I was in a resort at Bengaluru on 26 Jan, 2001, busy in last minute arrangements with regard to first day session of stockist conference planned to start by 3 pm. Stockists started arriving one by one and by around 12 noon I came to know that there was a strong earthquake – measuring 7.7 Mw in Gujarat with large number of causalities. Overall enthusiasm of conference came down and we started enquiring those Gujarat connected stockists about well being of their kith and kin. Though we got the respite on the fact that hardly any of participants’ close contacts were affected, overall mood was low due to 20000 causalities. Somehow conference went off well, of course with heavy hearts,
It was a normal day for Chennai on Sept 25, 2001. I just had my dinner and chatting with my daughter in the sofa, which was placed just next to the wall adjoining the entrance door of my living room. My wife was busy cleaning the plates in the kitchen. Suddenly I felt like my sofa was pulled back by somebody to the extent of around 2 feet and again pushed forward by 1 foot. It was a mild jolt and the feeling was as if a toy was pulled apart and immediately put back in the wrong groove slightly upward! .All these happened within a span of 5-10 seconds. As there was no empty space behind the sofa, I was awestruck.
Simultaneously my wife shouted from the kitchen that the still water kept on a vessel shook and the cup kept on the edge of kitchen platform slided down and broken. I opened the door and saw few neighbours too near their entrance doors. Had a quick chat with them and concluded that it is nothing but an earth quake and all of us rushed to ground floor through stairs and started phoning friends and neighbours and few switched on their mobile radio and got confirmed that the jolt is nothing but an earth quake. After spending 2 hours in open area and having not experienced any subsequent jolts we all slowly returned to our home reluctantly. This was my first experience of earthquake!
Dec 26, 2004, being a Sunday, though I woke up I was still lying on my bed with racing mind thinking too many thoughts! It was at 07.58 hrs, I watched the ceiling fan above my bed swinging heavily. Having realized it was a jolt of earthquake we all came out and assembled in the open area. After an hour or so we came to know about the first Tsunami in Chennai. As we in India never experienced Tsunami for hundreds of years we neither equipped nor had knowledge. Resultant effect was that the mighty angry ocean engulfed 20000 lives and properties.
It appears earth quake, Tsunami and Covid-19 are not just disasters, but warnings to stop undue exploitation of nature by mankind. It is time to introspect and understand that we are the reason for all these happenings and respond appropriately so as to avoid any further natural outrage and ensure a safer planet for future generations.
