by Anuradha Bakshi | Sep 5, 2006 | Uncategorized
A nomadic childhood meant many a school, but when I look back on those years, each school no matter where it was located, always had a teacher one remembers with fondness, someone you wanted to emulate, someone you looked up to!
Be it Melle Valent in France, Mr Studenmayer in Algiers, or Mere Jean Marie in Saigon, they all played their role in building what I am today. And though lost somewhere in the recesses of my brain, a simple trigger brings their faces to my mind and they validate the high esteem teachers are held in, in India.
That was the, things are not quite the same today. Students have scant respect for their teachers, and teachers are a far cry from any expectation. Welcome to 2006 India where teachers take bribes and students beat teachers to death!
My heart went out to little K who put her best and grownup dress to celebrate teachers’ day where she was to teach a class. K is 6 and still believes in good and right. My heart went out too to many pwhy primary students teaching their peers with commitment and maybe imagining themselves as teachers one day!
Who is to tell them that this may not happen as they are likely to drop out somewhere along the way.
In times where passing the buck and playing blameGame, I think one should stop and ask ourselves a simple question: how responsible are we for this state of affairs? And if we are honest then we will see that each one of us has a part to play in this sad scenario. Absent parents in search of materialistic eldorados, teachers who have turned learning into earning, a government elected by us and thus representative of our aspirations that has let children down..
The list is endless…
In times where education is often heralded as the panacea of all ills and the key to every door, we have forgotten the basic truth: that education is based on mutual respect between teachers and taught. Teachers are per se, the obvious role models of children, something that we have lost on the way. Like everything else, we first must address our shortcomings, only then will teacher’s day regain the meaning it was meant to have.
by Anuradha Bakshi | Sep 4, 2006 | Uncategorized
The results of a recent survey indicates that India is the sixth most dangerous country in the world. Afghanistan, Palestinian territories, Myanmar and Chechnya were placed better than India.
Many will and even are contesting these results, and even if we do better, there is much that is not the way it should be on planetIndia!
The first thing that caught my attention as this news was being aired and commented upon was the fact the welfare ministry would be consulting the labour ministry to determine what a child is! The UN convention says 18 and below, our labour ministry says 14 and below, rape laws say 16 and below… now if we were to go by the UN then we are talking of 42% of our population, unfortunately only very few are voters!
The factors that were given were physical violence of any kind (outside or within the family); mental violence; displacement; sexual abuse and trafficking; early marriage; child labour; a lack of formal identity, including birth registration; the absence of parental care; detention without sufficient cause; a lack of freedom of expression; discrimination on the basis of gender, ethnicity or disability; poverty; HIV/AIDS and other diseases; a lack of vital services (including education and health care)
When i look around me, at the kids of pwhy many of the above factors fit like a glove. So whether we are 6th or 66th, Indian children are not given their basic rights. And those who try and do something are hounded and harassed till they give up. the laws that are made for them, are often eyewash, as no proper roadmap is made let alone followed.
So where is the solution one may ask? Well like for everything else I believe it has to come one step at a time from the grassroots by creating simple models that raise awareness and make people responsible.
Seems like our law makers and protectors have forgotten the children of India. It is for us to make them remember that they too exist. It is time to take a serious look at them and do something.
by Anuradha Bakshi | Sep 4, 2006 | Uncategorized
And the combat ceased, for want of combatants.
Le Cid (IV, 3).
These words from a play long forgotten sprung to my mind this morning. Live every child put through the French system. Corneille is a must and often the play selected is Le Cid, where a tragic hero finds himself caught between his love and his duty as a result of a series of events outside his control. One is reminded of the doubting Arjuna in the beginning of the Mahabharata.
Both are compelled to follow their duty and fight someone dear. In the case of the French hero, the battle ends as for want of combatants!
I find myself in much in a similar situation where a series of events seem to have snowballed pushing me inside a labyrinth I cannot find the exit of. What makes it worse is that the enemy is invisible but powerful using simple minds as Machiavellian weapons.
Nowhere does the law say that one cannot terminate someone’s service. There must be hordes of people having lost jobs for various reasons, and none of them seem to have been meat for shady Trade Unions as these as well as the labour inspectors are well fed by factory owners and other employers who break every law with impunity.
I find it strange that a tiny organisation, who pays minimum wages as per law, and goes beyond what is expected to be present when people are in need, finds itself accused of vile and reprehensible things at every step. How can we be a danger to anyone, or are politicians and slum lords scared of the awareness we spread?
From providing women, to pocketing funds, I have done it all. I wish I had the wisdom and the ability to laugh it off, but pwhy is a child I have created with love and hardwork, possibly the best things i have done in my life, and I cannot distance myself.
Sometimes I think of locking it up but I know that this is exactly what my detractors want. But when I imagine, even for an instant, pwhy closed I realise that it will mean shattering many dreams, dreams you see in the picture above: young girls will drop out of school, babies will be back on the street, manu will not have any playmates, nasreen will not be able to dance to celebrate Independence day, and young Sunil will have to beat iron all his life.
Many may say: so what, there are millions like them ? My answer is simply, yes but if millions like us took the first step then things may change. Some of my staff, feeling extremely dejected this morning, asked me why were such things happening. I just answered that it was simply a micro reflection of the macro reality of India, and it was imperative to set the micros right so that the macro can change.
