It was a chilly cold morning of a December. The train Sambaleshwari Express dropped me in the platform of Panskura railway station. The early morning sun was yet to peep. But there was visibility as any where in an Eastern Indian morning.
Many men and women were flocked in the platform. They included vendors of fresh fish and vegetables. Baskets full of Hilsa and other fresh water fish were kept waiting for trains to various destinations. Flies big and small gathered on them. The vendors occasionally attempted to wag them off in vain.
Some dogs were standing here and there hopeful of getting a bite of scintillating Hilsa.
I was waiting for the passenger train to Haldia.
Suddenly I could observe a stir among the stray dogs. It was a disgusting scene that followed. A skeleton of a dog came running. It was skinny, stinking and rotten.
The stink was too pungent. It spread rapidly and the marshy smell of Hilsa faded into oblivion.
The dog was a patch work of pieces of skin over a large canine skeleton. It was gory bloody patches of hairless skin and red and white flesh intermittently strewn. Its eyelids were partially fallen off.
Worms were creeping all over its body. Some lurked into the flesh and some appeared out.
It was quite annoyed by the creeping worms. But the poor thing had not even a tail to wag.
It rubbed against each pillar it could in the platform. In that process left a part of the worms and puss over them.
The stink spread from pillar to pillar. The flies from the Hilsa baskets flew and covered this creature and its rub offs.
This rubbing seldom relieved the discomfort of the poor creature. Suddenly in a surprising turn it ran towards a strong healthy dog. Its devilish rage made its ugly face more ferocious than before.
The healthy did not accept this challenge. But with a grunt it ran towards a far corner.
None among the other dogs dared to touch this rotten brother. But he expected an angry bite that would momentarily soothe him.
After a long wait my train to Haldia came. The vendors, the Hilsa baskets, the rotten dog all went out of my eyes. The pungent smell chased my nostrils to further far. But the image of that rotten dog looms large before my eyes every now and then.
The dog of Panskura is a plain simple creature. It acted upon its instincts. How would have it behaved if it belonged to the human race?
It will definitely clad in fine costumes. Apply extravagant dose of deodorant over its stink. It will pretend to be the best cosmopolitan, friend, leader or saint. Will seem outwardly a wizard, a magician, a healer, the abode of peace and amity.
Meanwhile it will donate its contaminated blood to its brethren and silently transmit its rot to the maximum possible number in its race and pave the way for a renaissance.
The ethos is changed. The rotten becomes a religion, a belief, a culture, a custom or a political party.
National rot day will be a holiday. World Rot Day will be an awareness creating day.
The not rotten are no more accepted. They are treated as antisocial and antagonists
and
Madness will be the essential qualification to rule the world.
