WHAT WILL KILL ME?

WHAT WILL KILL ME ?

The world is gripped by the Corona pandemic. There is a cloud of fear and panic as country after country announces its own protocol to prevent this unseen enemy that is wreaking havoc across the continents. It is causing massive lock-downs, preventing people from travelling across the world, overloading the already overloaded hospitals and destroying the infrastructure of developed and developing countries, without discrimination.

There is tremendous pressure on the governments to protect its people and the economy is tearing down faster than you can say, Corona! News and fake news are circulating faster than a sandstorm. Face masks and sanitizers are the top trending shopping items, flying off the shelves faster than shoes and clothes and designer bags.

The onslaught is massive yet the countries seem to be in preparedness to return it with equal and opposite force. The wave of virus hitting city after city seems to be ebbing in some places. Fewer cases get detected and fewer people seem to be falling prey to its deathly trap. Containment is on the horizon although the fear is not.

But this is not what is going to kill me, although I stand an equal chance as rest of the world. Then what is?

Let’s begin with a true story that starts in the beginning of the year 2012. The new year had begun with a great promise, hope and happiness. Life had settled to a routine and we were at the juncture of big milestones in our kids’ education. Like all middle-class families, we had saved enough for the forthcoming educational burden so that our children could pursue their dreams. The savings were of course, distributed in a couple of bank accounts. By February first week we were contemplating debiting a chunk of our saving from a co-operative bank, Rupee Bank to be precise and transfer it to a nationalized one so that educational loans and transactions become easy.

Even before we could think about it, came the news of sanctions on the bank. I panicked. As usual, my husband was optimistic. Don’t worry, it’s our hard-earned money. It won’t go anywhere, he said. I believed him. However, in a state of panic I ran to the bank, taking leave from my hospital duty. A huge crowd had collected in front of the locked gates of the bank. A lady officer was assuring all the anxious, palpitating faces that this problem would end in fifteen days and then it was open to business. There was no way to know what had happened. Reassured, I went back, praying fervently that what she said was true. Over the next two weeks, news started filtering about bad loans and defaulters and the debts the bank was in. My heart started sinking low in despair with each rumor which unfortunately turned out to be a fact. 

Fifteen days turned to months, yet no sign of the problem going away. All we could withdraw was a measly thousand rupees from our accounts. I kept going to the bank every couple of months. Each time I went, I could see distraught faces of people like me who had saved for education and weddings and vacations and illnesses, pensioners whose life’s savings were stuck and were desperate for both, time and money, housewives whose budget had crumbled and bank officials who faced the barrage of angry clients and account holders. The respite was that we could withdraw fifty thousand from one account per year for either wedding/education/hospital. Few people, me included, somehow managed to get hold of the necessary paper work and some money saw the light of the day. But it was just one reason per year. And not everyone was as lucky.

It’s been more than eight years since. There is no sign of the bank de-freezing. Associations, mediators, dharnas, morchas, petitions, take-over bids, everything has come to a naught. Our savings in this bank remain a distant dream and a deep wound in the heart.

Circa 2020. Yes Bank, PMC, and countless other banks collapse leaving millions of people distraught, broken and without hope.

People who lead an honest simple life, who love their families, who want to give their loved ones a good life and a chance to dream keep their savings in the banks they trust. For millions like us, banking is about safety of our monies and a probability of earning a minuscule interest after giving it up for safe keeping. Bank is that place which allows us to work even harder for our loved ones and allows us to sleep peacefully knowing our sweat and blood is safe for now. Bank is something we can bank on with complete trust. “I am just an ordinary common man” goes a powerful dialogue from a Bollywood movie. Just like all commoners, we all leave the accounting to young officers in the bank whom we develop a special bond over years, whom we occasionally ask for a favor for a locker or a withdrawal in time of high rush, whom we ask for advice for a fixed deposit or a mutual fund, whom we trust as much as we trust the bank. We proudly look at our pass-books and gloat over the saved amount. We dream of a nice airy house in an upscale or a marginally better neighborhood than what we have, we dream of a doctor or an engineer in the family, we dream of Kashmir and South India tour and that once-in-a-lifetime, foreign trip! Our daily survival, our travel, our food, our groceries, our medicines come home by the bank card which assures us of our spending capability. For people like you and me, routine is this. A good life is this.

Then suddenly, one fine morning you come to know that the bank shutters are downed, notices have been pasted, ATM’s are closed and the smiling trusted officer has gone underground. The world comes crashing down, not knowing when and how you will get your lifeline back. An intense pain sears the heart and eyes are blinded by the sheer hopelessness of it. As a first reaction of disbelief, you rush to the branch and spend the next umpteen hours standing in front of locked doors, hoping to get a sliver of information. You rush from pillar to post, trying to make sense of who stabbed you unawares! You cry, you take ill, you get angry, you shout, you take out processions, you meet the all-important peoples’ representatives, then you cry some more, you feel helpless. And then you are shattered.

Yet another crash, yet another stab in the back. Yet another event that destroys your life.

It’s not Corona. It’s the system which will kill!

Dr. Reina Khadilkar.