Who Guards the Guardians? E-Book

Ishwar Singh

• Herausgeber: Ishwar Singh
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2026

Beschreibung

This book was born not from imagination alone, but from observation—quiet, persistent, and often uncomfortable.
Every day, in cities and towns across our country, millions of people pass through gates without a second thought. Housing societies, hospitals, schools, colleges, offices, malls—each protected by men and women in uniform who stand watch long before we arrive and long after we leave. They open barriers, check entries, enforce rules, prevent chaos, and absorb impatience. Yet, despite their constant presence, they remain largely unseen.
We call them security guards, but rarely do we extend them the security of dignity.
Society has learned to respect power backed by fear—uniforms that carry the authority of law, punishment, and consequence. But it often fails to respect responsibility backed only by honesty and discipline. This imbalance has normalized humiliation, verbal abuse, and even physical violence against those whose only fault is that they protect without being protected.
Who Guards the Guardians? is not an accusation; it is a question. A question directed at our laws, our institutions, and our everyday behavior. It asks why a slap against a policeman rightly invites punishment, while abuse against a security guard is dismissed as “normal.” It asks why children learn to salute authority but laugh at service. It asks why silence has been mistaken for acceptance.
The story of Shiva—the man at the gate—is the story of countless real individuals whose names we do not know, whose faces we pass daily, and whose humanity we often forget. His journey is not heroic in the traditional sense. It is quiet, restrained, and deeply human. It reflects the lived reality of those who endure disrespect not because they deserve it, but because the system allows it.
This book also recognizes hope. It acknowledges that change does not always begin with laws or loud revolutions. Sometimes, it begins with a pen that refuses to look away, with small acts of solidarity, with awareness growing where ignorance once stood. It shows that respect, when practiced consciously, can become a powerful form of protection.
If this book makes you pause the next time you pass a gate, if it makes you look at the person standing there and see not just a uniform but a fellow citizen entrusted with your safety, then it has served its purpose.
Because the strongest security system any society can build is not made of metal, weapons, or surveillance.
It is made of respect.

Leseprobe

Who Guards the Guardians?

PROF. ISHWAR SINGH

Copyright © 2026 by Ishwar Singh

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

Who Guards the Guardians?

By Ishwar Singh

Cover Design: Ishwar Singh

Interior Design: Ishwar Singh

Published in Italy

Second Edition: 2026

DEDICATed to

I am dedicating this book to my parents

Preface

This book was born not from imagination alone, but from observation—quiet, persistent, and often uncomfortable.

Every day, in cities and towns across our country, millions of people pass through gates without a second thought. Housing societies, hospitals, schools, colleges, offices, malls—each protected by men and women in uniform who stand watch long before we arrive and long after we leave. They open barriers, check entries, enforce rules, prevent chaos, and absorb impatience. Yet, despite their constant presence, they remain largely unseen.

We call them security guards, but rarely do we extend them the security of dignity.

Society has learned to respect power backed by fear—uniforms that carry the authority of law, punishment, and consequence. But it often fails to respect responsibility backed only by honesty and discipline. This imbalance has normalized humiliation, verbal abuse, and even physical violence against those whose only fault is that they protect without being protected.

Who Guards the Guardians? is not an accusation; it is a question. A question directed at our laws, our institutions, and our everyday behavior. It asks why a slap against a policeman rightly invites punishment, while abuse against a security guard is dismissed as “normal.” It asks why children learn to salute authority but laugh at service. It asks why silence has been mistaken for acceptance.

The story of Shiva—the man at the gate—is the story of countless real individuals whose names we do not know, whose faces we pass daily, and whose humanity we often forget. His journey is not heroic in the traditional sense. It is quiet, restrained, and deeply human. It reflects the lived reality of those who endure disrespect not because they deserve it, but because the system allows it.

This book also recognizes hope. It acknowledges that change does not always begin with laws or loud revolutions. Sometimes, it begins with a pen that refuses to look away, with small acts of solidarity, with awareness growing where ignorance once stood. It shows that respect, when practiced consciously, can become a powerful form of protection.

If this book makes you pause the next time you pass a gate, if it makes you look at the person standing there and see not just a uniform but a fellow citizen entrusted with your safety, then it has served its purpose.

Because the strongest security system any society can build is not made of metal, weapons, or surveillance.

It is made of respect.

— Prof. Ishwar Singh

Who Guards the Guardians?

Chapter 1: The Man at the Gate

Shiva arrived at the gate before the city learned how to breathe.