Our battle cannot cease, we are its combatants and everyone who has believed and supported us. If it ceases, that it mean that there is no hope for a better tomorrow. The enemy has to be worn down and won over. And if you ask why, then my answer is simple: Manu cannot go back to begging on the streets, his body infested by maggots, Nasreen has to dance at every celebration and Sunil must have a choice in life.
This combat will continue, even it there is only one combatant.
by Anuradha Bakshi | Sep 1, 2006 | Uncategorized
I often wonder who are the present heroes that the children of India can look up to and want to model one’s self on. The ones that are often cited are jaded or otherworldly.
We live in times when all we hear about is violence steeped in the widest variety of sauces. Our so called leaders are busy fulfilling their dubious agendas, or filing their pockets, their bureaucratic acolytes in tow.
People are murdered in crowded rooms but the state prosecutor cannot find a witness as the so called guardians a law are busy perfecting the art of covering up.
When we were young there were many we wanted to emulate: our teachers, often being the first choice. Today students beat up teachers to death in public, and no one stands up for a dead colleague. This is the India we live in, one where everyone runs scared.. or almost every one as when you are about to give up all hope comes by a simple faceless Indian, a barely literate peon who rises above everyone and conquers his fear and does the right thing though he knows that he may lose his life.
Komal Singh Senger a peon in the college where the sordid incident took place did not succumb to fear and came out to tell the truth and identify the culprits. he is of course stunned by the inertia of his senior educated colleagues and says: Because they have lost all integrity. It’s a shame that they continue in this profession, all of them should be shifted out everybody should be shifted out. Everybody from the Principal to the entire college staff who are scared to speak. If they cannot speak out for their own colleague, there is no doubt that no one will protect me either.he goes a step further when refusing monetary sops to buy his silence he adds: Yes, I was offered money. They said they would marry off my daughters and bear the expenses. But I don’t care. They will get married when the time is right. I did not give birth to them thinking that such people would relieve me of my responsibilities. Why should I take money from them?
It is true that he has been given police protection but we all know the strength of two constables in the face of those who are trying to protect the culprits. One can only hope that this true Indian will be protected. It becomes incumbent on all self respecting Indians to ensure his safety. Were anything to happen to him than all that is honourable and good would be lost forever and we would become a land of people ruled by fear.
Sengar is someone that every child should know about as he vindicates the stand that integrity and righteousness does not come with money or power, but lies within everyone irrespective of his origin. he is a man who could not see injustice and stood by what he believed to be right.
We salute Komal Sigh Senger, a true Indian!
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Sep 1, 2006 | sustainability
The bete noire of any not-for-profit organisation is undoubtedly its sustainability particularly if one views such work as having a duration in space and time. Education above all does not make any sense if its temporality is limited to the ‘bon vouloir’ of funding agencies.
This is one of the reason that we, from day one, shunned instructional sources of funding as they are far too often linked to too many ‘ifs’ and ‘buts’. We preferred a far larger funding group namely individuals.
I cannot even remember when I first thought of the one-rupee-a-day option, but in spite of its Herculean administrative hassles, it intuitively felt right from the instant it sprung in my mind.
Then like so many of us, I got swayed by others and the ideas that they mooted ad nauseam. As everyone seemed to view my idea with an array of negative reasons ranging from doubts about its difficult execution to cynical remarks about its every essence I played along and began our quest for sustainability which burnt a huge hole in our tiny resources and covered a range of activities: paper and jute bags, costume jewels, nutritive biscuits, baby clothes, bio-diesel plant nurseries, soaps, chocolates.. the list is endless and met with as many obstacles: lack of adequate outlets, competition that one could not meet, licence and permit raj but above all the total refusal of people to give up their salary syndrome, something that I believe is particular to Delhi.
Somehow when people set foot in India’s capital city – @ of over 600 a day says recent statistics, they somehow feel they earned the right to the elusive government job. I can cite countless instances of simple people having paid unfathomable sums to touts to get them a government job. Wonder how rich they and self sufficient they could have become had they invested that amount in something as simple as a chai shop. So it becomes impossible to get people to shed that attitude and take their lives in their own hands. Now basing our sustainability on such efforts, was a recipe for disaster as we learnt the hard but necessary way.
So we are back to square 1 and to the magic number 1 as this is the only way we can flip the existing equation. I have always held that development and change will come from the bottom when every one is aware of his/her responsibility in the democratic and civic process. As long as we carry on dispersing hand outs things cannot change as the process entails immobility: the giver gives and the recipient takes.
We have seen in the recent past many things move when people got involved albeit thanks to the oh so powerful media. A rupee a day gives everyone the possibility of altering his/her status irrespective of caste, creed, or economic background and of taking an active part in change.
It is a uphill task, one that will take time as we move with baby steps. But it is the only one that will esnure duration and multiplication. Till then we will need support and we hope that it will be in the form of 1 rupee donors so that we can evolve a strategy and put it to test.
In her second novel, Leonora Miano a writer from Cameroun talks about women taking charge of their own destiny, as this activist writer strongly believes that the new tomorrow will dawn on her continent only when Africans themselves take charge. This is a lesson that transcends continents, one I hope we learn soon.
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