Government should protect Indians travelling abroad with timely warnings

The government of India recently warned Indian nationals in Thailand that protests could turn violent and so they should take precautions for personal safety. As it turned out, people have died in the protests. A job well done by the Indian government? But of course. Why apply the same standards to life outside India as to life within our land of ancient culture and wisdom? In any one of India’s state capitals or other large towns, sudden protests, rampaging mobs and rampaging policemen chasing the said mobs are as commonplace as wandering cows. But Indians are likely to be unprepared for such normalcy when they venture abroad. So, the government did right to issue the warning.

Next, the government should issue warnings about corruption in certain parts of the outside world. Indian travellers abroad might otherwise be caught off-guard, much as the “innocent divorcees” of our matrimonial columns, no doubt, are on marital life. Potholes on roads present themselves as another category. Vehicles driving on the wrong side are a little complicated: in North America and non-British Europe, the right side is the wrong side for us. But our government is full of very clever people when it comes to figuring out what to say. They will know how to say this without causing confusion. Doing things, of course, is different.