Poignancy of memories
One incident can be a reason worth living your whole life ahead and at times that one incident can compel you to think about the worth of life for that matter, I like to see my life through the latter idea. Life has given me a lot of bumps for such sceptic perspective towards her, it's a fact of life, lot can happen in fraction of seconds, and I realize this as I am writing this note while remembering my friend in Operation Theater, I too would have been only if I was a few seconds early prior to the 7/11 Delhi High Court blast but I do have an instinct deep down, that I will choose the former path in life but then question before me is, when.
Kabir, a proud son of a reputed politician along with me operated an NGO, it had been two successful years in this stream, together with a few legal experts in our organization, we dealt in the legal areas for the welfare of the downtrodden and the poor's of the society. We were quite proud of our work however there were certain glitches, the organization at the same time was politically motivated because of Kabir's father involvement in it, often there were disagreements and discourses because of it but we continued doing the work which was directed towards the interest of the people we were working for.
It was in the Month of March, 2011, I switched on to the news channels only to see a building which was under construction and the place where I had recruited volunteers to engage with the labor and their families who were involved in the construction had collapsed leading to innumerous death tolls and injured people. I instantly rushed into my car for Kabir's place where I saw him arguing with his father's involvement in the cement scam, it was crystal clear to me, the involvement of his father in this case. This to me clearly meant an end in partnership with him and it was evident when he started to disapprove his father's involvement in it and within weeks, fight broke out in between us.
After having detailed information and data collected from different sources and giving a resignation with a few colleagues from the organization we worked in, we filled a suit in the lower court accusing people behind the case. Because the case was highly politically motivated the lower court gave its decision in the favor of the other side but since the case had got enough limelight in the media, we got the attention of opposition party's leadership, for their own benefits. The case was challenged in Delhi High Court and we were supposed to appear on September 7. Meanwhile I had successfully managed to get ticket from the opposition party for the upcoming state election because of an unprecedented and overwhelming support of the society in various strikes and processions we started conducting after the verdict of lower court at different places, the opposition had a lot expectations from my side as they had miserably failed in the previous state elections 5 years back.
September 7, 2011.
It was a big day for me, I had lot of responsibility over my shoulder, we had come here from a very long way and we expected that justice should be and will be prevailed in the Delhi High Court and the culprits will be punished. I wore my regular white shirt and black trousers and stepped outside my home and started heading over to the High Court where my people were patiently waiting for me, they had mentioned, Kabir and the rest of them had come early. We had faced a lot of things during our strikes against the government and I along with few was detained so it clearly meant it wouldn't have been awkward for either of us to look into each other's eye. I started at 9:50am and reached at the sight at 10:15am, a bomb blast had occurred outside Gate no. 5 (10:14am) where I was expecting everyone to arrive, the difference was I came few seconds later, I saw through the glass window of my car, people burning, people dead, misery had underlined the sight in front of me. I had no idea what was happening, I became pale and gradually numb. People were dead, that was real, happening in front of my eyes. The courts were sealed. I came back and started checking for the dead and injured reported, the death toll was 17 and 76 people were found injured. Kabir, his father and the rest were included in the death tolls.
After a few weeks the case was reopened and we won the case, people accused were sent to judicial custody. Kabir's father party which was in power faced a debacle when it came into news about his involvement in the scam. The state election dates were announced, the state president called me into his office for party's campaign leadership. But, 7/11 attacks had traumatized me to very great extent, my inner soul restricted me to be a part of the society. After running a very hard and tiring opposition campaign for a few days, I resigned from the party from all the posts and tried to back from where I started.
Memories, I say there are good ones and there are bad ones but the thing which is common in them is they will transform you from who you were to who you are to who you will be ahead in future. It has been 2 years now that the NGO has been replaced with a TRUST and is named after my childhood friend, Kabir Mehta.
