The temptation to go viral

Newspapers recently published a story about a young man who lay

bleeding on a road while onlookers took pictures of him and made a video.
The incident happened in Koppal in Karnataka. The bicycle this 18-year-
old was riding was caught under the rear wheel of a State transport bus.
Though he emerged alive, he was badly injured and crying for help.
Apparently, bystanders couldnʼt figure out how to help him, but they used
their mobile phones to take pictures. A video of his suffering soon went
viral, as they say, suggesting that it became visual material worth
watching. An ambulance was summoned and took the young man to a
hospital, but the doctors could not save him. Had he been brought
sooner, they said, he might have survived.

A familiar story

Instantaneous gathering of curious onlookers is common in our part of the

world. Anything new or unusual spotted on a street makes people stop
and stare. When an accident occurs, a traffic jam follows, not always
because the vehicles passing by have less space, but mostly because
drivers slow down to take a good look at the accident. Cyclists place one
foot down on the ground and pedestrians gather. Curiosity alone canʼt
explain this behaviour, for no one seems satisfied with one good look.
People keep staring as if they are waiting for something to happen. They
realise that the police should turn up in a short while and then something
will happen, so there will be more to see. The scene finds resonance in
our mythology and history; it suggests a deep reluctance to take the
initiative or to get involved. Once a crowd gathers, the lone individual who
might be inclined to take the initiative also loses the instinct to do so,
simply because a crowd — any crowd — discourages individuality. The
pressure to behave like everybody else greatly increases when you stand
in a mass. So it is natural for people standing in a crowd to simply stare
rather than to do something.

The cellphoneʼs capacity to serve as a handy camera has added a new

dimension to this familiar story. If a crowd has accumulated for no
particular reason or cause but merely to stare, and the people assembled
have a common reluctance to do something or get involved, the camera
function of the cellphone provides a fine outlet for everyoneʼs somewhat
confused energy. The idea of taking a picture creates the option of having
something to do. It presents an attractive opportunity of sending the
picture across to your friends and anyone else interested. The desire to
share a picture instantly by placing it on social media is a new kind of
behaviour in the history of crowds. Having witnessed it among students
during excursions, I think it creates the satisfaction of doing something,
apart from in itself being somewhat exciting. A screen picture in colour
looks sharp and bright: taking and transmitting it offers the contentment
of capturing something one has come across. It channelises and
disperses the sense of personal responsibility one might feel as a witness
to something awful. The fact that I have sent the picture to others spread
across my country and even across other countries liberates me from the
gnawing thought that I did nothing because I was paralysed or scared. At
the very least, it offers some relief from the feeling that I just stood there
and watched a person bleed. It provides the satisfaction of doing
something while maintaining the relief that I am not getting involved in
something that might cause serious inconvenience later. The cellphone
camera serves as a mediator. By creating a distance between the viewer
and the object, it neutralises the horror of seeing someone in pain and
screaming for help. Thereby, it also mitigates the guilt one might feel
being a mere onlooker.

The law and change

Karnataka now has a Good Samaritan law that protects the kind-hearted
citizen helping an accident victim from police harassment. The enactment
of such a law undoubtedly marks a step towards change in onlooker
behaviour as it acknowledges an old source of fear. Apparently, the Good
Samaritan law has not sufficed to create the confidence it takes to act in a
scene like the one witnessed in Koppal. Apart from confidence, one must
also feel like taking the initiative. Reluctance to do something is habitually
guided by the apprehension that the consequences of involvement canʼt
be predicted or controlled. This feeling runs deeper in district towns
where the institutions of the state, such as the police, donʼt always convey
a sense of security to the common citizen who is not a local notable—a
term colonial district officers were fond of. Anyone who has faced
questioning by the police in a provincial town or village knows what it
takes to breathe without fear in the presence of a police officer. Let us
imagine that someone who saw the accident in Koppal took the initiative
to stop a car and rode in it with the injured youth to a hospital. This would
surely leave bloodstains in the car and one of the bystanders would have
captured its number plate on the mobile camera. It takes mature
sensibility and respect for ordinary people to avoid probing them
unnecessarily before declaring them to be Good Samaritans.
Distinguishing good involvement from bad at a scene of crime demands
significant levels of training and perspicacity. Long, very long and
circuitous questioning by the police has been the norm since colonial
days. During such sessions, the person who is not the perpetrator of a
crime but merely a helper of the victim is subjected to the same routine
ruthlessness that the perpetrator might deserve. If you think your role is
over once you have transported the victim to a nearby hospital, you are
likely to be proved mistaken.

These are still early days in the history of the Good Samaritan law. It will
take a long time for people to feel secure under its provisions. Any law
that attempts to change peopleʼs perception of a state agency demands a
parallel change in the behaviour of the agency itself. In this case, it is the
police. Reforms in the system of investigation, articulated and
recommended decades ago, have been waiting to be implemented. Both
the will and the resources required to implement them are in short supply.
It is anybodyʼs guess whether the police in Karnataka understand and
accept the Good Samaritan law. If they do and if, in a few cases, they act
according to it, they will have to publicise the names of many Good
Samaritans over the coming years and decades to make an impact on the
public, on its insecurity and apprehensions.
But what about picture taking? This behaviour has risen remarkably
rapidly over the last two decades. The cellphone has transformed the
meaning of photography. You can now take countless pictures without
worrying about exhausting a reel. You are equipped to take pictures all the
time and everywhere. No matter where you may take young students on
an excursion, as soon as they get there they start taking pictures. Neither
the solemnity of a place nor its rarity makes any difference. Their urge to
capture everything using their mobile has turned into a compulsion. The
object does not matter: it can be a flower, a poster or a person who is
bleeding, as in the case in Koppal.

Flat notion of education

In their commentary on the Koppal story, readers have berated the loss of
sensitivity and values. Quite a few have blamed education. It is difficult to
agree with them, although one can understand why education serves so
readily as a whipping horse whenever social values are discussed.
Administrators and political leaders share with ordinary people a flat
notion of education. They donʼt appreciate what it takes to make
education an experience that has the potential to create self-awareness
and sensibility. A key resource often underestimated is the teacher. It is
fashionable to express frustration with teachers and to recommend
technology to control and replace them. As for teachers themselves, they
are being pushed hard to cope with the active presence of cellphones in
the classroom. You are supposed to find ways to use studentsʼ passion for
cellphones rather than criticise it. The ideal teacher these days is one who
pretends to be unaware that students are busy with their cellphones,
sending and receiving messages and pictures.

Krishna Kumar is former Director of NCERT and professor of education,

Delhi University.

Any law that attempts to change peopleʼs perception of a state

agency demands a parallel change in the behaviour of the agency
itself. In this case, it is the police