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Monday Musings: How we gifted a pollution-free Diwali to our child
How does one escape the two-three days of firecrackers-induced sound pollution and air pollution that have become a characteristic part of our Diwali celebrations? Simple. Just go on a family vacation, far away from your city
The 2019 Diwali was perhaps the best Diwali of my life, which I shall soon elaborate upon.
But before that, let me recount one of my deeply disturbing memories of Diwali which revolves around firecrackers from my childhood. We were then living in Bombay (now Mumbai) and were visiting relatives on Tilak Road in Pune. Children can be very cruel at times, and some teenagers had tied a string of firecrackers (‘ladi’) to the tail of a stray cow. The ladi was then lighted with an agarbatti (incense stick), and as the firecrackers started bursting, the cow panicked, more by the gunfire-like sound than anything else, and ran helter-sketler on the road.
The children who played this prank had their laughs at the expense of the fear-stricken cow.
Rather than a genuine festival of lights and the celebration of good over evil, Diwali in our country has been reduced to a festival of sound pollution and air pollution.
Delhi perhaps witnessed its worst Diwali this year with the already high air pollution levels, escalating still further, because of the bursting of crackers. Air quality levels in almost all cities were certainly worse-off than normal because of the noxious stink and pollution caused by firecrackers.
There is growing public awareness about the polluting effects of firecrackers, and it is heartening to note that many children today are sensitive to the cause of the environment and do not burst firecrackers. I was delighted when my 12-year-old daughter returned a box of ‘apti-bombs’ to the person who had gifted it to her. This Diwali, she did not purchase a single rupee’s worth of firecrackers.
She skipped the nominal purchase of firecrackers and this was her first Diwali without firecrackers, simply because we were far away from the city, out on a holiday.
We were in coastal Karnataka, with halts in Udipi, Murudeshwar, Gokarna and Mangalore. Along the way, we also visited the Dandeli forest reserve, Dharmasthal, Belgaum and Kolhapur. The seaside towns of coastal Karnataka were extraordinarily enchanting. The beaches were clean, the air, fresh and pure and the food, very satisfying.
We were lucky to narrowly miss the cyclone and heavy rains that was battering Pune, western Maharashtra and parts of Karnataka around this time. The tourist traffic was very thin wherever we went, partly because of the uncertain weather and partly because it was Diwali time when people prefer to be at home.
The end result was that we escaped the two-three days of firecrackers-induced sound pollution and air pollution that have become a characteristic part of our Diwali celebrations. We escaped the thick smog that envelops our cities every year post-Diwali.
For me, personally, this was indeed a kind of a breakthrough moment: the best place to be during Diwali is out of your city on a holiday. Experience it for yourself.
