There is a famous legend of the Pied Piper. It says that back in the Middle Ages, the mayor of town Hamelin in Germany hired a person to get his town rid of rats. He was a piper donning pied clothes. Hence, the pied piper!
He played his pipe to attract all the rats of Hamelin to follow him blindly until all of them got drowned into the Weser River. However, once the task was done, the mayor of Hamelin easily backtracked from his commitment. He disowned the hired piper and refused to remunerate him for his services.
Sometime later, on the eve of Saint John’s day, the people of Hamelin town were in Church to offer special prayers. When they were back home, most of them found their children missing. Hired piper had treacherously done his job. He had seduced 130 children of Hamelin town towards his colorful attire and enticing tunes. The children of Hamelin had followed him for never to return. It is said that only three children remained behind and did not follow the hypnotizing tunes. One of them was limping and could not move as fast as other children, the other one was blind and thus could not see where other children were going, and the third one was deaf who accompanied other children out of curiosity only up to some distance.
The piper’s pied outfit was deceptive. The tunes of his pipe were vicious. His intentions were wicked. He wasn’t sincere. He made all the rats drown to his tunes. To settle scores with the mayor, he played foul, abducting innocent and naïve children of Hamelin town.
There is no dearth of such deceitful paid pipers in the world around us. From politics to institutions to society, many such paid pipers make others dance to their tunes. Sadly, it is not rodents and animals that lure to their tunes; it is humans who get ensnared by them. It is not the naïve children, but the sane minds of every society that get influenced by their nefarious designs.
One class of paid pipers appears once in a few years. Playing the same old melodies of electricity, water, jobs blah blah, they woo the laymen again and again. For the sake of difference, some of the pipers compose some new tunes like K-resolution, Healing touch, Statehood, revocation of AFSPA and much more. Surprisingly, given the history of this place, all the paid pipers have a similar pack of herds following all of them. These herds paint their hands in black to give credence to these tainted pipers who act as real ‘red herring’.
The herd does not stop here. They get influenced by other classes of paid pipers as well. These are the ‘off-the-stream’ pipers who apparently play tunes in contrast to what ‘occasional’ paid pipers’ play. But the fact is that they too are hired by ‘others’ and their pipes are tuned and engineered by them only.
Yet another creed of paid pipers is prevalent in institutions and establishments. They are the camouflage creatures, the conspirators made of destructive brains. They play ploys, misleading tunes, villainous stories to dupe people and get benefits.
In Hamelin town, three kids did not follow the bait. Astonishingly, none lags when it comes to following paid pipers here. Even those who do not count in the scheme of things, too become the ‘torch-bearers’ for the rest of the herd!
We limp, but we still want to be at the forefront. Our eyes only see, as our vision remains blind. Hence, we keep trailing. Our ears hear but our conscience is deaf. Therefore, we continue to flow with the tide. We tag along with the tunes till we are drowned. We cannot claim to be too naive like the children of Hamelin to be deceived by the paid pipers. The truth is that we are reduced to rodents, bereft of any sense of judgment.
The tricks and traps of paid pipers are successful as long as we allow ourselves to become prey or party to some kind of vested interest offered by the different pipers surrounding us. For when our self gets corrupted, it becomes ‘paid’. Then, pipers are sure to have a field day. However, there is equally every chance of paid pipers being used and thrown off by their payers. Anytime. Anywhere.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are the personal opinions of the author. The facts, analysis, assumptions and perspective appearing in the article do not reflect the views of GK