Bystander effect

Something that happened enroute to Mumbai yesterday, shook me up so much, that it brought back one very unpleasant memory. Writing it here just so that people are aware that such things can happen to ANYONE.

About 6 years back, when I didn't blog, I was on my way back from Bangalore after a successful interview with Ogilvy & Mather. Back then my family or me did not have the the required financial strength to travel by AC sleeper coaches in Trains, let alone flights.

So, I was used to travelling by trains in second class sleeper coaches (of course I'd aspire to fly, and would tell myself that soon, i'd be travelling only by air), so my travel back from Bangalore to Hyderabad was by the Kachiguda express. There was an old couple and a boy in his early twenties. None of us spoke. In fact the entire compartment was strangely silent. I was rather tired so I had an early supper and went to sleep. I was on the middle birth and on the middle birth next to mine was the young boy. In the middle of the night i woke up gasping. This boy was feeling me up. I jumped out of my birth and screamed and cried for help. In my fear and anger, I threatened to hand him over to the RPF. I screamed for the TTE and the RPF....well, they didn't come, of course. But then, neither did my co-passesgers help me either. They stared at me as if I had woken them up  from a beautiful slumber, unnecessarily. My vain attempts to throw this boy out of the compartment only gave him more confidence and he went back to sleep with the blanket covering his face

Bystander effect, or what, I don't know. Not a soul helped me. Forget help, not a word told to the sick man. For the rest of the journey, i sat near the stinking toilet, shocked with my luggage. Shocked more with the reactions of my co passengers. The next morning before the train stopped, the boy had jumped out out the compartment and made his escape, before I could get my beloved fiance to beat up the bugger.

My point here is: while I always, aggressively campaigned against errants like these, I never doubted for a single second that the public is such a mute spectator. Not for once did I think that this can happen to me, and really, never did I realise that in a situation like this i would feel so helpless.

So when some thing as terrible happened to me on the flight, I did not know how to react. So I did not. I just let the sick man go.

But, I should not have.

And yes, such things happen on the flights too. Not just second class sleeper coaches.