Many years ago, my secretary, who used to travel by the good old suburban trains of Mumbai, told me stories of the strange therapy sessions that happened on the rails. Total strangers, wedged together on a wooden bench, would whisper their deepest troubles. She once confessed to me that she had saved a young wife from suicide—simply by listening, nodding, and saying a few words of hope between Borivali and Andheri. Imagine that—life saved not by a psychiatrist’s couch but by a railway seat.
I wonder, could that ever happen today? Not a chance. Step into a train or metro and what do you see? Rows of heads bent, not in prayer, but in reverence to a small glowing rectangle. Every thumb is scrolling, every ear plugged. You could collapse right there, and the fellow next to you would not even notice—unless your fall knocked his mobile out of Wi-Fi range.
I recently traveled on the metros of New York and Chicago, and last year through London’s famous Underground. What struck me was not the engineering marvels or the speed but the silence. Hundreds of passengers sat shoulder to shoulder, yet not one glance was exchanged, not a single nod of recognition. You could be the loneliest person in the middle of a crowd. Everyone was there, but really, nobody was.
Have we turned into something like the Tesla, driverless cars? Moving, but empty? Transporting ourselves from one station to another without human touch, without the possibility of giving someone a lift in spirit?
I still remember the days when you boarded a train and someone would inevitably say, “Kitna late hai train aaj!” (How late the train is today!) and just like that, a conversation began. From railway timings, it could move to rising prices, politics, cricket scores, and even personal heartaches. The journey became shorter because humanity had made it lighter.
Today? Start a conversation with someone on a metro and watch them recoil like you’re a thief after their phone. We’ve lost that simple art of human contact. We’ve forgotten that sometimes what a person desperately needs is not advice, not even money—but an ear. Just someone to listen.
And that’s what frightens me. In this world of endless “connections,” we’ve become disconnected. In this marketplace of likes and followers, there’s nobody to truly follow you home, sit you down, and say, “Tell me what’s troubling you.”
So maybe it’s time to try something revolutionary: put aside your phone when you enter a public space. Look around. Notice the frown on a forehead, the worry lines on a stranger’s face, the silent scream behind someone’s eyes. Maybe—just maybe—you’re the one who can save a life by offering not an app, but your attention.
Try it. Because no battery runs out faster than the human soul when it has no one to talk to…!