Someone in power sometime back, suddenly decided that liquor brand names should not be visible. So the authorities go on a spree removing any reference to Kingfisher or 100 Pipers or Smirnoff or whatever. Of course no one stops the sale of alcohol…oh no, they earn too much from that.

Cigarette advertising is banned. But sales are encouraged. More tax to the government.

Another top dog decides that the best way to control crime is to make sure everyone is at home by 11. While it looks like the authorities go comfortably to sleep by midnight, the crime rate doesn’t come down.

Some where else a bunch of story hungry media predators accost young ladies coming out of a pub and paint them as ladies of questionable character.

And now, the rumor that ladies are going to be allowed to dine out only till 10pm. Is this a city or a woman’s hostel in disguise?

Even a silly, insignificant thing like traffic management seems to be beyond the scope of the people concerned. The new traffic lights at Nagarjuna Circle have amplified the trouble more than they have solved them. The traffic jam is longer lasting and just plain longer as well.

And then we have more and more people qualifying for various alphabet levels of private security. And we have officers brandishing flags and coloured lights that cut through the traffic that even ambulances can’t.

At popular Biryani Joints bouncers start harassing vendors and mindless of the fact that it is a woman, and that people are watching, they beat up flower girls.

What the hell is going wrong with this world? This city in particular. Do we have no choice but to remain silent witnesses, impotent pawns in the games that are being played in the name of politics or power play or both.

Where is the world that looked at Hyderabad as the cleanest, greenest city. As the safest city and the city where civic authorities had brains, maturity and respect.

Have they all drowned in the stinking Hussain Sagar or vanished along with the water at Gandipet? And why this silence?

From people being affected? From people being trampled on?

Have we all collectively lost our voices? Are we so dumb that we are acting deaf…and blind?

Come on Hyderabad. Prioritize…stop reacting to problems that you cannot solve…Is Manmohan SIngh a hero of the Silent Movies era? Is Rahul Gandhi a better bet than Narendra Modi? Oh come on…let’s go micro…let’s look at something that’s affecting US. Our children. Our neighbours.

Let’s make the world a better place…for me and for you. But let’s focus on OUR immediate world first. Believe me…the rest of the world will soon learn to behave.