by Anuradha Bakshi | Aug 8, 2008 | Uncategorized
The teach India campaign is in full swing, or so we would all like to believe. Our tryst with them was short lived: we did not fit the model they proposed as we could not take in the minimum of 100 volunteers that they offered – we had asked for six. The organisers could not understand why in spite of our 9 centres we were unable to accept the 100 volunteers offered. To them the maths was simple: 9 centres into 2 shifts into 6 days = 108!
We tried to explain to them that it would be terribly unfair and even disruptive to the children and their teachers to have a new volunteer each day of the week. And though they did try to pressurise us, we stood firm: the children and their well being was far more important to us than being associated with any campaign no mater how glitzy or big.
I decided to spend some time on the website of the teach India campaign and landed on their message board. I was saddened to see that there were many young volunteers waiting for a phone call that would tell them they had been selected and would assign them a teaching opportunity. The message board was replete with words like: not received a call, no reply, no call, I am disappointed, how long?????
My heart went out to these young Indians who had taken a first step towards making a difference and were waiting for the call that would allow them to do so. Some even said they had registered 2 months ago and the campaign being for 3 months I wonder if their phone will ring. There were a few lucky ones and they shared their experiences which were heartwarming. The idea is a winner and it would be a tragedy if it failed.
In the midst of all the message threads was one that brought whoops of joy: tt simply said: Can we Form a Group if teach India doesn’t call us and go ahead. For me those simple words showed that no matter how the blitz ended it had succeeded as it had ignited a sparkle in young India. Here was a group of youngsters who were not waiting for calls but simply going ahead. They had understood the real message, the one that would save and change India. One did not wait for someone else but took on the challenge and make it happen.
I sincerely hope that the thousands of would be volunteers who may not get a call will not give up but will find it in themselves to carry the torch and teach India
by Anuradha Bakshi | Aug 7, 2008 | Uncategorized
When little Prakash was born we were delighted as he was a bonny baby. His mom was part of our programme for pregnant and lactating women and all seemed to pint to the fact that our three month intervention programme worked. But we were in for a rude shock.
Months went by and instead of thriving, Prakash began to wither. His head was the only part of him that seemed to grow, the rest his body could not keep up. His milestones were delayed and it was as if the child was vanishing. He sat in a corer of the creche, his legs folded not able to stand in spite of being 14 months old. Hi social skills remained poor and all you got from his after a lot of prompting was a toothless smile. Local doctors felt he had hydrocephalus. A series of tests were done but with no clear results. His pitiable state was heart wrenching. Not able to stand helpless we sent him to the paediatric ward of leading hospital and we has diagnosed with rickets! We were aghast as rickets is a form of severe malnutrition.
I began reading about rickets and discovered that one of its main causes is vitamin D deficiency or in other words lack of sunshine. The penny dropped. In a city where housing is a huge problem, greedy landlords have brought down their old structures, one with courtyards and sunshine, and built airless and windowless rooms where night reigns all day. When we were looking for a room for 7 month pregnant Madhu, Prakash’s mom, we found one across the street. It was dark and that is where the mother spent her last months of pregnancy and delivered Prakash. It was also there that he spent the first few months of his young life. NO matter how well we tried to feed the mother and then the child, we were unable to make up for the sun rays.
Many children are born and live in dark holes where the sun never shines. This is the price to pay for urban dreams a far cry from village life where the sun is abundant and where children spend time in the open, even as babies who are oiled and massaged and left out in the courtyard under the watchful eyes of the clan. I remember being shocked when many years back our cook brought his mother to the city for a medical check up. The woman looked very old, as all village women do, and was thin as a reed. But when her blood tests were done her haemoglobin was over 13, something rare in India. I knew the family was poor and wondered how that could be possible. he answer was simple: the family ate black millet instead of wheat flour, as the millet was what they grew in their fields, and black millet is know to be rich in iron. The family also ate lots of seasonal vegetables that grew in their yard something impossible in a city.
