Pollution Madness

I'd reached one of the crowded streets of our capital city, a familiar marketplace that had emerged from tawny fumes and dusty mists of dawn and slowly been drowning into a chronic, hazy greyness of the mild-wintry afternoon—the ideal place to carry out my activity with maximum success.

- Sreelekha Chatterjee

Hoping to pass by unnoticed, I turned around to find people moving about the marketplace with face masks, and the ones without them used their handkerchiefs to cover their noses. The sky seemed to harbor a pale light of sun veiled in thick smog—completely colorless, paltry. The lingering greyness of the weather dropped a few shades deeper—the day seemed to be visible through palls of smoke. The vehicular emissions on the road were perhaps responsible, or the fires on agricultural land, exhaust from diesel generators and power plants, dust from construction sites, smoke from burning garbage and illegal industrial activities. They felled the trees, resulting in climate change that further escalated into global warming by blocking the seasonal rains that could have otherwise reduced the air pollution levels.

Having gone a few steps further into the market, I constantly felt the invisible presence of a pair of eyes hovering over me, while the shopkeepers of some garment shops kept calling out to me amiably.

“Come over. You'll get the best-fitting dresses.” For a while, I stood there in admiration, as the shops exhibited dazzling magnificence—satin and silk garments embellished with sparkling gold and silver embroidery work on one hand and the light, pleasant-to-the-eye cotton ones on the other. On earlier occasions, I'd stopped by to check the outfits, sometimes alone and at times with my boyfriend. But that day I wasn't meant to be there as a potential customer.

Momentarily my thoughts swayed me away to my illusory world when I recognized a temple of Lord Shiva at the center of the market, which stood in its usual traditional glory.