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.
by Anuradha Bakshi | Aug 1, 2008 | okhla
About 40 pwhy kids were in for a huge treat last week. Our very special Sari Kids had planned an outing for them and they were all to visit the science centre. A big bus had been booked and kids from the Okhla centre and the women centre were the chosen ones. They were a motley crew of primary kids and giggly teenagers. A handful to say the least!
The bus left pwhy at the appointed time with the 20 odd primary. First stop Madanpur Khader to pick up the women centre’s kids. Then destination was to be the science museum at Bengali Market but by some quirk of fate the party landed at the science centre in Pragati Maidan. The day as described by the Sari kids in their blog seemed worthy of a Marx Brothers film!
It was a day of discovery for everyone. The normally quiet secondary girls of the women centre suddenly got morphed into giggly and pesky teenagers as soon as they boarded the bus in their Sunday clothes and high heels on which they would wobble the whole day. The first hurdle was the ride up the escalator. It was a mild shock for their hosts who come from a land where escalators are as normal as the air you breathe. Here it was a yeoman’s task to get these kids to take it, and though some managed with a little help from their sari pals, for the others the escalator had to be stopped. Blissfully we were in India where this can still be done.
Next stop the 3 D film with its snakes, rats and skeletons that have the required effect: shrieks and violent gesticulating from all. Tome for a few science experiments that all enjoy and then it is lunch time. The cafeteria offers only a limited choice. The smaller kids eat to their hearts content but the pesky ladies perk their nose up live their hosts flummoxed. Ultimately after a little coaxing, they are left to their antics. Needless to say they got reprimanded later and did apologise for their abysmal behaviour.
Sated with images and experiences an exhausted lot takes the long ride back. But there is more in store. Just as the bus is about to reach the women centre the skies open and a huge downpour greets them. Every one returns to base drenched in water and emotions that will be awhile going.
You can share some of the moments of this memorable trip.
by Anuradha Bakshi | Jul 30, 2008 | Uncategorized
On my drive back from the project I was accosted by a beggar woman at a red light. As I travel in a three wheeler, I cannot roll up the window and look away. And anyway I never do, as I cannot forget the words of a beggar woman of yore years that were perhaps one of the greatest lesson of my life.
The woman held a small baby girl in her arms and almost thrust it in the vehicle. The child seemed to be asleep but one look at it made you realise that the sleep was induced and the child drugged. His head flopped backwards and is body was flaccid. As I was not carrying any eatable, I gently asked the woman to move on. The light turned green and we went our way.
For the past few weeks I have also been disturbed by a little 2 year old who lives close to our computer centre. She has recently come from the village and is the daughter of a rather elderly man know for his anti social activities in his home state and who often comes to Delhi to escape authorities. His wife is illiterate and live sin constant fear of her husband who is to say the least quite a terror. This little girl is their second child, he first being handicapped and let in the village. We did try to convince them to send the child to the project, but in vain. The little girl spends her days on the street in front of her house or in the homes of neighbours who often shoo her away.
I wonder what the future holds for these two children of India. Actually one need not wonder, one easily guess their future. The beggar child will soon be tugging along her ‘mother of the day‘ (as the woman may have simply hired it), and as soon as she is a little older will be the one knocking at car windows. As she grows older she may be even given a pair of crutches. One day she will be married off and may be the one holding her baby and begging.
The little girl from the slum does not have a brighter future. She will follow the her uncaring parents from village to city to village. She will never attend a school or get an education. She will never have friends, or toys and one day when she is barely pubertal will be married off to some older man just as her mother was and will produce other children who will have the same fate as her.
The tragic part is that there is nothing much one can do as these children belong to strong mafia like social groups that are totally impervious to change. And yet they become a challenge that one needs to address. The question is how!
