So Diwali, like every year, is back with a bang (read: loud,big bang) bringing 3 privileged holidays work for so many people around the country (articled assistants included!), good shopping steals, yummy sweets and snacks (aka 'faraal'), spending quality time with family and friends, exchange of blessings and wishes (in cash/in kind/as emotions!) and some pollution.
Ignoring the long introduction let me come straight to what I wanted to blog on..Pollution during these 3 privileged holidays viz air and noise pollution. Appreciated the article (courtesy: The Times of India) which boasted about students pledging not to burst crackers and donating the money saved. That really touched me.
I get all heated up when I see people, those so-called citizens who are well verse with the cons of bursting crackers. Mind you, I too enjoyed Diwali in my own simple ways (shopping and feasting to name a couple) excluding the so-called joy of bursting crackers. Well you cannot go and give a boring lecture to kids on the hazards of bursting crackers (still I feel they can be convinced to bursting a few crackers instead of dozens). But why do our elders, or even the youth simply ignore greater issues and go on bursting crackers at the cost of their own environment? I am sure you too would have noticed the dozens of mini-clouds formed in the skies at night these days. The crackers are so powerful that the smoke lingers in the air many minutes after the thing bursts. And the boom-bang sounds are loud enough for anyone to go deaf. Instead of enjoying the starry bright skies I was going all cynical on the auspicious occasion of Laxmi Pujan while watching the sky go up in smokes post the bright lightning, thanks to the pollution-friendly crackers. Not only the skies, the roads too are heaped up with red and white paper remnants of the 'joys' bursted these days. These remnants cannot be recycled due to their dangerous chemical contents. The result: another pollution on its way-land pollution.
How can one feel elated by bursting a whole pack of chemicals, coughing in its smoke, clapping while watching black smoke shoot up in the air and dancing around its greyish paper remnants? Its time to wake up and celebrate festivals in the spirit were supposed to be and not in such 'chemical spirit'.
P.S. I confess I lit a couple of those sparklers last weekend..The kids at my building insisted me to participate in their small celebration and I found it too difficult to ignore their smiles..
A bit late, but wishing all a Happy and a Safe Deepawali..
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