Indian Crabs

I remember this story that we were told as kids (damn now days I seem to be remembering a lot of things that have happened in the past, looks like quarantine has got me reminiscing on the past). The story was that of Indian crabs. For those who haven’t heard of this anecdote (a short amusing or interesting story about a real incident or person) here it is.

In a popular CRAB market, there was a store which housed all the crabs of the world. There were baskets of each country in the world lying there full of live crabs. The baskets of each country were covered from the top except that of one country "India". The basket full of Indian crabs was uncovered from the top. This perplexed a visitor who asked the owner why only the Indian basket was left open from the top and that of every other country was closed from the top. 

The owner replied: “It’s simple. If we left the baskets of other countries open, all the crabs would climb to the top and walk out. However with the Indian crabs it is never so as every time an Indian crab tries to climb up the container, another crab pulls it down and therefore none of the Indian crabs are able to leave the container!!

Sadly, in the current pandemic scenario this holds true. Rather than working together to find a way to combat the virus, the political parties have been trying to pull each other down, squabbling and complaining like little kids. Rather than bridging the political divide and coming together to work as one they are more hell bent on bringing each other down, trying their best to destabilise each other and add to chaos that’s already there. You can be critical of each other, but for once work with each other for the benefit of the people who elected you and not for your political agendas.

We don’t need clapping, or banging of plates, lightning of diyas, or showering of petals. These are for social media, they are not going to do anything fruitful. And the financial package, sadly, would never reach the ones who need it. We need a leadership, which sadly is mostly missing and mostly appears to either assign some new tasks or extend lockdowns. Celebs and social influencers are either quarantined in their farmhouses, busy posting pics of new tricks they have picked while on lockdown and will only make appearance when it suits them.

We need to stand united if we need to make it out of this situation and come out alive we need to work together, especially our political parties. After all united we stand, divided we fall. Now that’s a thought for another write up!