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What if we reflected upon our conditioning where “going on” and "keep going” even at great personal cost is encouraged, regarded, and even rewarded, right from early childhood?
What if: a BIG question all of us are pondering on.
I don’t think anyone of my generation could have been unaffected by the tragic news of singer KK passing away in Kolkata. For me, it was no different. I didn’t just love KK and his music. I fell in love with it. From his initial music, which was a part of my college life, to his later forays into Coke Studio, his music was integral to my playlist, especially when I needed a calming mixture of soulfulness and nostalgia.
And, I don’t think any of us are unaware of the equally disturbing news fragments. The ones that sporadically but consistently tell us about the obvious discomfort that the young icon (yes, 53 is young) felt, the alleged lapses by the organizers, the prevailing conditions.
So before we give into our ritual of reducing absolutely every tragedy to a social media thread, or a media circus and then letting it slip into oblivion, a few questions for us to ponder on:
So, while everyone is trying (and failing at it) to imagine a world without KK’s songs, I want you to try and imagine a world with these what ifs:-
What if we didn’t have such a strong culture of breaking rules, both at a society and individual level? We are so proud of this jugaad, ho jaayega and chalta hai mentality right? (“It’s ok, happens” kind of mentality!)
What if we reflected upon our conditioning where “going on” and “keep going” even at great personal cost is encouraged, regarded, and even rewarded, right from early childhood? What if we believed in stopping or pausing? Didn’t equate taking a break with quitting? Didn’t think of quitting as a bad word?
What if instead of creating a potpourri of a blame game throwing in authorities, politicians, conspiracy theories, we actually had a system for fact finding, and finally course correction?
What if we stopped broadcasting few second clips from his last moments (a public figure too deserves his dignity and privacy, especially in death), and those parts of the postmortem reports.
What if another senseless, possibly preventable death finally started to make us value human life?
The last one above is almost wishful thinking… will we become human enough?
As “Pyaar ke Pal” streams on loop for so many of us, I leave you with this: Don’t let the lyrics from that song be the only lesson from this tragedy.
Shalini is the author of "Stars from the Borderless Sea", a collection of three novella length stories that explore different nuances of love. She is a practicing doctor with more than 20 years of experience read more...
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