My fellow people. Today I stand before you all with the felicity of heart surrounded by recalling clouds of grief. After two years of consistent quarantines, lock-downs, isolations and all such it is time we finally speak of exemption, joy and redemption.

Every jurisdiction regarding the coronavirus pandemic is withheld from this hour of the day. It is a national holiday and we all should come together, celebrate, look back and figure out the differences that have been made by all those deaths, depressions and odds we had to endeavor. Come together, enjoy the day in fresh airs and plan for the better. For we know, the days to come are on the better side.

It has been rough two years. Covid-19, a single tragedy trespassing the national borderline to the international, within no time, turned itself into a giant global epidemic and caused us life and living. An awful experience for the whole world, a bolt from the blue. We were hit hard. We all witnessed the dreads, no language can express what we underwent. For time being it seemed we have been suffering and God knows, we have buried our beloveds into our hearts. Maybe it was the worst time in the life of many of ours. But beauty’s rose shall never die and whatever is on the good side is beautiful. And so we stand again for beauty and goodness’s sake.

Pandemics, disasters and ills are all part of the life we lead. History has scars of epidemics, black-deaths and outbreaks. There were always threats to living beings. An unusual part of the usual.

But they all teach us some lessons. All these deaths cannot go in vain. Mistakes cannot happen again and again. We have to learn from our mistakes. Repenting does not make things better but learning does.

We all learned something new in this way or that. We know our mistakes and it is us who should consider not making them again. We experienced visions of inequality, tragic episodes, hope and hopelessness.

And today standing together again through adversity’s precious jewel, we know one thing.

We can change for the better. We can build our land a better land and we can make our life a better life. And we shall do so.

The nation is still under trauma and as we can see there are many things to heal and repair, it is a crucial time in the revival of the state. We have not recovered completely, memory has left dark traces behind. Wreckage of the virus still scatters over our roads, homes and over the graves of our beloved deads (may they rest in peace).

We need to reconcile institutions, public places and our lives with a pleasant one. It is time to work, it is time to change.

Hospitals are in bad shape. We lost devoted doctors, nurses and medical workers. They did their part for the sake of humanity. The government will look upon their families for any support and they will be taken care of.

People are out of work, the economy is partly damaged. Striking poverty, hunger and miseries are all around.

For months students were out of school. There must be changes in the schooling system, so that our students have a better learning space. It is time the students and the youth came forward, share their innovative ideas and help change the world. Most systems have fallen apart from the way we used to think and organize two years before. So it is time for a major change.

Undeniably we had to face a great loss. It is impossible to compensate for the past, because the past is past and every second we dive into the aroma of future. So we need to work on what we can change. That is the future. We need to give effort on our future with our learnings, experience and intelligence.

The ministries of the government will send necessary instructions regarding all the coherent issues to relevant institutions. The government is taking measures and planning about every aspect that needs attention. We will soon get out of all those and live hale and hearty.

The people who went away will never return. Still memory haunts us through our lives, memories cannot be washed away in the rain. And so people close to hearts will never die, we will cherish the memories and live on. We have the blessings and have to start changing things for the better, with the dark scars of memories behind. We shall celebrate, after all the odds, after all we have seen, and after all we are shown. Forget of hatred, revenge and unlikeness. Forget those for a single day, we can shake hands, maybe we will keep holding them forever.

Remember it is time to move on, time to ascend the stairs of liveliness again. Time to cut ourselves from possibilities of odds. And for that every people in the country, every man, every woman, regardless of any inequality, must come forward, everybody has the right to express and opine.

The pandemic has once again reminded us of the strength we need from the closest ones, from the people, from our friends and families. We all need to plan for the world we live, sustainable and effective, because it is our life and our home and we need to protect ourselves. The covid-19 pandemic is just an example of crisis we can face, nationally and globally and indeed there will always be threats to living beings. We should avoid making risks for our own. There will always be hard days.

But man can be destroyed but never defeated. And by man we include the whole human race irrespective of differences.

It is the world of cooperation and the world of competition must be abandoned. Together we will make a better, greener and peaceful earth and we will live our lives in beautiful times.

Stay fine, stay happy. A beautiful time is yet to appear and until then work hard and keep patience.

June 30^th 2021

For the commonwealth essay writing competition