PERSPECTIVE

One day I was traveling by a bus to attend a bit of work in a city. It was thickly packed. Some were involved in chat, some in sightseeing, some in nap, some were simply waiting for their places to come to get off and I was observing this overall scenario. Meanwhile a beautiful girl stole the purse of a handsome male fellow. He noticed it and conveyed the same to the fellow travelers. A few of the fellows threw words at her condemning her act. She became depressed and began to cry slowly. The tears on the cheeks of the beauty hurt many. Yet nobody tried to console her for they missed words to do that in such a context. At last one fellow rose and went to her. He looked a bit posh and rich. He smoothly asked her, “You look beautiful and rich. Can I know why you stole the purse from his pocket? You do not seem to be a pickpocket for they attend such things dexterously. I am interested in your explanation”. She said, “I have been in love with a young fellow for five years. We always remained good friends maintaining our ethical limits of human conduct. The world liked to call us “lovers” and we could not change their mindsets. We eventually accepted to be identified with that tag for we knew what we are. Recently it was discovered that he is affected with blood cancer. The doctors told that they are uncertain about the length of his life. He is counting his days on the deathbed. I told him that I want to die with him. He told me not to. I always respected his words. He is a very silly fellow and that is what attracted me toward him. I asked him to seek some boon from me. He told me to steal a purse from the pocket of any male traveler. He knows that it is a tricky and risky act to be carried out by a girl like me. He remained funny even at the gate of the palace of death. I have ventured into this act to fulfill the desire of my beloved. The common perspective of the society is that pickpocketing is mostly a profession of males. A beautiful girl stealing a purse like this seems to be a strange and odd act to many in the society for it is a rare occurrence. I observed that many remained silent at my act. They liked my beauty and so failed to assess the content of wrongdoing in my act. Had it been an ugly male fellow, everybody would have dared to call the police to hand him over to. Beauty has much respect and value in this society. This is the reason why majority of the beautiful women in the world fail to understand the realities of human life in this world. Everybody tries to please them in some way. In this process they fail to discriminate between good and bad. This is the lesson I learnt from this act. This is what my beloved fellow expected me to learn. He always tells me, ‘Understand the basic human psyche and the accepted way of the social behavior. Never go against these two if you want a peaceful and comfortable life. And, mostly try to think and act against these two if you want to understand the essence of human life in a realistic sense. You can choose either way depending on your choices. Don’t follow both. It lands you in a dilemma wherein you fail to understand yourself. That makes your life restless and chaotic’. I am following the hard route. I am interested in understanding life rather than in making it comfortable remaining on the safe side like majority in the society. I am not going to give back this purse. I have to show it to my beloved”. Everybody remained silent, including the one that lost his purse. The perspective she has toward her life looked interesting and appreciable. The issue of purse looked negligible in this perspective. My dream ended at that.

Datla Chiranjeevi Raju