Editor,
When I step out to the market for simple groceries, the first things I encounter are broken roads, blocked drains, and overflowing drain water spilling all over. Then come the endless traffic jams, long chains of vehicles that make anyone’s patience run dry. By the time you finally reach the market, the prices of vegetables and daily essentials are sky-high. You argue with the shopkeepers, but you cannot do it every time and get used to it, with no choice, because survival leaves no choice but to buy.
Money is always short for the common man, and falling ill feels like a curse. At the hospital, you are handed enormous bills even for the simplest of ailments. Buying medicines becomes another struggle, where you realize the nexus between doctors and pharmacists – sometimes the prescribed drugs aren’t even available easily and you find the medicines only from designated pharmacy. And finding a genuine, trustworthy doctor feels no less than searching for a needle in a bush. With this, even recovery seems uncertain.
If you try to secure a better life by preparing for entrance exams or government jobs, you find that many of these posts are already sold off before the exam even begins. It kills hope. Government schemes, too, are tainted by political links, leaving the honest and deserving ones sidelined.
Even if you try to build your own business, reality hits hard. Customers pile up dues, some with no intention of ever paying back. In Itanagar, many businesses have collapsed under the weight of such dishonest people.
Dreams end, not because of a lack of effort, but because of dishonesty around us.
It makes me wonder – will we, the dwellers of the ICR, ever see good roads or reliable infrastructure? Will we ever come out of these vicious cycles? The saddest part is the mindset: many people have accepted corruption as the only path to success.
And these are just a few examples. There are countless problems ordinary people face daily. Our organizations and the system are useless, or at best inefficient, if they cannot solve the very problems that common citizens suffer from every single day.
This is the painful reality of our lives here. The hopeless feeling is, maybe nothing will ever change.
A common man