A university student’s poignant reflections highlight the stark inequalities faced by the youth in our society and the urgent need for compassion
In this world of pain, oppression, the torments of life, and the endless blows of fate, sometimes the heart wonders:
Why is there so much suffering in this world? And is there no one who can ease this pain?
I was leaving my university campus, my thoughts entangled in the weight of books, deadlines, and the pain of unrequited love—a charmer whose thoughts and memories nestled in the deep layers of my heart—and the endless corridors of a future I was free to chase. The air hummed with the chatter of students and corporate employees, the shuffle of shoes against the pavement, and the occasional burst of laughter from a group of students making their way home. The world felt vast and open, like an unwritten story waiting for me to claim my place in its pages.
But then, at the bus stop, while waiting for my bus, I saw them. And suddenly, the vastness of my world shrank into a single moment—a moment I can never unsee.
I saw a father, helpless and without any support, lying on the harsh grills of a bus stand. In deep restlessness, he held his child close to his heart, making sure the little one wouldn’t fall. His grip was not one of peace but of necessity, as if his very bones were the only shield he could offer against a world that had already turned its back. His child was wailing in helpless agony, and tears streamed down his face as if the entire city would drown in his grief and perish in sorrow.
His grip was not of peace but of necessity, as if his bones alone could form a shield against a world that had already turned its back. His feet, cracked and caked in dried mud, bore wounds—open, unhealed cuts that narrated silent stories of suffering, of roads walked barefoot, of battles fought against a life that had only been taken and never given. Seeing this, my heart leapt, and my eyes immediately welled up. I stood frozen. My hands, still clutching books filled with knowledge, suddenly felt heavy in my grasp.
Whether it is love or the ways of the world, why is there so much inequality in this life?
I used to think that inequality existed only in love, but now I see it is woven into the very fabric of this world.
Because I have seen people in love—there is always one who longs more, fights harder, holds on tighter.
Love is never truly equal; there is always one who gives more while the other receives. (As I said, there is no equality in love either.)
What knowledge prepares you for this inequality, this suffering in this cruel world?
What dream is worth chasing if it means leaving people like him behind?
Are we truly young when we mistake youth for something that can be hoarded—when we build fortresses around our ambitions, forgetting that youth was never meant to be stored but spilt recklessly, like ink on forgotten pages? We tell ourselves we are too young to change the world, too caught up in the tides of our own existence to turn back and extend a hand.
But what, then, do we make of those whose youth has been stolen before they ever had a chance to grasp it?
Where do the youth live? Is it in the carefree laughter of children running barefoot through the fields? In the plucking of flowers, the exchange of whispered secrets between siblings, the easy innocence of a life untouched by hardship?
Or is it here—bleeding into the cracked pavement, cradled in the weary arms of a father who has long forgotten what it means to be young?
If youth is meant to be free, why do I see it chained to pain?
Why do I see it gasping for breath in the arms of a man who should have been running, leaping, dreaming—but instead has only enough strength left to be a shelter?
Hands too small to bear such burdens, stained with the filth of streets where childhood should never belong. Blisters carve stories into their veins, wounds whisper louder than their voices—long silenced by the indifference of the world.
Where I live, there are many wanderers around me who have no permanent place to call home.
Sometimes, when I pass by them on the streets, I see nothing in their eyes—just an empty, aching silence.
O my heart, have you seen their eyes?
Those hollow wells where dreams drown before they ever have the chance to ripple?
There is nothing in their eyes—I have looked closely, and I have seen it for myself.
Those eyes are empty, utterly vacant.
They do not hold the weight of tomorrow, nor the warmth of love for another.
They do not dream, nor do they deceive.
They are not burdened with hope, nor tainted by hypocrisy.
They are simply hollow—eyes that have seen too much, yet hold nothing at all.
Do you not feel the weight of their hunger, the ache pressed into their ribs like an iron brand of fate?
We walk past them with pockets full of coins, never realizing that to them,
Wealth is not a fleeting game but the cruellest joke.
The coins we let slip from our fingers—careless, thoughtless—
Mean the difference between hunger and survival,
Between another night on the cold pavement and the distant hope of warmth.
Push love beyond the tongue—let it spill like rain on their barren days.
Let their cheeks rise, if only for a moment, like mountain smiles that defy the storm of a world that has left them behind.
And yet,
Why do we watch in silence?
Why do we stare at how they tame their hair with fingers stiff from suffering,
When even the slightest whisper of cruelty cuts through their fragile hope?
We build mansions to guard our insecurities.
We hoard wealth for days we may never live to see.
We call ourselves wise for planning futures so far ahead that we forget to live in the now.
But here, beneath the flickering streetlights of a forgotten night,
A father holds his entire world in his arms—
Not in ambition, not in hope,
But in sheer, aching survival.
Is this what it means to grow up? To look away?
To let the world decide whose youth is worth preserving and whose is worth stealing?
We are told that to survive, we must be strong.
That to succeed, we must be ruthless.
But if strength means turning a blind eye,
If success means stepping over those who have already been trampled,
Then what is it worth?
My heart became the dart for the silent grief in that moment.
I thought of the books in my bag, the dreams I carried so freely,
While this man held his world in his arms—
Not in ambition, not in hope,
But in the desperate act of holding on.
And then, I wondered—was the world’s fiery tongue not enough,
Burning through his days, scorching his skin with indifference?
Would fate strike again, aiming at the softest chamber of his heart—
The child he held so tightly, the only warmth in his cold reality?
Are we ever truly young when we let ourselves be numbed by the suffering around us?
When we convince ourselves that someone else will help, someone else will save, someone else will care?
Are we ever truly young when our hands remain idle,
When our voices remain silent,
When our hearts refuse to break for the broken?
Tell me—do we rise by walking past them?
Or do we rise by bending down, by lifting another?
Dedicated to a world that glorifies youth yet steals it too soon.
To the children who trade playgrounds for factory floors.
To the daughters who barter their dreams for safety.
To the sons who learn too young that a full stomach is a privilege, not a right.
To the fathers who become walls of flesh when the world offers no shelter.
To the mothers who swallow their hunger so their children can eat.
This is for the youth spent not in laughter, but in survival.
For the ones who should be running free but are instead shackled by the weight of an unjust world.
May your sheltering arms be stronger than the storms that rage against you.
The writer is a 1st-year student at the Jain University, BangaloreÂ
Kamran Hamid BhatÂ
24********@***************ac.in