Aab is fascinated with ants. He has this strong instinctive feeling that
they are far superior to human beings.
He loves sitting in a corner and watching the rows of ants walking with
so much discipline and team spirit to collect morsels of food and bring them to
their den. They even pause for a fraction of a second and touch the ones on the
return journey, as though to convey love or salutation, and merrily continue in
the path trod by those in front of them. No fights, no groupism, no rebels, and
no one trying to assert authority – and the army keeps merrily marching on!
To test them out Aab sometimes puts down a
piece of a biscuit or cookie he is eating, and observes what happens. In no time a single roaming ant turns
up. Aab watches closely as the ant seems
to taste a tiny piece of the biscuit, satisfies himself, refuses to gorge on
the remainder himself, and quietly disappears. Very soon he sees a row of them
making a beeline towards the biscuit. He
cannot recognize whether the scout ant is in the lead or not, but they sure
know where they are headed. Not one of them starts eating by himself – they all
pick up one morsel and start their return journey in a systematic row. No
idling, gossiping, overtaking or wandering off.
There is no visible ‘boss’ supervising their behavior, but they don’t
seem to need one.
To test them out Aab sweeps a portion of the
row of ants gently. They tumble over,
are scattered, but within seconds they get back into line and continue their
task. Unfortunately Aab cannot see what
happens inside the anthill, but he can guess how the tasks are carried out with
equal responsibility and commitment. Aab looks around to see if he can find any
group of human beings who behave in such exemplary manner – but in years and
years of his observation he has never found one.
Aab wonders what it would have been like to be
born as an ant. No competition, no jealousies, no worries about who will cheat
you, and no striving to get the better of anyone else. No one gets thrown out
of his job, no one is promoted or demoted, no one’s rights are trampled upon.
He wishes that at least he should have been able to talk to ants. They would have so much to enlighten him, and
he could have made lifelong friends. But
unfortunately Aab is born a human and has to die one. In the intervening years he has to observe
sadly all the cunning, cheating, malice and jealousies of the “superior race.”
