Listen up, folks, because the truth doesn’t come with a cherry glaze and spoonful of sugar. In the heartland of India—Madhya Pradesh, where temples meet traffic jams and politicians perform holy PR stunts between scandals—14 children are dead. Not from war, not from starvation, not from natural disaster, but from drinking cough syrup. Yes, you heard me. A syrup—meant to ease a cough—ended their tiny, innocent lives. Welcome to Incredible India, where the medicine cabinet doubles as a crime scene, and no one wants to take responsibility.
Let’s cut through the incense smoke and dhol beats. This isn’t just a “tragedy”—a word bureaucrats toss around like confetti every time their negligence comes home to roost. This, my friends, is state-sponsored apathy, bottled up, branded with a barcode, and sold across counters like it’s a 2-for-1 offer at the pharmacist of doom.
The children, all under five, were victims not just of toxins but of a system that’s become toxically complacent. The syrup in question—a locally manufactured potion—contained diethylene glycol, a cheap substitute masquerading as medicine but better known for being the same poison used in antifreeze. And yet, it danced through regulatory gaps with the ease of a corrupt MLA slipping out of a sting operation.
Let me spell it out for you: If you’re poor in India, your medicine might kill you before your illness does. And if you’re a politician in India, your job seems to be “offering condolences” from the comfort of your bulletproof SUV while the bodies pile up.
Where’s the accountability?
The state government says they’re “investigating.” Ah yes, that evergreen Indian phrase that translates to: “We’re waiting for the outrage to die down.” Meanwhile, the central government—busy flexing at G20 cocktail parties—is mumbling about “state jurisdiction” and “supply chain audits.” Translation? “Not our problem.”
Let’s call out the real disease here: regulatory rot. The kind that lets pharma companies play God for profit. The kind that allows Health Ministry babus to rubber-stamp licenses and look the other way—all while the watchdog agencies sleep like it’s a Sunday siesta during a house fire.
But wait, here comes the kicker—India has seen this movie before. Remember Gambia, 2022? Over 60 kids died after consuming tainted Indian-made cough syrup. Global headlines, international shame, the whole nine yards. Did we fix anything? No. We slapped on cosmetic reforms, got some photo ops with WHO, and basically played PR bingo with children’s lives.
That’s not governance. That’s gaslighting on a national scale.
So let me ask the question the TV anchors won’t—and the politicians can’t: Who’s going to jail? Not just the small-fry factory scapegoat who mixed the wrong chemical, but the health officers, the regulators, the pencil-pushers who signed off on the poison and then conveniently went blind.
14 children are dead. Not in a war zone. Not in a terror attack. But in a doctor’s office—in the arms of parents who believed in a system that sold them death in a bottle labeled “medicine.”
If you’re not furious, you’re not paying attention.
To the grieving families of Madhya Pradesh—you don’t need candles and condolences from politicians. You need justice. And you need it yesterday.
Because if the Indian state can’t guarantee the safety of a child’s medicine, what good is any of it?
The game’s on, and I play to win—for the truth, for justice, and for every innocent life lost to the negligence of this broken system.
Justice isn’t a slogan. It’s overdue.
– Mr. 47
