Seven billion strong. Or are we?

"Dude tom morn 6.30 madhavan park" Sharath messaged. I set my alarm to 6 and went to bed. We play football in the mornings, I had asked sharath to talk to the other guys and confirm if we were playing the next morning since it was a holiday. I woke up to the alarm after snoozing only once - have gotten used to waking up early in the morning. I reached the ground at around 6.30 and the others guys were just coming. Only six of us had come today, we played a good game for about an hour. It was 7.45 and it was time to leave. We removed our studs, put on our flip flops and strode back to the parking lot. We stood there and were talking about the Van Persie hat-trick in the weekend Arsenal – Chelsea game. Just as we were talking about how Terry had slipped and let Persie score his second, something happened.

A woman came out of a house on the opposite side of the road with a bucket in her hand. She walked slowly to the middle of the road, looked on both sides to make sure no vehicle were coming and SPLAASSHH…she poured the contents of the bucket right at the middle of the road and walked back, closed the gate behind her and went inside her house. We were stunned looking at what just happened. It was water that she poured, from the steam which rose from it we felt the water was boiled or something. Also there were two grey objects too lying on the road, we couldn’t guess what they were. We got back to our conversation and dispersed in a few minutes. I had come walking to the ground so Sharath said he would drop me home. I climbed on to the back as Sharath rode the bike. We had to cross those grey objects and the water as we went back. We saw what those were when we got close enough, they were rats! Two dead rats!

‘What the hell’ Sharath exclaimed

‘I know. She just threw away two dead rats on the middle of the main road’ I replied, still not able to believe what we just saw

‘Why the hot water man, they were planning to cook and eat them or what’ sharath joked

I smiled and looked the other side.

To me, what that woman had just done was the epitome of our whole country’s general irresponsibility towards the community. I couldn’t help but wonder what that woman was thinking when she did that. Was she thinking that the corporation janitors would anyway come and clean it off? Did she even realize that the road was public property and doesn’t belong to her just because it was in front of her house? Did she think of how much harm those dead rats could cause to the people around in the shops and commuters who pass by? Well I don’t think she had thought of any of those. To her it was just the road where other people drove and it’s the government’s responsibility to clean it up. Those rats aren’t in her house anymore and that’s all she cares for.

Now I can safely say each and every one of us at some point or the other have been that woman. It may not be dead rats that we threw but even garbage from our houses, food wastes or whatever it may be. We can’t deny the fact that you and I are responsible for the mess we’ve created around ourselves.

World population hit 7 billion yesterday. (Baby Nargis, the world’s 'symbolic’ seven billionth person was born near Lucknow on Monday). We Indians alone form about 15% of the whole chunk and we don’t look like slowing down any soon.That more than anything else should make us only more responsible than anybody else, shouldn't it?

Yes, we are the fastest growing economy and the largest consumer market in the world. Yes, the IT industry in the US would collapse if not for us Indians. Yes, an Indian company owns a club in the English Premier League. Yes, our movies make billions at the box offices worldwide. Yes, we hosted out first F1 grand prix spending about 2000 crore on the Buddh circuit. Yes, India has become the most attractive destination for automobile companies and all other types of foreign investment. Oh yeah we’ve also destroyed all our trees to make way for this humongous economic juggernaut to march on. No doubt we can be proud of all this growth but we need to face the fact that India still stands behind Guatemala in terms of living standards and human development. Guatemala? Seriously?

We can blame the government and the administration as much as we want but at the end of the day, it boils down to each one of us to act responsible and salvage whatever is still left. Our country is too precious, we can’t afford to give up so easily. Let the government come up with its green initiatives, let the auto companies come up with their ‘eco-friendly’ cars, let the real estate developers come up with their ‘green’ housing projects – all good for the CSR image of their brands but what actually makes a difference are the small things we do, day in and day out.

I’m not trying to be the ‘social activist’ here, not the ‘savior of the environment’. I’m not beckoning for a revolution or a sea of change. Not that cliché again, we all know how that’ll end up. But… what am asking for is,

Next time when you throw that plastic wrapper on the road, just think twice.

It goes a long way!