Last few months have been somewhat hard. I am not talking
about me but about the humanity, about our collective future (may be a little
about me too ;)). Its long time that I have written something, it is not that I
do not want to write or I do not have anything to write. There have been
millions of thoughts and words kept forming in my mind but feeling was so
overwhelming that containing those in single blog was not so easy. Therefore, I
capitulated; thoughts flowed and lost like a river in sea. However, I had to overcome
that hesitation at some point of time, regardless of what my personal crisis
is, so here I am.
If you are going to continue on this blog then I should add
a disclaimer. Please do not relate your personal life with the content written
in the blog. Please make a note that if I would have been in your shoes, I
would have actually acted in the same way (I actually am in your shoes). This
is just the sentiment expressed keeping the bigger picture in view, and you
might have to open your other eye to experience that view.
By just having a cursory glance around me and a small effort
to look at the world I get a déjà vu that I am looking at some scenes from Matrix.
Every scenes are pre-scripted and people are like robots who are doing exactly
the same things that they are supposed to do (Again ex-claimer – Not saying I am
any different). The interesting thing is, this movie has only three recurring scenes
– one - a constant exercise of facial muscle along with multitudes clicking of
camera, two - frantic typing on the keypad of phone, three - many stone face statues
travelling in car, buses and bikes with earphone plugged in their ears. It just
gives a chilling sensation of being in a bad sci-fi movie where whole world is
remote controlled by some mighty corporation through the tools like earphone,
camera and phone. We are living in a uni-dimensional world with our sight
limited to a 45-degree view. We are missing or willfully ignoring the other 315
degree. It is I, my future, and then my children and their future, and many of
us goes long way and reserve future for some thousand generations ahead. Forget
about the atrocities we are perpetrating on the mother earth in the process, we
cannot even think of our own next generation (except for some material wealth
that might not even have significance) and what future they might have if we do
not stop and change track.
India’s population is currently 1.324 billion. We are ready
to overtake China (1.379 billion) any day. Currently our population growth rate
is hopelessly high (~1.7%) to even dream to stabilize it to optimum level. We
are already beyond the sustenance level that the earth can support. 2.4% of
land in India is already supporting 17% of world’s population which itself is a
nightmare in current state. Think about all those stampede death in Mumbai, traffic
jam in Bangalore, huge crowd in Kolkata, sea of human in Bihar and UP and so on.
This is the chaos that we face at current population level. Think about next 50
years. Even if we manage to miraculously lower the growth rate to 1% (which is
next to impossible), our population will still be 65% more than today (2.178
billion). That means 850 million more people (around the combine population of whole
Europe and Brazil together). Think about situation of Local train of Mumbai,
roads of Bangalore and street of Kolkata with those extra 850 million people.
Think about what will happen to our water system, our forest, our biodiversity,
when we have 850 million extra mouths to feed. We cannot even achieve that for current
1324 million after depleting all our natural resources. It is a nightmare,
which should haunt each one of us. However, are we even concerned? Do we even
think about it? All we care about is to get a degree, get a job, get married,
and start family and proliferate the Vansh (I cannot even fathom the Vansh
crap). We do not even have slightest compunction about our contribution in
making this world worse and worsen. It is the high time that we stop swooning
over babies. We should stop thinking about it as a boon and start treating it
like a grim moment. A moment that keeps propelling us towards the doomsday. Five
thousand years ago, human race was fighting for its survival and reproduction was
integral part of that survival plan. 5000 years later, we have entered the 21st
century and human race is again on verge of survival war. Only difference is
this time war will not be fought with other species, this war will be fought
among us and we will eventually sink and will take every sign of life on earth
along with us. In order to win this survival war and save humanity along with the
biodiversity, we need to embark upon a different path. Instead of celebrating creation
of new life, it has to be made as a somber moment. A moment to stop and think about
the future of those new lives and their expected contribution to the ongoing
eternal survival war. I know, the moment you read these words it might seem
blasphemous to you. How can we even dare to pop those thoughts in our mind? That
is not how civilization has ever worked. However, like rules of wars, rules to
live also changes. These are the time, which requires backward movement. Our
survival war started with a primitive Neanderthal who first learnt to make fire
and then different tools. We started our journey from there and moved to
achieve bigger things. There was always a next, hunting to agriculture,
agriculture to industrialization, industrialization to a cyber-age. We kept
moving, we kept getting better at everything but we never learnt to stop. We do
not even know what lies beyond and when to stop. This is the time. This is the
time to move backward instead of forward. We do not need entire humanity to
understand that. Even if half of the world grasp the gravity of this problem and
be ready to make sacrifices, we might have small chance to save this wonderful
world. Or else we are doomed to our own destruction. In Gandhiji’s own word, we
have ample for everyone’s need not greed. Our greed had run amok for so long
that we have reached to a point where there will not be any left for the “need”.
It is the time that we take the reverse gear and start on a new radical path
that will not only ensure our survival but also will give us chance to live a
worthy life.
