Fear has many colours, many textures many shades. I have lived with fear in different degrees all the 77 years of my exciting and God protected life. I was never scared of my parents or my teachers or any of my bullying friends. I was scared when my Headmaster was not able to find my name in the list of students who had passed the Matriculation examination. Fear of failure, I guess.
I was scared when the girl I kissed, under the portrait of our school founder, told me that she had forgotten to brush her teeth. The fear of contracting some dreadful disease, kept me from “lip-locking” for several years.
I knew both fear and hunger on the day the Mahatma was assassinated and there was no food available at the St Xavier’s College Hostel and the roads were so empty and quiet that I kept looking over my shoulder to see if some assassin had found out that I loved the Mahatma dearly.
My most intense fear was on several occasions during my service in the Indian Air Force. I was Under Officer in charge of the cadets during my training in the Air Force Academy.
There was one particular cadet who was a “squealer” who refused to share the goodies he received from home with the other cadets. One night we rolled him in a blanket and dumped him into a tank next to our dormitory. It was called a blanket parade. I spent the next 24 hours really scared that my training would be terminated.
{{/usCountry}}There was one particular cadet who was a “squealer” who refused to share the goodies he received from home with the other cadets. One night we rolled him in a blanket and dumped him into a tank next to our dormitory. It was called a blanket parade. I spent the next 24 hours really scared that my training would be terminated.
{{/usCountry}}Although I carried the same rank and wore the same uniform as all commissioned officers wore, I was not a flying type. I was a “penguin”. Officers of the logistic, engineering, armament, signals and administrative cadres who did no flying duties.
One day in 1952 my friend and colleague Pilot Officer Kohli was killed in a bomb blast. He had gone to blow up life-expired bombs and ammunition at a range between two hills in Khamaria, Jabalpur. He never came back. I should have been there with the group of logistic and armament guys. But my commanding officer told me that I was badly required to play in the finals of the Hockey match between the Army and Air Force. I scored the winning goal but the fear of “demolition squad” duty has been a part of my psyche all these many years.
I want to tell Mumbaikars, who are in denial, that there is no such thing as a fearless person. We are all afraid. I watched pilots of our bombers go out on missions to bomb Pakistani targets. All the pilots were afraid. Some so afraid that they dropped their bombs inside Indian territory and returned to the safety of their hangars. Other pilots who were also afraid stayed with their fear a little longer and converted it to courage, dropping their bombs on enemy targets in the heart of anti-aircraft fire.
Fear is a most normal emotion. It prevents rashness and foolhardiness. And the way to deal with it is to get in touch with it, acknowledge it and get on with whatever one has to do.
The denial of fear by Mumbaikars after the recent bomb blasts frightens me in as great a degree as the other fears I’ve accumulated in recent times.
I salute the spirit of generosity, of the spontaneous response to people in need, cutting across caste and creed, of the people of Mumbai. Yet as I write this old fears and new ones creep into the marrow my bones like some inexplicable cancer.
Let me confess that I am mortally scared of another deluge. Will I once again have to carry my granddaughter from the top of my road through waist deep water to the safety of my home? How many more monsoons will an old man undertake what for me has become a life threatening journey?
I am mortally scared of the ordinary policeman both inside and outside the precincts of a police station. And if there are women keeping me company the fear for their safety grows in panic proportions.
And even if I have faith in the higher echelons of what was once a great police force I am fearful because I know that in time of disaster they do not have the resources to come to my aid. Most of the force will either be on VIP duty or allocated for Z security. Nor do they have the right transport, communications equipment or firepower that is required to provide safety to a city of 17 million people. The budget allocations for the police are pathetic.
I’m afraid because the elite citizen has no love for Mumbai. I’ve been roughed up every time I question a Mercedes-Benz driver for throwing a bag of garbage out of his tinted glass window or for asking a chauffeur driven car to turn around because he is in the wrong direction of a one-way street.
To whom should I go for these minor irritants when the perpetrators of heinous crimes are walking free, occupying powerful positions and cozying up with those who are paid to destroy the lungs, the arteries and even the very heart of Mumbai, meri jaan!
I have hundred of other reasons to be afraid. I ask my fellow Mumbaikars to stop their ridiculous bravado. They went to work because they were afraid of the consequences of not going to work.
There is no shame in being genuinely afraid. We need to admit it and make a loud and continuous noise about our fears otherwise we shall be taken for granted and nothing will change.
(The writer is a Mumbai-based management consultant)