In response to a post on friendship (by Shri Anil Kumar Singh)

The fact of the matter is that friendship or for that matter any relationship is locational (geographically and socially). Means of communication, viz. personal visits, letters, telephoning, and now online communication do stretch the locational sense but do not replace it. These days, more concerningly, the last one, the internet means of communication and engagement, usurps the location itself and empties relations of what it was meant for and reduces these to a mere formality. It is a marker of advancement but the tragedy is that we abysmally lack the public infrastructure or even the awareness of its need to support people in distress. Being distressed is an inevitable part of everyone's life; one must realise this too. Old age is one such inevitability for most people and traditionally they depended on their children for support. This is also now gone in too many cases.

Niraj Kumar Jha