by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 7, 2006 | lohars, two indias
that is the end of the rule of law and the breakdown of democracy were the harsh words the Chief Justice of India used yesterday while haring the pathetic excuses of a government caught red handed!
Thanks heaven for the rule of law, no matter how tardy, it ultimately catches up and sets things right.
As the Supreme court verdict enfolded, it was pathetic to see that no one truly understood what was at stake. Everyone was busy protecting his own tiny reality be it the traders, the politicians or the administrators. I am no judge but even I find the arguments put forward laughable and almost contemptuous. An elected government that confesses it cannot handle law and order, an angry trader community that decides to oppose the law, and petty politicians looking at ways to further their hidden agendas.
What one would have liked to see is all concerned accept part of the responsibility and put forward a concrete option whereby everyone gave up a little. maybe the courts would have lent a more lenient view.
Laws exist from time immemorial when human beings decided to give up their solitary living to form a social group. What we have been witnessing over the past years is an absolute disregard for laws and a proliferation of news ways to break them. I was appalled when a trader friend explained to me the difference between having a shutter and a gate, the former being commercial, the later within the law, never mind if the activity within the gate/shutter is the same.
The government has done nothing for crucial urban issues like habitat for the poor. An example is the Lohar – nomadic – community of Delhi, who has been promised resettlement for the past 25 years and not got any. They still live in shanties along the main arteries of our society. But hold on, the shanties have a postal address, its occupants a voter ID.
Migrate to India’s capital city and two years down the line you become a voter; try and get a caste certificate to be able to qualify to the innumerable schemes and you are asked to prove that your family resides in this city since 1951!
The situation that we face has taken years of corruption, and law breaking to come to what it is today. And the law has been broken with great impunity. Wonder why?
I guess it is because our moral and social fibre has been corrupted and we are we have turned into a selfish bunch of people. We are appalled by the slums and are willing to defend sari shops and branded good stores.
Never mind if the former is because we just forgot that the poor needed proper habitat, though we continue to use greedily all the services they offer and the later, the later our own kind so deserve our support. Only, as we are above all selfish, we are willing to withdraw our sympathy when their acts irk us – namely we cannot go shopping, send our children to school and go for our kitty party, or simply commute.
The government has tracts of land available, wonder why everyone does not for once give up their petty agendas and sit around a table and work out a resettlement plan that could then humbly be presented to a court. I was aghast to read in the press that politicians of the ruling party are busy inventing new band-aid fixes that range beyond the gate/shutter one: divide the shop between brothers so that it comes within the limits, wall the facade till a solution is found, shift your ware to your house etc
Driving this morning to pwhy – as we are open – was an eerie experience as the hustle bustle of the roads was no there to greet one and reassure us that all was well. There were no children in their sparkling uniforms rushing to school. A city is held to ransom because someone someday had broken a law and no one was there to stop him.
reminds of the story of the boy walking to the gallows who tells his weeping mother: why didn’t you slap me the first time I broke the law!
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 3, 2006 | sealing
here we go again.. says the popular song.
I have been watching the tos and fro’s of the local authorities regarding the now existential question: to seal or not to seal!
To take the Shakespeare reference further we could easily say; all is not well in the State of D.. (substitute Delhi for Denmark). Is there a solution?
To understand the present situation one has to travel way back and ask a multitude of almost rhetorical questions: why the master plan which had a fair allocation for commercial buildings was not respected? Why did the local authorities happily give green signals to illegal activities? Why did the politicians promise regularisation of unlawful construction before each and every election? many questions and no answers as it is a chicken and egg situation.
For the past few days the government both local and national have been in their usual band-aid mode? One arm says yes to sealing and the other no. But what is disturbing is the pathetic excuses: a festival here, a law and order situation there. In the meantime a city is held to ransom, children cannot go to school and violence lurks at every corner.
Everybody has been caught unawares! Those who paid and retreated into comfort zones, those who received and promised, those who broke laws with impunity and those who turned their eyes away..
This crisis management situation has become endemic to our very nature with no one realising that it just delays the inevitable just a little bit longer.
