I know the vehemence of poverty and exploitation. Have I not seen the overflowing garbage bins where starved humans and dogs creep towards, together, in little mincing steps to look for a couple of food scraps? I begin to feel even more staunchly that there might be something in the doctrine of karma. After all, what's the price of life in the slums? I am filled with despair.

Destiny has embezzled every expression of normality from the slum dwellers. Piercing tragedies - starvation, domestic violence, chronic illness, rape are the horrifying occurrences happening everyday in a ghetto. Who is bothering if an old man had hung himself, or his bones and liver had finished him off? Who listens to truth of a girl child molested by her drunkard father? No one cares if the shanties have drinking water or not. There are two elements here; slow death and sudden demise.

Meanwhile! What role have I been playing as an individual? The question ruins my sleep because I can tell you that as I lead my life, I show a sense of concern, only through mere words of mine.

I watch the poor, the diseased - trapped in their terrible circumstances. I see the failure in the system, and the huge responsibility to bring reforms to support the poorest masses. I know it is important to feel how people live around us. The overall setting is overwhelming and disturbs me. But there is nothing much I have done to defend the suppressed. That's the reason why I say: Smash My Glass.

Geeta Chhabra

From the book: Smash My Glass by Geeta Chhabra