At around 5:30AM today morning, a bearded young man walked inside Alwaye railway station. He was carrying a dark duffel bag and a carry bag containing something really heavy. He walked confidently to the ticket counter and took a ticket to his destination. Taking his bags he walked to the far end of the railway station and identified a strategic seat next to a halogen lamp post.

It all started when two females passed by him. It was as if he did not like their proximity. Without even a side-ward glance he killed both of them and sat down comfortably near their corpses. Armed in his left hand he casually took out a book from his bag and started reading. The alarm must have been raised by then because a batch of around 15 commandos surrounded him. Without even dropping his book he killed all of them with just his left hand.

Another wave of attack came in another 20 minutes. This time the fight was a bit more tougher and the serial killer had to drop his book for a few minutes and had to use both hands. In 5 minutes it was all over with dead bodies strewn all around him. Smaller waves of attacks occurred at intermittent intervals. By 6.30 a train moved into the station and the killer picked up his backpack and the carry bag and walked comfortably over the corpses to board the train. A few bystanders who witnessed the whole episode could not and did not do anything to stop the young man from leaving the scene of the crime.

I was on my way back from a friends marriage at Kozhikkode. I stayed at my aunts place at Chalakkudy and was at the Alwaye railway station at the time of these encounters. I must have killed around 30 mosquitoes sitting there :-). It was tough especially because it was dark. Kochi is one of the towns with the worst mosquito infestations in Kerala and people still have not realized that it is their wanton actions that are fueling this menace. I am terribly allergic to mosquito bites but I am really good at killing them - an evolutionary adaptation that came together with the sensitivity to the bites. I am really good with one hand too.

Only if people would stop dumping garbage on roads and into drainages directly and indirectly can this problem be tackled. Mosquitoes are only one side of the problem. Our waste management systems are so bad and the associated problems so big that even what basic systems that we have are proving to be highly insufficient to tackle the issues. The basic cause of this is the lack of awareness among the general public and when there is awareness a lack of proper attitude.

A few of us have joined hands for an initiative started by Cris and have set upon ourselves the task of tackling this issue or at least doing our part in tackling this issue. We have named this campaign Tidy City Campaign and we are currently operating a blog at http://tidycity.org/blog and a mailing list. I hope that we will be able to mobilize enough support and momentum for something as big and complex as this and that something good will come out of our efforts. I call upon anybody sensitive to this issue and interested in making an impact to join us and see what we can do together.