A king was very tired of the laziness of his masses and he thought of teaching them a good lesson. One day, when people came out of their houses to go to work, they saw that a big stone was lying in the middle of the main road. People kept passing from the sides of the road but no one stopped to remove it or put it at a side. They criticized the government authorities for not working properly.

They also complained of their fate for being in such a country where nothing was in a proper order. When the sun was about to descend, King ordered his men to assemble the masses near the stone. When they all got assembled there, King ordered his men to remove the stone.

Under the stone was present a box that was full of gold and a piece that read, "For one who will move this stone". King told his masses that he had left this treasure for one who would remove the stone but no one did so and their laziness was really shameful. The masses had nothing to say except to feel ashamed.

In our daily lives, we come along a number of occasions when a general duty is not fulfilled by anyone. For any such occasion, our famous excuse is "Ma ra chi wa tu ra chi" which can be translated as, "What the hell does it have to do with me or you?"

To remove a stone from the way, to pick a rubbish from somewhere, to stop a car to let a child, a lady or any pedestrian pass away, to stop and collect the things of a person who has dropped his shopping bag on the way, let someone (like a bus driver) deceive someone or charge someone unfairly and in broader sense to accept any unfair condition like instantaneous and unfair rise in price of a commodity without having the courage to stop or resist it and many more.

It is said that when cities grow in both population and prosperity, people get busier and the competition to earn more and more increases which results in two conditions. First people become unaware of the sufferings of others and secondly, they gradually become indifferent or in a true sense, stone-hearted about the different unfair conditions being going on in their vicinity. Contrary to this, dwellers of rural areas are more and more concerned about the sufferings of others and thus show more sympathy in this regard.

It is the reason why when a person with no place to go and nothing to eat goes to a village, he is warmly received and served by the villagers. On the other hand, if any such person begs to a number of people in a city, hardly anyone would show readiness to take him home and do any service.

An event, scene or occasion that moves one's feelings and makes him feel sympathetic to it, often has strong impact in the beginning. It is the reason why you feel yourself compelled to move forward and do anything that could bring ease in the seriousness of the event. But the more you see such events or scenes, the more you get habitual of them and with every passing event, your level of interest keeps falling. With this, you feel less interested towards them and thus you feel less pity. In the end, a condition comes when you feel nothing at all and this is the stage that can be termed as the stage of 'Stone-heartedness'.

In cities, as population is big and with growing population, number of incidents also increase and people experience more and more of such events which can be called painful and sympathy-provoking. A person who comes to a city from a rural area feels surprised at the behaviors of people when they are not affected by any scene that might make a villager sob into tears. On the other hand, as village population is limited and such unhappy incidents are also rare so people take great effect of any such event when someone suffers from a calamity or accident. The scarcity of anything makes it more worthy.

In our society, people fail to extend any kind of help of because of their hesitation. As any such preceding example of helping others is very rare and it is taken as something strange and new, people think that if they did so, it would be taken as something strange and might become a matter of embarrassment. But there lies another reality in this case; when a person does any act of goodness and does something out of the routine, it makes the people rethink on their role and approach and thus this act receives an invisible appreciation. Thus it must be well understood that while doing any such act we should absolutely ignore the criticism of others and have a firm belief in our good nature.

An old man who was accompanying an old lady who was paralyzed and sitting on a wheel-chair was waiting beside the road to cross it. The road was very crowded and fast-moving cars had no time to even notice them. A motorcyclist stopped and also stopped the traffic by his hand and let the old couple to cross the road. Some of the car riders tried to protest his act but then they saw that there was a general feeling of appreciation and agreement with the act of the motorcyclist and thus they also found it better to remain silent.

As good deeds motivate the others to do good deeds and thus an air is developed in which everyone takes it as a responsibility to help others, in the same way, bad deeds also spread from one to the other member of the society like a viral disease. It does not mean that people make up their minds to harm others or do any such other act but it certainly makes them feel indifferent and less sympathetic towards the sufferings of others and also make the others to feel so.

There is a Persian saying that if a house is at fire and that house is far from your house and you are certain that this fire would never reach to your house and thus you don't extend any help in putting out this fire then a day will come when your house will be on fire and you will be crying and begging the others to help but they will be totally indifferent to it.
This destructive fire can only be averted by the cooperation of both the sides.