" The Story"

“Life is a race, agar tez nahi doudo ge, toh koi tumhe kuchal k aage nikal jaega”

It seems to be just a dialogue from a super hit film…but it is the reality of the so called “modern era” in which we live… we live in a country where a woman who is worshiped as goddess Laxmi is beaten till death, where pizza deliveries are faster than ambulances, where the fight against corruption is considered as a publicity stunt, where an innocent guy is imprison for a year in acquisition of stealing 200 Rs/- and a minister who is involved in a scam of billions is set free, where you get car loans @ 8% and education loan @12%,where a sports personality get paid even more than soldiers fighting on the borders risking their lives. We live in a world of irony, still proud because we have adopted the “chalta hai” attitude. So in a country where we have worriment in every step the endangered English literature seems to be just another name on our “problem list”.

But it’s not a small deal because it’s about the intense feeling that a writer has for his work and it’s about the state of a reader who wants his spent penny to be worth. When a writer’s work goes undervalued he experiences the same feeling of getting hurt as a mother feels when her child weeps in pain. When a literature loving person observes that how beautiful emotions of love are subjected to vulgarities, just because of the way they are presented, the feeling of disgust take over. When a worshiper of literature comes across the use of slang and informal language he finds the true essence of the classic English literature absent. With every mark of error that a publishing house serves; both the readers and the author are embarrassed.

So who is responsible for this chaos?

Is it the author? - Definitely not, because the author wants his work to be the best. So is it the publisher?  I guess no because the publishing houses have their reputation at stake. Then who? The answer lays in the system the gap between the one who owns the thought and the one who sells it. If the bridge between the terminals gets stronger we will relish what we get to a great extent.

So now who is winner in the race…?

I seriously have no clue to this puzzle, but yes I know that the loser is simply a person like me who worships literature as her most prized possession. Who wants to write, who wants to get lost into some classic tales, who wants to see her name on the cover page of a best seller, who wants the answer to the problem of her lives through books she reads, who wants to express her feelings being fearless from being weighed by currency. I am just an ordinary girl who is trying to put light on her feelings which are curbed by the system.

“I” am just a voice for the millions who dream to be one among the published names.

It will take some time and all of us have to play our roles honestly then, just a little effort and we will have one name less in our so called “problem list”.

So let’s hope for a better tomorrow.

Arushi A. Shukla.

A 19 year B.Tech student who loves writing whatever comes to mind, dancing without any occasion, gossiping with a never ending list of friends, meditating (it strengthens me), watching movies and eating heavily. I am a typically religious girl having a 24*7 hotline with god. I am grateful to my nation and love my sweet family, I truly believe in simplicity and destiny. Contact : arushishukla027@gmail.com