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Are we kind enough?
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Kindness is now a word that is obsolete, a virtue that is uncoveted. A look at a few hours in the day of an average person will convince you of this.
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THE CHORUS of a hymn often sung in full-throated blast at schools is "Have you had a kindness shown? Pass it on. It was not given for you alone, pass it on." Alas! Kindness is now a word that is obsolete, a virtue that is uncoveted. A look at a few hours in the day of an average person will convince you of this.
At the crack of dawn, the newspaper comes flying over the gate, the supplement sheets scattering all over the front yard.
A request to the delivery boy to drop the paper in the veranda is met with a rude response, "I am not paid for all that. It is none of my business." And mind your own, is the implied threat. You then console yourself with the thought that everybody's day begins this way.
The next great moment is when Her Royal Highness, the maidservant, condescends to put in an appearance. Occasionally, you wish to establish the fact that you are the boss and summon up sufficient courage to ask her why she is late. Pat comes the refrain, "I can only come at this hour. If you don't approve, settle my pay and I will keep going." Of course, the minor detail of her pay going towards repaying the six-month advance she took on her salary is completely forgotten. The next half-an-hour is spent in atonement — pacifying her for actually having dared to question her — and attempting to restore her good humour.
It is now 8:24 a.m. and in about six minutes the entire family will troop down demanding breakfast. `How many times do I have to remind you to keep breakfast ready on the dining table' — a rude calling from the children. When they discover that the day's breakfast is only upma, they flounce off to work on empty stomachs as a measure of protest.
The morning's misadventures over, a promise to help a friend's child get admission into an educational institution means the forenoon is spent locking horns with an auto driver whose fares are daylight robbery.
At the institution, the security guard, usually the epitome of nicety on account of the tip he always receives, is as rude as the rest because its admission season. Gone are the polite terms of address — `You there' is the politest he gets.
Once past the security guard, there are P.A.'s on the prowl sporting scowls. Blocking all routes to the admission rooms and herding everybody in with the general crowd, they refuse to recognise even known faces.
Back home, disillusioned and tired, the first greeting is the shrilling of telephone. It's a wrong number and you say so politely. But when the voice on the other end, brimming with blatant rudeness, spews unintelligible abuses into your ear, it's the final straw.
Screaming returning rudeness measure for measure, you have given back to the world what it has given to you.
So it's time to be honest, be Indian and choose which slot of rudeness each one of us fits into — outright, blanket or blatant — or worse still, do you fit into all three?
THARA MOHAN RAO
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Metro Plus
Chennai
Hyderabad
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