The sealing situation threatens to become a hydra headed monster and no Hercules who would look for the neck and sever it. We just go on snipping the heads which grow again and again.
But one day the laws catch up and everyone stands helpless. There is a Hercules, but in this case not an individual but a complex entity covering all sides and willing to take on his or her share of responsibility and willing to lose some to set matters right.
Wishful thinking in this day and age where individual benefits are more important than collective ones, where rights are demanded but duties shunned!
Where do we go from here…
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 2, 2006 | Uncategorized
I am livid. Do you remember Babli?
Here I was back in a comfort zone feeling smug like a proverbial Cheshire cat, thinking that with her brand new heart, Babli was sitting on a school bench making up for lost time when I was hit by another thunderbolt.
R and S came back from a field visit visibly upset. On the way they had passed Babli’s slum cluster and found her sitting on a cart selling chewing tobacco, cigarettes and biscuits instead of being in school, her little sister standing in the background.
The cart was supposed to be the father’s way of earning some money, but he simply left her there to pursue his gambling habit. Seems that it happens often as she sheepishly told us that her name had been struck of the roll of the school.
The mother spends long hours in the factory she works in and the father does as he pleases. Come tomorrow and we will set out on a remedial mission which will start with some plain talking with the impossible farthest threatening to put him behind bars if he abuses the child in this manner. Then a PR expedition to government school to ensure that she is taken back. Somewhere down the line the mother will get a dressing too.
These moments are when you just feel throwing your hands up but you stop midway and wonder how you can address the situation that actually is one of protecting children’s rights. We can carry on our crisis intervention, but there is a larger question that needs to be looked at: parents need to be informed about the laws in existence and about the importance of giving girls a good education.They should be made aware of the child labour laws and more..
The presence of little Arzoo in the background is a blatant proof of the fact that girls are treated differently as Ramu the brother goes to school.
There is so much to be done, one step at a time…
Note: two days after this post babli was back in school, and sister arzoo back at pwhy’s creche.
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 2, 2006 | Uncategorized
I have always feared comfort zones. You fall prey to them unwittingly. When things look alright, when no untoward incident occurs, that is when comfort zones appear and you easily fall prey to their lure.
This has happened time and again at pwhy though I have tried to fight it as best I could. When things are smooth you even stop seeing things as they are.
Then something happens to bring you back to earth and you feel a tad guilty looking for meagre excuses where none exist. And when it pertains to a child, then the guilt is far greater. So many little miracles have escaped my mind and yet where there for all to see.
Many of you may wonder why I have not written about Nanhe for a long time. Simply because I feel prey to the comfort zone syndrome. But a lot has happened and it is time to share with all those who have loved and supported him.
After his leg operations Nanhe has been able to stand and is slowly learning to walk with a walker. It is a huge step for this child who till recently was condemned to drag himself in a sitting position. To us who take our standing as granted it may not seem so important, but imagine what it means to little Nanhe. he can now stand with his classmates and take part in the morning exercise routine, and even dance with them.
No wonder then that the smile has got even bigger!
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 1, 2006 | common school, girl child
My limousine had not come so I decided to spend some time in the creche where the big section – all between 4 and 5 – sat in a circle for its daily activity.
The past few weeks had been so hectic that I had barely found time to spend with the children as I was busy struggling to survive. But the breakdown of the three wheeler – ie my limo – allowed me that luxury. Once the children were settled and work handed out, I found myself staring at this little circle of around 15 kids and knew that there was something I could sense but not yet see!
It took me a few minutes to register what was disturbing be, till I felt hit by a bolt out of the blue: there were only 3 girls in the group!
It is true that the socio-economic profile of the early education group has always been different to the other sections. I guess that the presence of volunteers of all shades and hues and the fun and laughter that often emanates from this group made many slightly better families bring their children to us. This has been god sent to one like me as it was almost a precursor my dream of a common school as the solution to many problems in our country.
It is also true that the sex ratio of south Delhi is one of the worst – 784/1000 – but it is only today that I saw the chilling numbers it the very micro sample that is pwhy.
There are missing girls and we cannot afford to turn a blind eye. The importance and essential value of the girl child has to be restored in the minds of each and everyone.