At five-thirty every morning, when the sky above the metropolitan sprawl still hesitated between darkness and dawn, Shiva stood upright beside the iron gate of Shantiniketan Residency. The city’s tall buildings rose behind him like silent sentinels, their concrete bodies heavy with sleeping lives. Windows were dark, balconies empty, corridors quiet. The city had not yet put on its noise, but Shiva had already put on his uniform.

He adjusted his cap carefully, smoothing the faded cloth with both hands. The uniform had been washed the previous night and dried on a rope behind his rented room. It still carried a faint smell of soap and ironed fabric. He straightened his collar, tucked in his shirt, and checked his shoes—black, scuffed but polished. No one inspected them. No officer checked his appearance. But Shiva believed discipline was not something imposed from outside. It was something one carried inside, like a backbone.

The gate stood tall and heavy, painted green but chipped in places where years of opening and closing had worn away its shine. Shiva touched the cold metal lightly, as if greeting an old companion. This gate was his world for twelve hours a day. Everything that entered and exited passed through him—people, vehicles, goods, arguments, indifference.

He opened the register book and wrote the date slowly, carefully. His handwriting was neat, shaped by years of copying alphabets on school slates and later filling forms in job offices. The register smelled of ink, dust, and time. Each page held names that would be forgotten by evening.

Shiva looked up as the first sound of the morning approached—the soft hum of a milk van. The headlights cut through the thin fog and stopped at the gate.

“Morning,” the driver said casually, already impatient to move on.

“Good morning,” Shiva replied, checking the vehicle number out of habit.

The barrier rose. The van entered. Milk would soon boil in kitchens where families woke up complaining about the heat, the news, the traffic. None of them would think about the gate it crossed, or the man who ensured it belonged there.

The sky slowly lightened. Morning walkers emerged—men and women dressed in branded sportswear, earphones plugged in, faces fixed straight ahead. Some nodded without stopping. Most passed by as if Shiva was part of the gate itself—an object, not a person.

“Good morning, sir.”“Good morning, madam.”

Shiva greeted everyone the same way. His voice did not rise or fall. Respect was his default setting.

Invisibility, he had learned, was not the absence of presence. It was the presence of someone whom others chose not to acknowledge.

By seven, the society had fully awakened. Cars lined up at the exit. Office-goers checked their watches, honked unnecessarily. Shiva checked stickers, noted unfamiliar faces, opened and closed the gate dozens of times. His movements were precise, economical. He never leaned against the wall. Never sat unless permitted. Even when his legs began to ache, he stood straight.

A black sedan stopped abruptly.

“What are you looking at?” the driver snapped.

“I’m just checking the sticker, sir,” Shiva said quietly.

The man rolled his eyes and drove forward aggressively. The side mirror brushed close to Shiva’s knee. For a second, danger hung in the air like an unfinished sentence.

Shiva stepped back. He did not shout. He did not complain. He wrote the vehicle number in the register and returned to his place.

This was his daily education—learning how to absorb disrespect without letting it show.

By mid-morning, maids entered in groups, vendors pushed carts, delivery boys argued about signatures. Children left for school in buses, pressing their faces against windows, shouting jokes. One boy pointed at Shiva and whispered something to his friend. Both laughed.

Shiva pretended not to notice.

He remembered his father, Gurpreet Singh, standing at factory gates decades ago, waiting for shifts to change. Gurpreet had worn oil-stained clothes, his hands rough from labor. People had walked past him then too, speaking over his head, around him, never to him.

As a child, Shiva had once asked, “Why don’t they listen to you?”

Gurpreet had smiled, tired but gentle. “Because they think listening is a favor. It is not. It is a habit.”

At the time, Shiva had not understood. Now he did.

By eleven, the sun pressed down hard. Heat rose from the asphalt. Sweat soaked into Shiva’s uniform, tracing lines down his back. He resisted the urge to loosen his collar. Discipline, he reminded himself, especially when no one is watching.

A woman walked out with a dog, pulling the leash impatiently.

“Open the gate,” she said, not looking at him.

“Yes, madam.”

The dog paused to sniff near Shiva’s shoe. The woman tugged it away sharply, as if afraid of contamination.

“Be careful,” she muttered, finally meeting his eyes—not with concern, but irritation.

Shiva nodded.

She walked away, heels clicking, leaving behind perfume and something heavier—discomfort at having acknowledged his existence.

