Is the Horse Oppressed?

An encounter between a tonga driver and the “cruelty folks” seizes a university student’s attention on his way to class.

- Mirza Athar Baig

Sometimes I remember strange things.It’s about those days when there used to be a department for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. I believe this department is still functioning, but in those days their presence was felt immediately as one walked across a road and noticed two official men on their bicycles. They would always be on duty in a pair, though they may have worked individually as well. I always saw them in a white shalwar kameez with a khaki cap. These officials were called “the cruelty folks” by the laymen, and you could often see them slowly riding their bicycles on the extreme left end of the road. Every time I saw them I used to think to myself: Here is someone who cannot endure cruelty to animals.

Strange things come to mind and in such strange ways. Was the day that has just come to mind cold or hot? I cannot say with absolute certainty, but it must not have been too cold or too hot, or I would have remembered it because of its temperamental intensity. In any case, it was an ordinary day. Yet it was also not an ordinary day, and that is why I am reminded of it with such strange intensity. This memory is reawakened in me like a storm of pollution on the roads. Just imagine waking up one morning, and the moment you come out under the sky you realize that the whole world is enshrouded with layers upon layers of pollution, and if you are a living, breathing creature there is no way out of this oppressive suffocation. If you can imagine this feeling, then you are quite close to the environment of that day that I am reminded of.