The emphatic victory

It’s been 4 years. I still remember every moment of that day. Hello everyone. Myself Subrat and I am sharing one event of my life with you.

Every arrangement was made. A large projector, two loudspeakers and the live match was creating the scene. It quite felt like we were in the stadium witnessing the historic India-Sri Lanka final match of world cup, 2011. We were around 20-22 friends, die hard cricket fans. By that time we were all in the final year of engineering. We thought of celebrating this moment. You can understand our craziness if you had ever been a final year student.  Just one day ahead, we planned, decided and executed it.  We booked the terrace of famous Asoka hotel. A feather to our craziness, we had made a deal with the hotel manager that, if India wins, we will have chicken biryani and drinks, sweets in dinner else veg biryani with cold drinks. At first the manager laughed at us then agreed.

On that fine afternoon, we gathered there. The match was very fierce. We had a huge target to chase. India lost early wickets most importantly Sachin. Emotions were finding their way out in our words and body language. We were rejoicing on every boundary, singles & doubles. Every wicket was switching on the panic button following uncensored commentary. The match moved very dramatically. The captain cool who had failed throughout the tournament was playing a significant innings.  The match grew more intense.

Finally the moment came when MSD finished the tournament with a stylish sixer. Wow what a moment was that. We all jumped, shouted, cheered and celebrated like anything. The whole town, state and country was celebrating this magnificent moment.  It looked like another Diwali and probably the most cheerful one.

Half an hour later, we were all tired. Filled with sweat from top to bottom, gasping heavily sat down on the floor. It was time for the party. 2 serving boy got all the dishes for us. We forgot every misery, every failure of our life. We were just living that moment. The aroma of delicious biryani added flavor to our celebration. 

After a heavy dinner, I stood up & collected the plastic disposal plate and threw it to the backside of the building towards the darkness. I heard a keen sound of someone walking in darkness in that abandoned garbage area. I tried to see through the darkness. At first it felt like a dog or a cow. But I could figure out something different. A wave of anxiety and fear spreaded all throughout my body. I have grown up hearing the scary stories of ghost and witches throughout my childhood. It dint took me a second to recollect all those childhood stories. My friends were chilling out; I came downstairs, asked the manager for a torch. While giving me the torch, he formally asked me for reason, I dint replied.

I came out and walked slowly towards the garbage area. I could not dare much to go ahead. I stopped there and shouted “whoz there?” the sound muted. I repeated again in a firm voice. Then I heard the voice of someone walking towards me. I focused the torch in that direction. I saw a boy of 10-12 years walking out of the darkness. I took a shy of relief and asked in a dominated voice, “what were you doing here?”. “Nothing sir”, replied the boy in a very keen voice. I repeated the same, loudly this time. He replied, “I was collecting the plates.”

“Why?” I asked in an annoyed voice.

“I was collecting the residual food from the plates thrown here.” He was collecting food from the plates that we had thrown from the terrace. I felt pity for that boy. Taking a deep breath I asked the boy, “What ll you do with it?”

The boy broke down into tears. Replied, “What else would I have done sir? I have not eaten anything since morning. My mother is very ill. I use to work in a hotel for cleaning plates and tables. Somehow I manage to get food for both of us and daily wage for her medicines. But today our seth (owner) has closed the hotel to watch cricket match. I am struggling to get food for both of us.” Two drops of tear shed out of my eye unnoticed.  I asked the boy to come along with me. In front of the hotel there was a tea shop. I gave him a buiscuit packet and a cup of Horlicks. He sat on the bench & started eating. He was stopping in between to control his running nose. He was wearing an old school uniform. The white shirt had turned into grey. Many patches were there in his pant. I went inside the hotel and got a food parcel for him. He smiled looking at the parcel in my hand. Very often I had seen such a genuine smile in people’s face. I started my bike and asked him to sit behind. He came and sat without any hesitation. I asked him where he lived? He told a slum area name at the end of our town. I started my bike. It was around 1 am. But the city was not sleeping. People were out on the road celebrating, hugging each other, bursting crackers. I crossed them. I reached at end of our town near the slum. The area was quite dark, silent and far apart from the celebration.  I stopped near a street light. The boy got down from the bike. I handed him the food parcel in polythene. He folded his hands to say thank you. He then ran into the un-electrified dark slum in bare foot. Gradually he vanished in the darkness. I started my bike. A sense of satisfaction was making me feel overwhelmed all throughout the way to my home.

The next day morning, I woke up late. I switched on the TV. On India TV a special program was running on India’s emphatic victory in the world cup. The news anchor was proudly announcing, “It’s not just a victory of our cricket team it’s a victory of hundred crore Indians.” I switched off the TV and asked myself “was it really a victory of hundred crore Indians?” It’s been four years, still I could not get an answer to this.

Does a world cup victory, an Olympic gold medal make every Indian proud? We live in a country where one fourth of the population lives in a daily income of less than 32 Rupees and we are building a statue of unity of worth 3000 Crore.

Does we worth it?