How does 'shooting' add to celebration?

It doesn’t take more than a second for an ecstatic celebration like a wedding to turn into a gloomy affair, especially when people who are part of that revelry choose to add some ‘artificial’ extravaganza by firing-in-the-air. For them raising pistols, revolvers or such like is simply a means to display power and to enjoy people’s attention. But such pleasure has claimed lives of several innocents.

  The problem of celebratory firing came into light once again when a 16-year old girl was allegedly shot in a wedding in the Aman Vihar area in West Delhi this month.   But this is not a lone example. Amit, a Noida-based businessman still gets goose bumps when he talks about a marriage function which took place a few years ago in his family and firing at the time of baraat claimed the life of the groom!

“I did not attend that wedding but my parents were present on that occasion,” says Amit. Talking about the trend of gun-firing in his family, he says, “It is very common. It is like a ritual. For some of my relatives, the celebration is incomplete without firing. On that day too, those relatives practiced the same thing but it turned fatal as the bullet hit the groom and he died on the spot. Till today, a court case is pending against those relatives of mine.”

He points out the problem of power display behind celebratory firing. “People don’t get a gun license easily. But when they get it, it makes them feel powerful. Therefore, they don’t want to lose an occasion where they can display their strength. Secondly, in most of the cases they are heavily drunk so they don’t know where to fire the gun. Ultimately, their style of rejoicing comes down heavily on others.”

More than power, what makes people pull out guns and pistols is the misplaced sense of competition. Anuj Tyagi, another City-based businessman who witnessed this so-called ‘competition’, says, “If more than two people are carrying guns then a competition is inevitable. They show off their power in such cases. They constantly fire in the air to prove to others that they are all powerful. It gives them a sense of satisfaction
mentally.”

Under such circumstances, the question is what is City police doing to curb the menace. When Metrolife contacted DCP BS Jaiswal he clearly said that no cases of celebratory firing have been reported so far in ‘his’ area. “Since it is an offence it is generally considered a murder case. The Delhi Police has, from time to time given advertisements in newspapers to stop people from celebratory firing,” says Jaiswal.

But since when did ads prevent people from pulling the trigger? The additional DCP (PRO) Rajan Bhagat, however, in a quote to a national daily did mention that, “Delhi Police has come up with a plan to curb celebratory firing. We will cancel the licence of wedding halls and hotels that allow guests to enter with weapons.” But how about setting up an example first by getting some convictions in existing cases?