I
am an Indian and a proud Bengali at that. West Bengal is a state intertwined
with a variety of Indian cultures. From being a once capital of India to have
earned the rarest of the rare distinction of being the only state in India to
be partitioned and recombined, we in West Bengal have witnessed it all, through
our forefathers.
The
tourism industry is quite developed in West Bengal(let us not talk about the
impending confusion regarding her name, recently I have heard of an initiative
being taken by one of the most popular English news corporations of India which
is trying to gather support for West Bengal’s name to be changed to Bengal),
mainly due to the ecologically rich areas in North Bengal. Not to be forgotten
are the two main coastal strips, Digha and Bakkhali. While Bakkhali is, in
common tongue, unattractive, Digha is exactly the opposite. Here, I am not going
to describe the place. It is about a dream I had on the night after returning
from my second trip to Digha.
The
first time I went to Digha was in 2009. I had planned to take my grandparents
somewhere or the other after my seventh standard terminal exams even before it
meant going next door(for the simple reason that they had visited
Vishakhapatnam with my brother and his family).
We
stayed at Sea Hawk, arguably the best budget hotel in the whole of Digha at
present. The rooms were nice, the corridors enabled us to move freely while
enjoying the breeze all the time, the hotel-owned beach was more than just up
to the mark. The sole problem with the hotel lay in its restaurant. Besides
being illogically overpriced, the quality of the food was not up to the mark.
It
was then that we found out the doings of most Sea Hawk tourist residents. They
used to purchase highly attractive king prawns from the local market and have
them cooked at any of the significant roadside food stalls on the opposite side
of the hotel. With a thriving business of these stalls, Sea Hawk’s restaurant’s
business gradually started to phase out.
We
followed suit and thoroughly enjoyed our last three meals in Digha.
A
few months ago, just before the semi-final match of the cricket world cup, we
went to Digha once again. Naturally we stayed at Sea Hawk.
It
was then that I came to know that the food stalls were not allowed any more to
conduct their business in the vicinity of the hotel. The reason was obvious to
me to be honest..after all why will a big hotel bow down to a small open-roofed
portable food stall? The sad can cope with sadness better than the happy
therefore it is better to sadden the sad more than they currently are.
In
spite of the reason being obvious, I was deeply moved at this but was helpless, just
like my poor foodie friends. We returned home a few evenings later and that
night I had a dream.
In
my dream, I saw huge harbour waves—like the ones which I saw from the 2004
tsunami footage. The waves were approaching the Indian coasts(Digha included)
at a tremendous speed. Within no time whatsoever, the entire Sea Hawk was
washed away. The waves receded in a short time after which the food stall
owners who had been deprived their right to live by the now dead Sea Hawkers,
appeared and began their business on that Sea Hawk road once again, this time
without their interference. I woke up just then and realized that I had only
been dreaming.
This
is exactly the scenario in today’s materialistic world. The hurt continue to be
hurt whereas the rich continue to store wealth which is on its way to topping the
list of all time greatest hobbies.
But there is someone called GOD/DESTINY/someone of similar stature who takes care of all mortals, especially the more deprived ones. So each and every person should remember about Mother Fortune's Wheel.