We will tend to little Prakash and hope he improves and makes up for lost sun. But I wonder how many little Prakashs live undiagnosed in the city.
by Anuradha Bakshi | Aug 6, 2008 | Uncategorized
To abort or not to abort that is the question? The last week has been replete with debates and discussions on the issue. The fate of a little unborn child lay in the hands of an archaic legal system and complex medical opinions. Two days back the courts decreed that the child was to live. This is not the latest plot of some avant garde movie but a real story.
An unborn foetus was diagnosed with a congenital heart problem. The parents sought legal sanction to abort the baby though the foetus was 26 weeks old on the grounds that they would not be able to bring it up. The hospital gave vague and contradictory opinions and to crown it all there was also a typographical error that sealed the fate of this unwanted child. The case has led to an onslaught of divergent opinions and debates- a mother’s right, the right to life, the plight of disabled children in India, the lack of support systems – and the battle is still on. Help has also be forthcoming for this baby: offers of adoption and free medical care. The one question that has not been raised is why this family went public with this issue in a land where clandestine abortions are an easy option? And one also wonders whether the parents now in the media and public glare will come to terms with the situation and give this child all the love and care it needs. Only time will tell.
All the children in the picture above have congenital heart conditions and thank heavens their parents did not think of aborting them. They belong to very poor families who and yet each one of them did everything they could to ensure their kids would live. Was it their prayers or the hidden hand of the God of lesser souls, but they all found their way to our heartfix hotel where broken hearts get repaired. Today they are all living healthy lives like any other kid and though there may be problems in the future I know they will all be overcome.
In another city lies a little 9 day old. Born to a surrogate mother to a Japanese family this child is also unwanted. Her surrogate parents separated while she was still in the womb of another woman and both women do not want her. The laws do not allow a single parent to adopt so she today is nobody’s child. One just hopes that the laws will bend a little to allow this child to have a real morrow.
by Anuradha Bakshi | Aug 3, 2008 | two indias
India is undoubtedly shining or should I say sparkling, albeit for a handful. A news item aired yesterday confirmed just that. A leading florist chain has tied up with an international floral couturier (did not know that they existed) and will bring to the ever richer and never sated Indian customer a new extravaganza: flowers decors designed by the master himself at a whopping 2 to 4 crores!
I must confess it took me some time to digest this. I must admit that I am one of those who find even the present weddings too ostentatious and even immoderate. I have for quite some time now stopped attending them as I find them disturbing and wasteful and devoid of any sanctity. For my own child’s wedding I decided to walk the talk though I must confess it did not go down well in a city where big is beautiful.
2 to 4 crores or 20 to 40 million rupees spent on floral decor is something I cannot begin to understand. The next day the flowers are wilted and simply swept away. Bye bye crores and the millions. Is it a way of showing who you are or simply a game of who spends more or comes up wilder ways of spending money? I do not know. Does it reflect a sense of insecurity that can never be revealed? I again do not know. And where it will end? It is any one’s guess.
Till a few months a core was way out of my league. I was imply battling trying to garber the few laks (1/10 of a million) needed to run pwhy. I only became aware of the value of a crore when we set up on the planet why journey. And even more recently the word crore has cropped up often as we debate the costs of construction of planet why. Yes planet why which will have: a guest house with 10 rooms, space for over 50 deprived children, special children and women to live with dignity, space for hundred to come and learn and pwhy to survive and will also be a zero carbon building does not come up to the price of one such wedding. It simply needs 1.8 crores.
Yet for us this figure is so daunting and immoderate that we wonder where it will come from. Just the price of a designer wedding, actually not even that as the 2 to 4 crores are only the cost of the decor!
I must again confess I am still trying to come to terms with this.
