Mosquito menace

When I was little, I remember that our apartment in Bangalore was infested with mosquitoes! My parents would go hunting about the house, furiously slapping walls, shelves and even my face to kill their tiny but frustrating enemy. When nothing worked, they would fall back on their tried and tested strategy; rubbing their palms with soap and grabbing at the flying pests. This always worked. You see, the moist lather would trap the winged devils!

Days of the efficient (and nostalgic) mosquito swatting are long gone. Our trusted hands have been replaced by the menacing electric bat. You know, the ones resembling outsized tennis racquets. Today, mosquitoes are being fried to death, the satisfaction of discovering a squashed mosquito corpse in the folds of your palms is lost forever.

Just the other day however, I was waving the bat frantically at a mosquito when the rude fellow just slipped through the metal net, unscathed! My parents had spoken of this with considerable irritation. It made me realize the whole mosquito hunting business has just gotten a whole lot harder!

You see, most of us view mosquitoes as winged devils with invisible horns. But they are much more than that. They are just as innocuous or vicious as any other creature on this planet and are playing their part in keeping the delicate balance of nature. One man's pest is another man's, well, angel! The bottom-line is that we have no right to wipe these creatures off the face of earth, any more than they have to bite and give us nasty fevers. In fact, we are part of the problem, with our greed fueled urban quagmires which create perfect breeding conditions for these tiny but resourceful creatures.

Coming back to the point I was making earlier, rampant use of this electric bat to slay mosquitoes has had unintended consequences. While we have been waving the bat with gay abandon, mosquitoes have not been standing still (pun not intended) Sure, the slower and fatter mosquitoes are being struck down, while the sleeker (narrow bodied?!) ones are escaping the net and guess what, laying eggs and passing on their genes! Uncle Darwin's evolution is at play here folks and all we have accomplished with the bat is to select the faster, supermodelesque mosquitoes to survive and thrive. Need I say what is going to happen in the years to come? Forget your hands, trapping mosquitoes with the bat is going to be an Olympics sport folks!

The rate at which we are going, be it mosquitoes or gut bacteria, we are making pests peskier! Literally. Whatever it is, I am making sure that the electric swatter ends up in the dustbin. I don't care what my mom says.