A Guilt Left In Me For Eternity!
By
Even though my university life was a “dream come true,” yet there was always a missing part to go home for every student at Tezpur University. The long wait was over with an announcement of Durga Puja holiday for 5 days. Receiving the news, all the student started flying in the air with excitement, anticipation, eagerness, and happiness. Everyone started planning about spending their vacations in the most adventurous way and buying a gift for families and friends. I started my journey in a fine morning from Tezpur to Jorhat, everything was okay until the time this incident happened.
I was completely lost in the beauty of nature, listening to music and planning my holidays. Suddenly a sound came and every passenger started shouting and whispering. I opened my earpiece and stood up from my bus sit to know about the hazardous situation.
I saw a young girl of my age with long hair, wearing jeans and tops lying in the midst of the busy street with her scooter beside her in a pathetic condition. She was surrounded by hundreds of people but no one had the dare or courage to check whether she is alive or dead to pick her up and take her to the hospital or merely call the Ambulance.
The worst thing was instead of helping her, people started assuming the circumstance, whispering blaming, shouting, screaming and talking about girls' freedom and character that has led to this painful situation. The saddest part of the accident was the prevailing mentality that exists in our society.
The passenger on the bus was not much difference since they got an opportunity of making an imaginary story of a girl character by abusing, criticizing and blaming her. Modernization and freedom is the real cause of the incident. This portrays how inhuman and selfish people we are surrounded by. People need a chance to backbite, toucher, harass and insult without even knowing the reason behind the accident.
I was so furious at the man sitting behind me who was abusing the girl continuously saying “Girls' freedom has led to destruction”, “Who knows what she might have done the entire night”, and another man discussing “Why should the girl ride Scotty?” These were the comments pinning me up like anything as if they were commenting on me with these harsh lines. Thus, I stood up and asked them
“Do you even know the reason for the incident?” “Instead of commenting on the girl, you people could have taken her to the hospital,” I said. Then why are you making your own kind of story in a negative way? I added. Seeing my anger, the man behind me said “Who are you teaching us about what is good and what is bad? So you should better keep quiet and secondly, the girl was dead so what is the benefit of taking her to the hospital?
Listening to that, I thought my mind could not be changed in one day, so even if I scream, shout or argue with these people nothing will work. So I took my sit but I was not able to come out of the incident.
At that very moment, I visualize myself in the place of that girl. I could feel the pain of the situation, tears were continuously rolling from my eyes and the picture of the girl was running in my mind with an uncountable questions. This reflects the inhuman behaviour, ignorance of society, the helpless girl, and the position of a girl in a male-dominated society.
The worst thing that put in the situation melancholy was, I was blaming the people around me but I forgot that I was also one of the passengers on the bus. I could have stopped the bus and taken the girl for medical treatment or at least call the ambulance. I was also lost in that discussion and could not think of any way out that would have changed the situation. This guilt is always leftover in my heart for eternity. I could have saved the girl and most importantly I didn’t even try to save the helpless girl.
If this kind of incident keeps happening every single second in our country then where is the so-called humanity anyone among us could be in that girl’s place, and not even a single person will be there to help us.
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