We, as a people, don’t take kindly to instructions, rules and regulations. Being the ‘jugaadis’ that we are, our first reaction to any rule is to think of a way to side-step it. We take our hard-won freedom very seriously and no one is going to mess with it. A fine example of this can be seen every day on our roads, where pedestrians and drivers alike; blithely flout rules and carry on regardless. No amount of counselling and explaining that these rules have been put in place for our benefit has much effect.
This is why a hapless administration is forced to come up with all sorts of bans and impose them at will. I have often felt that what we need is not a democracy but a benevolent dictatorship; with a kindly ‘Big Brother’ to tell us what to do because it’s ‘apne hi bhale ke liye’. Remember how porn sites were banned? And mobile phones for girls? And odd/even numbers on vehicles on certain days? So, instead of a benevolent dictatorship, we’d have a ‘banevolent’ one!
The problem with bans is that they have long-term, ripple effects that can’t all be foreseen. But that’s something that can be dealt with later, or not… The advantage is that they serve to shake up the general populace and keep everyone busy, endlessly debating pros and cons, thus ignoring the more serious issues at hand. The ‘Ban-ner’ looks virtuous and well-meaning and the ‘Ban-nees’ look victimized and injured. Both sides would have plenty to tom-tom. Everybody wins!
In my small way, I too would like to suggest some bans that would help us improve the quality of our lives and maybe even help the environment. The far-reaching effects maybe the reverse but then, one can’t think of everything!
- A ban on showers and jet sprays in all bathrooms and toilets. This would help save water during the summer months. A ‘balti-lotta’ was good enough for our elders, it’s good enough for us.
- Ban remote controls for televisions. People would get more exercise indoors which would reduce the risk of cardiac problems.
- Ban sex after 10 pm. It could help control the population.
- The use of air conditioners could be banned in all high-rise monsters made of granite and glass. Who knows, we might even reduce global warming that way!
- Instead of controlling the size of food portions served in hotels and restaurants to reduce wastage of food; why not ban eating-out? Maybe restrict it to odd-even days? Or months without an ‘R’ in them?
- Oh, how about a ban on the use of ‘fair’, ‘wheatish’ on all matrimonial sites? That should help cure us of our inherent racism. And while we’re at it, let’s ban ‘homely’ as well. It’s always puzzled me how a person can look or be homely. Home loving, yes; but homely?!
By the time, a distressed citizenry would have finished tweeting, trolling and forwarding the consequences of these bans, the administration would be ready with fresh, new bans in place. We would all be so busy discussing and debating and coming up with ways to flout all the bans that we’d have no time to mess up the planet any more than we have already done.
A new Ban Ministry could be created, whose job it would be to come up with original and innovative ways to ban things. That could reduce unemployment too!
This would go on until all bans would end up being banned. Or the human race would ban itself out of existence. Which can’t be too bad for the planet, right?
DISCLAIMER!! This has been written with tongue-firmly-in-cheek. Views are personal but not to be taken personally. Remember, overthinking kills irreverence!
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