Today’s headline in a major newspaper screamed, ‘Many Indians are treating AI as a doctor. And turning critically ill’. I chuckled—and decided to bring three people out of my imagination, one, my neighbor Ramesh who actually announced his own funeral date!
Let me explain.
Ramesh had woken up with a little chest pain after a particularly spicy biryani. Instead of calling his doctor, he typed into his shiny AI app: “Chest tightness, sweating, breathless.” Out came the answer: “Imminent cardiac arrest. Prepare for end-of-life rituals.” Poor Ramesh, ever the planner, immediately informed his relatives on WhatsApp: “Cremation at 10 a.m. Tuesday.” The relatives rushed to book train tickets, priests were contacted, and the woodcutter sharpened his axe. Later, the doctor calmly told him, “Acidity, Ramesh. Lay off the biryani.”
Another friend of mine, Radha, woke up with a rash on her arm. She uploaded a picture onto her AI app. The machine whirred, clicked, and solemnly pronounced: “Rare tropical disease, survival rate 2%.” Radha wept, updated her will, and even gave away her gold bangles. The next morning, her maid casually said, “Madam, bed bugs biting at night.” Radha is now back to sleeping on the floor, clutching her bangles.
And then there was John, a bachelor who fancied himself a fitness freak. After a vigorous jog, his knees started aching. He asked his digital doctor what it could be. “Knee deterioration. Prepare for replacement surgery,” came the grim reply. John quickly called his HR to check if his medical insurance covered titanium knees. The orthopedic laughed: “Young man, it’s just over-exercise. Take a break, eat a banana.” John is still jogging—this time to the fruit shop.
As we laugh at these three my imaginative friends, Ramesh with his premature funeral, Radha with her will, and John with his titanium dreams, let’s pause, and get out of my imagination mode and ask ourselves. ‘Isn’t this what many of our politicians are doing with the country?’ With little or no education about their ministries, they diagnose and prescribe remedies as casually as an AI chatbot.
They talk of economics without ever reading a balance sheet, of health without knowing the difference between a stethoscope and a selfie stick, and of science while proudly announcing that ancient sages flew rocket ships.
And today deciding the future of foreign policy, without relying on truth.
Just as Ramesh nearly cremated himself because of wrong self-diagnosis, we are fed half-truths and whimsical policies instead of hard facts. At this rate, one day, unlike Ramesh who is alive and still enjoying his biryani, we might actually find ourselves standing solemnly at the crematorium—not for a person, but for our country, gone too soon because quacks in power thought they were doctors of statecraft, whose comic beliefs were accepted by you dear reader.
So, don’t laugh too long. Because while Ramesh canceled his cremation, who will cancel ours?