In a tragic turn of events, three UPSC aspirants in Delhi recently drowned in the basement of their coaching institute when it was flooded due to the rains. Actor Abhilash Thapliyal, who played a UPSC student in the web show Aspirants, laments the incident and says, “More than what they were doing or what they were studying, the fact is teen bachche mare hain. And kisi ka bachcha mara hai and hum usko politicise kar rahe hain, isse neeche hum nahi gir sakte. That’s how I see it.”
Commenting on how the incident is being used to pass on blame from one authority to another, the 36-year-old says, “I understand how emotionally void we are as a country. For us, these are just numbers. We forget very easily. The sad part is that after such a tragedy, people are politicising it. I was talking to a friend, and I said ki laash ka dher dekh ke do hi log usko faayda utha sakte hain, gidd aur neta. It’s so sad that someone has died, and all that the system is doing is passing the blame. And this is happening in the capital city, no wonder what will be happening in smaller cities. No one is talking about that it shouldn’t have happened. Before this, a kid passed away because of being electrocuted. So, who is safe in our country?”
The actor agrees that such an incident highlights the lack of amenities in our country for students. “The problem is we celebrate the lack of things. We glorify those aspirational stories. But instead of celebrating someone who didn’t have anything and achieved something, we should feel ashamed as a system that we weren’t able to provide them with the facilities they needed when they needed them. We always celebrate struggle, and it is so sad,” he says.
{{/usCountry}}The actor agrees that such an incident highlights the lack of amenities in our country for students. “The problem is we celebrate the lack of things. We glorify those aspirational stories. But instead of celebrating someone who didn’t have anything and achieved something, we should feel ashamed as a system that we weren’t able to provide them with the facilities they needed when they needed them. We always celebrate struggle, and it is so sad,” he says.
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