An Ice Cream Story

Sirjee was a good man. he had a habit of helping people in distress. He was the go-to man for any problems that people faced. Sirjee was like a mini government. His good deeds had a humble beginning of having fought against the mafia in his locality. Once free from the mafia, he fought for equality for all in his apartment. He slowly started working for the good of everyone in the city.
It wont be really wrong to say that this good samaritan good get things done faster than any minister, and he never used any violence mind you.
He also taught at a school as a Physics teacher. All his students loved him and he loved all his students. His class always had the most attendance and was never missed.
One day, 3 of his best pupils were absent. Distraught over this development, he walked over to thier homes to see if everything was fine.
Alas!! It wasnt.
All the three had fallen ill. They had ice creams on the way back home, you see. This had given them a raging fever and a bad cough. Their parents were worried sick about these kids.

They missed classes for a month. Sirjee was restless. his best pupils were unwell. they would have exams in a few days, and even if they did make it to school during exams, they might not fare as well as they usually would have.
Their exams were crucial. If they fared badly, their college admissions would be affected. Their college admissions ruined, their chances of getting their dream jobs would be in jeopardy. Without a dream job, who knows what effect it would have on their psyche?
An entire future ruined due ice creams! Sirjee could not let this happen. These were childrens' futures at stake.
He met with a few parents and teachers who had a similar outlook to his. He decided that no ice creams should be sold anywhere near the school premises.
However, businessmen will stay businessmen. They shifted to elsewhere. Children could not resist the temptation, and followed the vendors to their new location.
Now it was a bigger issue. Children might get hurt walking to this new location which was at a considerable distance.
Sirjee suddenly had an idea. Why not get all ice creams banned across the nation?
The government laughed at him. The goverment was a balding, handle-bar mustachioed man who loved to laugh. The Government took his application read it, used it to wipe the bhajjiya oil off his hands, and summarily crumpled the paper and threw it into the dustbins.

"get rid of ice creams it seems, the old man has gone senile. has anyone ever gotten rid of such a tasty, and wonderful thing?"

The government could not stop laughing.
He went home in a huff. his wife had cooked bitter gourd for lunch. One look at the bitter gourd, and all his anger now turned towards the poor wife.
He stormed out of the house proclaiming that he would not eat ever. Not bitter gourd. No. First the government and the wife. Sirjee had had it now. The last straw it was.
News spread. like minded people who came to cajole him into eating saw the bitter gourd and decided that it would be better he not eat it.
Thus began his satyagraha the fast of a life time.
One by one, parents joined in.
Doctors who had gotten sick of treating children for tonsilitis and throat infections joined in.
Chewing Gum, candy and toffee makers to whom ice creams were a competition, joined in.
the message spread far and wide.
Everyone was joining. Not joining meant you were out of fashion.
Nosebook, Bharkat, Gaggle Minus the news was everywhere.
People who ate ice creams in the sly joined in.
Ice Cream makers joined in (secretly hoping to create an advertising with their presence)

The government was getting tired of people not eating any more. The Government's cook had run off to join the satyagraha no one cooked for the government any longer. The huge appetite of the government and the ensuing pangs of hunger made the government to pick up the oil stained application back from the dustbin, eat the few bits of bhajjiya sticking to that paper out of sheer hunger (it is said that the government contemplated eating the paper as well ... but thats a different story); and passed a law.

No more Ice Creams.

Today, when children fall ill, they tell sirjee that it was due to the rains or the wind, or the heat, or the bhoot that hangs upside down in the peepal tree outside the city.

As we pass by the city street today, Bharathjee's wife has unfortunately cooked bitter gourd. The government had laughed at Bharathjee's paunch. He wants laughter banned. Especially against obese people. They say, people are joining in. Noble thing. Satyagraha

(note: Cross posted on FB.
Social evils and ice cream arent the same, except if you are like yours truly who suffers from every ENT illness that has been discovered and is yet to be discovered.)