Of Valentine and my little nephew

On the benches; under the trees; near the entrance; here and there— wherever my eyes moved there was only one spectacle to see, and that was a pair of boy and girl gossiping intimately.

‘Today the place is seemed to have invaded by the youths. But, after all, what could be the thing?’— the thought raised in my mind seeing this, as I entered the park for the evening walk, with my nephew, a kid studying in the standard 3rd then, last year.

As I moved ahead, little far inside the park, more of the couples [boy-girl] began to be seen there, drawing more close, almost falling on each other, in shear defiance of all moral decency. Suddenly, words fell in my ear coming from some oldies passing by me— ‘God save us from such Valentine-day. God knows what else time is to show us at this age!’

‘Oh, so this is the fruit of Valentine day’— the thought clicked in my mind, clearing it [mind] of all the unfathomable questions so far befogged it. Amidst the scene around and in the state of dilemma, I gathered the courage to further raise my steps for the forward stroll, constantly watching sometime my nephew, and sometime the loving couples retreating different remote corners— where their activities now had got to be too outrageous to bear ; the people around were no concern for them. ‘Indeed, it is because of this there raises so much hue and cry against Valentine-day’— gradually it began to occur to me. Suddenly, I grew concerned about my nephew. And, almost when the thought as to what impression all this would be making on the innocent mind of the child, he in a shear innocent fashion asked me, ‘Don’t their teachers punish them for this, uncle?’ The question left me stunned. And, the very next moment I turned my steps and made the back journey, holding the hand of the child, thinking as to why something else not occurred to Valentine that we are today made to see this his so-called day.

By- Er.Rajesh Pathak