Old timers take fascination to share among their cohorts recollections of golden days they lived while moving from middle age to old age and be described as senior citizens. The celebrated English Poet Lord Tennyson (1809-1892) may soothe them as he wrote his famous line “Old order changeth yielding place to new.” Every generation is party to old order as a legacy and generates new order that suits them in an endless sequence. Contemporary society is staring down the barrel battling with life’s stresses, all their own creation.

While many are succumbing in the face of diverse issues engulfing the masses, the powers that be in the government are befuddled, managing somehow being their mantra. Even birds, with full-grown trees chopped by thousands everywhere (for development), denizens of the forests, with unabated denudation of greenery as well as marine and river-bound fauna, with rapidly rising levels of pollution are not spared. Given the ongoing scale of human vandalism, one cannot but notice the dawn of dicey days ahead.

The changing scenario in homes and outside is an off-shoot of people reacting to the change, mistaking their behaviours as response. Harmony in society is a pipe dream. Different sections in the population, identifying themselves with different faiths, have pushed the secular land into disarray. There are no signs of change in this societal order, except changing for worse.

Call it right or need, everyone is to be provided means to live a life of comfort and satisfaction. But, the yawning gap between the means, read income, and cost of living is yawning more, with no doubt about which of these — cost and income — will be victor. The answer, simple and obvious as it is, is as clear as daylight. There is no prize for correct answer. Resources supporting all life forms have already been outstripped by the growing needs of the land’s people, with only those with their pockets jingling with cash able to sustain themselves. In times of utter scarcity of resources, particularly water and food, an inclusive society will emerge, although in a negative sense.

The heaviest burden that has descended on the backs of the land’s people is the dominating influence of leaders with no claims to credentials to lead in desirable direction. The onus of arresting their march, unarguably, is that of the people. They need to discuss and debate among themselves, even agree to disagree, the nuances of getting rid of the rot in society for which act the people may thank none but themselves. Urgency is attached to act, not react.