Lunch time came quietly. Shiva ate standing, a steel tiffin balanced inside the small guard cabin. Rice, dal, two rotis. Simple food. He ate quickly. A guard did not get the luxury of distraction.

As he ate, he observed the society. Elderly residents rested on benches. Children cycled freely. Life moved smoothly inside these walls.

He wondered what would happen if he was not there.

The answer was clear. Chaos would arrive before appreciation.

The afternoon dragged on. A delivery man refused to show identification.

“Why should I tell you?” the man scoffed. “Who are you?”

“I’m just doing my duty,” Shiva replied.

The man shoved past him.

Duty. The word felt heavy. Sometimes it felt like a burden one carried alone.

Evening arrived with returning traffic and shorter tempers. Residents came back tired, annoyed. Shiva remained unchanged—same posture, same greetings.

A child dropped his cricket ball near the gate. Shiva picked it up and handed it back.

“Thank you, uncle,” the boy said.

The word uncle warmed him briefly. Not guard. Not nobody. Uncle.

But moments passed quickly at the gate. The child ran away. The barrier closed.

Night fell. Lights came on. Shiva logged entries, locked side gates, stayed alert. His shift would end late. His responsibility would not.

As the city settled into artificial calm, Shiva stood exactly where he had begun the day.

Silent.Watchful.Invisible.

People passed carrying dreams, frustrations, power. He guarded them without being part of their world. He enforced rules without authority. He absorbed insults without protest.

Shiva was not a hero.He did not fight villains.He did not carry weapons.

He simply stood at the gate.

And in that simple, unnoticed act, he protected lives that would never know his name.

This was the beginning.

Not of a revolution.Not of recognition.

But of a quiet question forming inside a young man who had spent too long being unseen.

How long can dignity survive without respect?

The gate remained closed behind him.The city slept.

Shiva stood.

Chapter 2: A Uniform Without Authority

The uniform fit Shiva’s body, but it did not fit the world’s understanding of power.

Every morning, when he buttoned his shirt and adjusted the belt around his waist, Shiva felt a strange contradiction settle over him. The uniform gave him responsibility—clear, unquestionable responsibility. It told him what to do, where to stand, whom to stop, whom to allow, what to observe, what to report. It wrapped him in duty as tightly as the cloth wrapped around his shoulders.

Yet the same uniform stripped him of authority in the eyes of those he served.

From a distance, people saw the uniform first. Up close, they saw only a man they believed they could ignore.

By the second day of the week, Shiva had already learned to read the expressions of residents as they approached the gate. Some wore impatience like a badge. Some wore indifference. A few wore irritation, as if his very presence was an obstacle placed deliberately in their path. Rarely did he see respect. Almost never did he see curiosity about who he was beyond the uniform.

That morning, a white SUV stopped at the gate with sudden force. The driver’s window slid down.

“Open the gate,” the man said sharply.

“Yes, sir. May I please see the society sticker?” Shiva asked, keeping his voice steady.

The man frowned, as if offended by the request itself.

“I live here,” he snapped. “Can’t you see?”

“Yes, sir. I just need to confirm,” Shiva replied.

The man leaned forward, eyes narrowing. “Who are you to stop me?”

The question was familiar. It had been asked in different tones, languages, and moods, but it always carried the same meaning. Who are you?

Shiva felt the words land on him like a weight. He knew the answer, of course. He was the security guard. He was the man appointed to ensure safety. He was the one following instructions given by the management committee, the security agency, the rules pasted on the guardroom wall.

But none of those answers mattered in that moment.

“I’m just doing my duty, sir,” he said.

The man scoffed. “Duty? You think you’re a policeman?”

The gate remained closed. For a few seconds, the silence thickened. Other cars lined up behind the SUV. Horns began to sound.

“Open it!” the man shouted.

Shiva hesitated—not because he doubted the rules, but because he understood the imbalance of power. If he insisted and the man complained, Shiva would be questioned. If the man forced his way in and something went wrong, Shiva would still be blamed.

He lifted the barrier.

The SUV sped inside. The man did not look back.

As the gate closed, Shiva wrote the vehicle number in the register, his hand slightly tense. This was the daily negotiation he performed—not between right and wrong, but between duty and survival.

Later that day, a delivery boy approached with a large package.

“Whom is this for?” Shiva asked.

“Flat 1203,” the boy replied.

“Please wait while I confirm,” Shiva said.

The boy rolled his eyes. “Why so much drama? I come here every day.”

