MAN kills man. Man dead and gone. Friends and colleagues gather by the dozen. One, two pick up a bucket. Three, four knock at my door!

Lazy as always, I tread soft and slow to my door knob and pull it open. Kids, aged 18 -27, explain what brings them to my door. They say “we lost a pillar of strength, a man with a future. It’s now for us – the people in and around my city – to take care of the dead man’s family!” A receipt book and a bucket point at me. I am being offered the option of showering money into the bucket in return for a receipt.

I ask: Why should I pay? Rival party hunting us down, they say. Our comrade has turned martyr. We have to take care of his family. I retort: Do it for God’s sake. But why should I part with my money? Political rivalry may have killed your friend. I don’t have a political connection. Why should I donate money for someone who died for the party those kids hold in high esteem and I do not?

Years ago, a similar group had come calling, I remember. One of them held a half-baked brick (sic) close to his heart. He said: We are off to build our temple in Ayodhya soon. We need money and we want you to give us the money, they say. Whattheheck! They want a temple , they have the bricks, they have a whole big leadership! And they need my money. Not just mine, the whole Hindu neighbourhood’s money! I tell them I don’t need a temple somewhere up in the north just to prove I’m a Hindu. I still remember the way the group stared at me as if I’m from Mars before speeding away in anger.

But why? Why on earth should I donate hard-earned money to someone who think they are doing social service when they are not. Political killings don’t entice me into being sympathetic anymore. Stab wounds and headless corpses are just part of daily feed to 24 x 7 news channels for me.

Mind you, these people who knock at your door for money are part of the elements who make you suffer on sun beaten tarred roads on afternoons by staging blockades. These are the guys who make life hell for you while on busy assignments by calling bandhs and shut downs. These are the guys who break the windscreen of your one and only car in the name of protests against an inconsequential government.

Why should I donate my money to such creeps? Why should I pay up for some suffering they begged for and pocketed? Would you?