Monday, September 2, 2013

Why did he do this?

I was at the doctor's for my mom's review, after three weeks of medicines, when the sad news had trickled in. In fact, my cellphone was with my man Friday as I did not want any interruption while my mom's medical examination was on and to enable me to mentally note down the dosages/timings of the medicines without any ambiguity! There's been a slight progress and a couple of medicines have been added.

It was with a sigh of relief that we'd come out of the doctor's inspection room when the boy at hand, had
informed me about an urgent call from my sister. As I made my connect, she broke the sad news about Suraj having taken his life the previous day. He and his wife are in the armed forces, and they've been at New Delhi over the past three years in pursuit of their professional careers.

I'd first met Suraj at their wedding reception on the eve of 30 Dec 2007 at a hall, adjacent to the headquarters of the Kerala Grandhasala Sanghom, in Thiruvananthapuram. His wife is related to me albeit, a trifle distantly, through my elder brother-in-law. A handsome young man, full of life and raring to go in his professional career - that was my first impression of him. And he was a damn friendly and outgoing guy. Subsequently, he used to visit us at our place at Delhi whenever he would come by on duty.

I'd met his wife and daughter, a few months back, at a relative's wedding here at Kochi, when she'd told me that he couldn't attend the function as he was busy at work. And the bad tidings have come by today.

Here's hoping that the young lady and their daughter have the strength to tide over these difficult times. But what keeps haunting me is as to what had gone wrong, when everything seemed to be going right for him, to have egged him on to take such an extreme step.

Suraj, here's wishing you peace in eternity and I must confess that I shall miss your smiling face!


Tailpiece.

The width of the highways, all over the country, has been fixed at 60 mts. In Kerala, citing lack of space thanks to its density of population - a weak alibi, if one were to ask me - a case was made to reduce it to 45 mts but the latest buzz is that it has been agreed at 30 mts!

We seem to be missing the cardinal point. With adequate width, a center median can be erected all along the highway, which would greatly reduce accidents and enforce lane discipline. But we, mallus, just don't seem to care because human lives are cheap out here, perhaps!!   

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