Price Tags for Privileged Love!

Pepe Jeans: Rs. 3500/-, Mango Top: Rs. 2000/-, Tanishq Earrings: Rs. 25000/-, Woodland Shoes: Rs. 4000/-, Privileged Sister: Rs. 75000/- per month!! Our future??? I wonder if our future holds such a product with price tag in the various malls sprouting across the country.

Small incidents, Big question: our project site required a connecting road to the main road and the connector will have to pass through a section of a small private property. The only option for my company is to buy out that section of the land for the connector or compromise on the connector itself. So, landed at this property one morning to get an idea about the ideal amount for our idea – the connector. Well, turned out that the son of the house is the deciding ‘authority’ as far as the sale is concerned, says the father. Ofcourse I am confused. Owner = father, Decider = Son! Question mark in my head and the face conveys it non-chalantly. The old father answered my unasked question, ‘He runs the house now, I cannot decide’!! I think I saw some glistening in those weathered eyes.

Similarily visited an old family friend recently while in tow with mother and I was party to the news exchange between the mothers. Apparently Aunty’s younger engineer son recently bagged a better job offer from Infosys. So he is jumping job from TCS to Infy, ofcourse with a hike. We are showered with words of exhilaration & pride about what a worthy son the junior has proved to be – Family’s prestige, you see. My mother suddenly launches into queries about aunty’s elder one. An engineer, ofcourse, but the one who chose academia over corporate ramblings and chose to forgo his Congnizant job for a professor-giri with NIIT. The mention does enough to bring all the exhilaration down with a one liner, ‘Ya he is also doing fine.’   

Less pride is a son who earns less relatively, diminished power to a father because he no more pays the bills, takes me back to the question – price tags for privileged love? Seems like paying more to travel in Radhani Express for the same distance, so that we get more attention (from the coach attendants atleast.) Will one be called a fool for liking people for just what they are rather than their materialistic stature? Is one being unrealistic if they feel manipulated on being considered a family status symbol?

But if these observations are reference points then we will all either renounce our societies or become self-centred, materialistic and hard hearted! Infact if we really look around that is where we are going right now as a global community. We have tears while in the movie theatre but we fail to even empathise with a similar sight when we see it at a traffic signal and that is the very reason why probably today we need more and more quotes and spiritual teachers to makes us ‘feel good.’