Dhomalu Sings

The credit goes to Dr. Ronald Ross, working in India, for doggedly focusing his blood smeared glass slides under the microscope. The effort started slowly to yield fruits – the moment of reckoning, the “eureka” of Archimedes lit his tired eyes like a bolt of lightning.

At last he had nailed the culprit who was spreading malarial fever at will. A typical strain of mosquitoes, anopheles, was acting as a carrier in dispensing this fever to any one, it was able to approach, with disdain. The clinching proof on the misdeeds of this species came during his work in Hyderabad. 

This effort resulted in being honoured with a Nobel Prize, the question of which Hyderabad can now be debated, once again, with passion – over plates of hyderabadi (or) Karachi biryani.

The anopheles mosquito has strongly entrenched itself, in the hot and humid climes of the earth, more preferentially in the Southern hemisphere. Probably it had been stamped a mosquito non grata in the regions near the poles - too cold for its comfort.

Quinines came to the rescue to mitigate the sufferings of those contracted with malarial fever. Even then it eked out its dues by way of body pains and weakness and left the patient with a sour distaste in 

the mouth.

Following the Quinines, sprays, coils, mats and oils made their appearance one by one. The mosquito retaliated; mutating & becoming drug-resistant. They gripped the mankind with another type of fever – the ‘dengue’. What a never say die attitude!

The mosquitoes woke the mankind from slumber and to act – fanned the fires of scientific innovation. Mankind produced the sidewinder missile – borrowing heat seeking technology from the mosquitoes. 

The humming noise, of the mosquito inspired Gnats and the name for the pilot-less drones.  These implements of war amply served the plans of aggrandizement and superiority complex of leaders professing world peace.

Apart from the science of destruction, the mosquito galvanized medical & pharmaceutical researches; brought branches of mathematics and physics in – vector and vector control. Malarial fever was classified as a vector borne disease! Simply stated mosquitoes carry and spread the infection from a host – a sort of blood to blood delivery system. This tiny insect has really nudged the humanity with its droning and biting.

The response of the humanity smacked of selfishness and as usual – the affluent with well laid out drainage system (of course government funded) became recluse and gave no audience to the dear mosquito.

The sandwich strata – the middle class, protected themselves with coils, mats, nets and oils, to mange and keep the drones away from biting distance.

The slum dwellers and the electorates in Panchayat Raj elections are the ones who are left to cringe under the attack of mosquitoes, in waves and in all seasons. 

The reason: the netas & babus who live in ivory towers have neither time (busy promoting their own causes) nor the money (already well spent in their neighbourhood).

The remedy: uprooting all the Panchayat Raj electorates – house, cattle and hay, and sandwich them in the posh lay-outs. Carry out, a similar exercise with the slum dwellers - tin       sheds, goats and tools of their trades. This way the society becomes all inclusive and the malarial fever and the mosquito bites are equitably shared.

**Dhomalu means Mosquitoe in Telugu.