“I understand, but rules—”

Before Shiva could finish, a woman stepped out of the building.

“Why are you stopping him?” she demanded. “He’s late already.”

“I just need to verify, madam,” Shiva replied.

She looked at him as if he had insulted her. “Don’t teach me rules. Just do your job.”

This, Shiva thought bitterly, was his job. To be responsible without being respected. To be accountable without being empowered.

By afternoon, the sun had sharpened everyone’s temper. An elderly resident walked toward the gate, carrying groceries.

“Sir, may I help you?” Shiva asked, stepping forward.

“I don’t need help,” the man snapped. “Mind your business.”

Shiva stepped back immediately. The man struggled slightly with the bags but did not ask for assistance.

Respect, Shiva realized, was not denied to him by accident. It was denied deliberately, as a way to remind him of his place.

In the guard cabin, a faded notice hung on the wall: Security guards must ensure strict entry and exit control at all times. The words were bold, official, unquestionable. But outside that cabin, those words dissolved into nothing.

A society meeting was held that evening. Shiva stood near the gate, listening unintentionally as residents discussed parking issues, noise complaints, and security lapses.

“These guards don’t do anything,” one man said loudly. “Anyone can enter.”

Another added, “They just sit there. Waste of money.”

Shiva stood motionless, his eyes fixed forward. No one looked at him as they spoke. It was as if he were invisible, even while being discussed.

He wanted to ask: How can I stop people when you refuse to let me? How can I control entry when you shout at me for asking questions?

But he said nothing.

When a policeman passed by on the road outside the society later that night, traffic slowed automatically. A few drivers folded their hands apologetically. Some stopped abruptly.

The policeman carried only a baton.

Shiva carried responsibility for hundreds of lives.

Yet the baton commanded more obedience than his uniform ever would.

The contrast stayed with him as night deepened.

A drunk resident returned late, staggering toward the gate.

“Sir, please walk carefully,” Shiva said politely.

“Don’t tell me what to do,” the man slurred. “You think you’re my boss?”

Shiva stepped aside.

The man laughed and walked past.

In moments like these, Shiva understood the true nature of his uniform. It was not a symbol of authority. It was a symbol of expectation—expectation that he would protect, obey, endure, and remain silent.

At midnight, when the gate finally grew quiet, Shiva leaned briefly against the wall, exhaustion settling into his bones. His uniform felt heavier now, as if soaked with unspoken words.

He thought of his father again—Gurpreet Singh—who had once told him, “A uniform gives you identity, but society decides its value.”

Shiva now knew what that meant.

The uniform gave him duty.The society gave him doubt.And between the two, he stood alone.

Still, when the next vehicle approached, Shiva straightened up.

“Good evening, sir,” he said.

Because even without authority, he still had dignity.

And dignity, he was beginning to realize, was the first battle he would have to fight—long before laws, protests, or recognition ever arrived.

The uniform did not make him powerful.

But it made him visible enough to be questioned.

And invisible enough to be ignored.

That was the cruel balance Shiva lived with—every day, at the gate.

Chapter 3: Gurpreet Singh’s Pride

Gurpreet Singh woke up before the alarm rang, the way he always had, even though the factory whistle no longer governed his mornings.

At sixty-two, retirement had taken away his routine but not his habits. His body still remembered decades of discipline—early shifts, night shifts, sudden overtime calls, and the constant awareness that time, once wasted, never returned. The small room he shared with his son Shiva in the rented portion of a narrow lane was quiet, filled only with the soft hum of a ceiling fan and the distant sounds of the city beginning to stir.

He sat up slowly, careful not to wake Shiva, who lay on the thin mattress near the wall, his uniform neatly folded beside him. Gurpreet’s eyes rested on the uniform for a long moment. The blue fabric looked simple, almost ordinary, but to Gurpreet it carried weight. It carried responsibility. It carried struggle.

He swung his legs down and stood, joints protesting briefly before settling. Age had stiffened his knees and slowed his steps, but it had not bent his spine. Gurpreet Singh had stood too long in his life to allow himself to stoop now.

He moved quietly to the small kitchen area and put water on the stove. As the kettle warmed, his thoughts drifted, as they often did, back through the long corridor of memory that his mind walked every morning.

For thirty-five years, Gurpreet had worked in a manufacturing plant on the outskirts of the city. The factory made industrial tools—heavy, loud, unforgiving machines that demanded precision and punished carelessness. He had joined as a helper, barely educated, his hands soft then, his confidence fragile. Over the years, his palms had hardened, his hearing dulled slightly by constant noise, and his back had bent under the weight of responsibility. But his self-respect had remained intact.

