Received a SMS from a friend first thing today morning - “plz forward this phone no. to all your friends. Very urgent.. A baby needs A -ve blood immediately. Contact 9944506707. pls do not delete, atleast fwd.”

Having received such sms in the past & being reasonably expert on them, asked him to verify the authenticity of the sender, nos & revert…..

No response till late afternoon, when I received a sheepish reply ‘pls ignore’

This was repeated twice during the course of the day; Mind you they were from different locations, friends who do not know each other.

This sets one thinking - Is this a marketing gimmick? Do people have so much free time to play around with someone’s lives if it is genuine enough???

WHATEVER the case may be, at the cost of being rude, I have made it a rule to always ask for verification/confirmation of authenticity before even thinking of forwarding such sms….