Poverty, the crucible of terror

Poverty, the crucible of terror: One is a juvenile murderer, the other was thrown out of home for stealing money from his elder brother. Both are compulsive gamblers. One studied up to Class 4, and the other dropped out in Class 5.Th

February 9, 2016
Crucible of terror

Apropos the article “Poverty, the crucible of terror” (The Hindu, Homeland, February 9, 2016), Josy Joseph has brought out the need for governments and policy makers to go deeper than the glossy surface, if permanent solutions are to be found for vexing social problems. For longer than acceptable periods, developed, developing and under-developed countries across the world have ‘cultivated’ poverty, illiteracy and unemployment beyond tolerance levels to safeguard the selfish interests of the rich and the powerful who supported governments of the day. The selfish interests are cheap
labour, implicit obedience by workforce and an air of superiority one feels by accumulating wealth.

The word ‘crucible’ has been rightly used by the writer. Unless governments world over do not take cognizance of the message conveyed in this article, whatever is remaining of the respect for governance will get further diluted and possibly, the crucible will melt away.  A recovery for the society from that stage will take ages. The possible remedial measures could be, for the rich to go beyond the legally defined CSR(corporate social responsibility) and charities which the rich normally consider when something untoward happens. This will, in simple terms mean ensuring a higher level of distributive justice in regard to wealth.

M G Warrier, Mumbai

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