, so who am I to point a finger at others.

But today it does seem ironic to me that on the one hand where we marvel at the glories of science and revel at the various achievements in this field, there are among us, who call themselves, or should I say, proclaim themselves to belong to the highly literate class, and yet believe in such silly superstitions as that of black cats bringing bad luck when they cross our paths!!!!! And have we not, even once in our lives, wished upon a shooting star, or for that matter, crossed our fingers for luck or said “touch wood”. Silly but true.

Not just superstitions, but there are quite numerous evils prevalent in our society that threaten our progress in the twenty first century. Leave alone the problems of nuclear threat and energy security or food security, disparity runs amuck in our society. Be it the disparity among the rich and the poor, the rural and the urban or that between men and women. Disparity is a harsh reality even today, in most towns and villages of India.

So today I am forced to ask myself this question: have things really changed?

I can’t negate the fact that things have changed. India, today, undoubtedly is quite a force on the world stage. And yet such incidents, as I mentioned before, continue to occur. The winds of change have started to blow. But now it’s upon us to direct this wind in the right direction.