PS: the picture of this priceless flower was taken by our hotshot lensman Utpal!
by Anuradha Bakshi | Aug 1, 2008 | common school, two indias
There is a new buzz in town: teach India, the latest campaign by a leading newspaper group. Larger than life posters, glitzy TV ads, Bollywood brand ambassadors, a dynamic website, heart rendering memories: the stage is set to make India literate, or so the well designed and implemented campaign would want us to believe. As an NGO who has been in the teaching business for almost a decade we qualified as partners and I received the concept note of the campaign.
Amongst other things the teach India wants to : Inspire, motivate and mobilize people to volunteer for education and be more socially active citizens and build a more cohesive and inclusive society based on trust and reciprocity through bridging people from different backgrounds in order to fight discrimination and marginalization. Is this not what many of us have been wanting and trying to achieve for a long long time.
The campaign like every other media campaign is short: 3 months, at the end of which a monitoring process will begin to check the impact of the classes and the efficacy of the program. Wow, wish things would be that easy.
My mind went back a few years to the time when we too at pwhy had tried to inspire, motivate, mobilize people to be more socially active. I remembered the day when after having been in the glare another media campaign, replete with glitzy ads, Bollywood stars et al, I had sought help for our just one rupee campaign, where we did not ask for two hours of any one’s time, but just a simple rupee a day to teach India! The fact, as I realised just a few minutes ago, that I have even removed the campaign form our website, speaks for itself. The idea failed, no one was mobilised, inspired or motivated. A handful did come forward but the impact of such an option could only be felt if it withstood the test of time and became part of one’s life, almost like an old and bad habit!
For months I tried to flog the dead horse but soon realised it was mission impossible. I did many a post mortem but must admit could not find one valid reason that perhaps could have been addressed. There were many: people got bored and tired of one cause and wanted new ones; people preferred spending their money to help dramatic and heart rendering causes: a heart surgery, a tsunami…or simply coming with packets of food and feeding poor kids! Things had to be visible and the only visibility one could proffer were pictures of kids learning, exams results or some passionate blogs. Not enough to keep them interested and have them make the effort to remember the next month’s or year’s cheque. I had failed to motivated, inspire, mobilise people to give a simple coin, one that would not even been missed.
Soon the just one rupee a day dream was set to rest without much ado. But the teach India campaign bought it all to the fore and for more reasons than one. If India is to change for the better we all have to accept and assume our part of responsibility and cannot simply hope that government policies and a handful of committed NGOs will do the magic. And though the teach India campaign has all the right ingredients for success why is it that I feel that it will just wane away after the blitz is over. Am I simply getting jaded and tired.
It would be terribly unfair to a bunch of people from different walks of life if I ended my post here leaving all and sundry to believe that no one can get mobilised, motivated, inspired. We have been in the teach India business for almost ten long and exciting years and can boast of great track record (no failures in school, good results in Boards, kids gainfully and well employed) and this is because we managed to find, mobilise, inspire, motivate a great bunch of human beings that form what we proudly call the project why team! We did not have media campaigns, Bollywood stars or any such drama, we simply spoke to their hearts. Our teachers do not have swanky degrees or MNC jobs. They are simple Indians with a few years of schooling and loads of common sense. They belong to the strata we normally fail to acknowledge and often pass by. They are rich in commitment and goodwill and give themselves wholeheartedly to the work entrusted to them. And boy they do it well. To them all I can say is chapeau bas!
Over the past years they have been helped by another bunch of rare beings that go by the name of volunteers. They come form faraway lands: Singapore, France, the US an UK, Italy, Germany, Holland and other lands. They come from famed Universities and Business Schools. They are your would be honchos. They brave the heat, the stench, the mosquitoes and the spicy food and spend what is often their holidays teaching India. They do not need media campaigns to motivate, inspire or mobilise them: they simply follow their heart. To them again chapeau bas!
Teach India is undoubtedly a brave campaign which we would want to believe has been launched for all the right reasons. Its success depends on each one of us and our ability to carry on after the limelight has faded away.
You can see how we at pwhy teach India by flicking through these pictures.