He had never been a supervisor. Never had an office. Never had people stand up when he entered a room. Yet he had earned his bread honestly, returned home tired but clean in conscience, and raised his son with values he believed mattered more than status.

When Shiva was small, Gurpreet had often brought him to the factory gate during holidays. Shiva would stand wide-eyed, watching men in uniforms stream out at shift change, their faces marked by exhaustion and quiet pride.

“These people,” Gurpreet would say, placing a hand on Shiva’s shoulder, “they build the city with their hands. Remember that.”

Shiva had nodded then, too young to understand fully, but old enough to sense the seriousness in his father’s voice.

The kettle whistled softly. Gurpreet poured water into two steel cups and added tea leaves, milk, and sugar by instinct. He sat on the small stool and waited, staring at the wall where an old calendar hung, its pages months out of date. Time moved differently after retirement. Days blurred. What remained sharp were worries.

His eyes went again to Shiva’s sleeping face.

Shiva looked younger in sleep. The lines of restraint that life had begun to carve into his expression softened. Gurpreet felt a familiar ache in his chest—a mixture of pride and concern.

He was proud of his son. Proud that Shiva worked. Proud that he did not beg or depend on others. Proud that he woke up every day and went to his post with sincerity.

But worry had begun to creep into that pride like rust.

Gurpreet had seen the way people spoke to security guards. He had witnessed it himself—sharp words, dismissive gestures, casual insults thrown as if they meant nothing. Once, while waiting for Shiva outside the society gate, he had seen a resident shout at another guard for asking a simple question. The guard had stood silently, eyes lowered, absorbing the abuse as part of his job.

That silence haunted Gurpreet.

He sipped his tea slowly, memories rising uninvited.

In the factory, there had been supervisors who shouted too. Managers who treated workers as replaceable parts. But there had also been unions, rules, and a shared understanding that a line could not be crossed too easily. A worker could not be slapped without consequence. An insult, though common, was not always free of risk.

Security guards, Gurpreet realized, stood alone.

The door creaked slightly as Shiva stirred and sat up, rubbing his eyes.

“Bapu,” he said softly.

Gurpreet smiled. “Wake up. Tea is ready.”

Shiva washed his face at the small basin and joined his father. They sat side by side on the floor, sipping tea in comfortable silence. This quiet companionship was their ritual, a small island of peace before the day demanded its dues.

After a few minutes, Gurpreet spoke.

“How was yesterday?”

Shiva shrugged lightly. “Same as always.”

Gurpreet studied him. “Same can mean many things.”

Shiva hesitated. He had learned not to burden his father with every incident, every insult. But Gurpreet had learned to read silences as carefully as machines.

“A man shouted,” Shiva said finally. “Nothing new.”

Gurpreet’s jaw tightened slightly. “For what?”

“For asking him to wait.”

“And you?”

“I did my duty.”

Gurpreet nodded slowly. “That is good.”

There was pride in his voice, but also a shadow of unease.

After Shiva left for his shift, Gurpreet stepped out into the lane, walking slowly toward the nearby park where retired men gathered every morning. They sat on benches, discussing politics, prices, and memories, pretending not to worry about children scattered across cities.

One of them, an old colleague, asked casually, “What does your son do these days?”

“He is a security guard,” Gurpreet replied.

There was a brief pause. Not long, but long enough.

“Oh,” the man said. “At least he has work.”

“At least,” Gurpreet repeated later to himself, the words echoing hollowly.

That afternoon, as Gurpreet walked back, he passed a construction site. Young laborers worked under the sun, their sweat visible, their voices loud. No one doubted they worked hard. No one questioned their necessity.

Why, Gurpreet wondered, was dignity distributed so unevenly?

When Shiva returned late that night, tired but composed, Gurpreet waited up.

“You eat?” he asked.

“Yes, Bapu.”

They sat again, sharing food.

Gurpreet spoke carefully. “People say many things. They will always say. But remember—no honest work is small.”

“I know,” Shiva said.

But Gurpreet saw something in his son’s eyes—a quiet fatigue that had nothing to do with physical labor.

“Still,” Gurpreet continued, “a man should not be insulted for doing his duty.”

Shiva looked up. “What can we do?”

Gurpreet did not answer immediately. He thought of his own life, of years spent accepting things as they were.