by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 19, 2006 | Uncategorized
I have always held that the poor emulate the rich! This is apparent in more ways than one: urban slums weddings for instance now look like upmarket ones: food stalls, decorative thrones, DJs and smoky dance floors.
This is also apparent in the proliferation of cell phones, bikes, VCD players et al!
Yesterday I saw something that made me smile. Our local juice vendor was rushing with a bunch of plastic bags filled with orange juice, and dropping them to different jhuggis. Actually each jhuggi had a sick person in it.
Yes health consciousness has also hit the slums.
I did not even dare think about the quality of the plastic or the origin of the water used to dilute the juice…
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 18, 2006 | Uncategorized
Sometimes you wonder why children are made to suffer! I wrote about Himanshu locked in his world and who had found a pal in Nanhe.
Well someone got jealous or cast a spell and the next day nanhe found suffered acute renal colic and had an epileptic fit that send him to hospital and Himanshu found himself without his new friend.
Himanshu’s story is what horror films are made of: his mother committed suicide by hanging herself, probably because of domestic violence. His maternal grandparents then asked the father to come to the village proposing that he marry the dead wife’s sister. the father thought it would be a doable option for his two children as Himanshu has a younger sister.
In the village, in some remote part of Bihar, what awaited him was a family seeking revenge. The man was shot by the brothers and the whole deed made to look like another suicide.
Today the children are being looked after my the dead father’s sister who has chosen no to marry in order to bring up these two children.
I wonder what Himanshu saw that made him the way he is, locked up in a strange world of his own, trying to deal with something he cannot understand.
In the face of such tragedy I remain speechless.
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 18, 2006 | utpal
I have always loved the Greek word ‘hubris’. The dictionary gives many meanings to it: from arrogance, to pride to cockiness.
According to me there is only one being who has the right to be hubristic and that is God him/herself, in whatever shade or colour you may want. Only God can turn desperation into hope.
Many of you may have forgotten J a.k.a Mr P’s mom. There are many who may have written her off as a gone case alky, a bad mother, a woman of lose morals and many more such explicatives.
I have always held that God makes mistakes and then sets on to paint very large and sometimes incomprehensible pictures aimed at setting them right. J is one such case. Her lonely battle to turn the leaf began on a terrible night when little Utpal fell into his boiling pot and we landed in his life. A series of occurrences followed as time was not ripe. Many drunken brawls had to be endured and the abandoned daughter had to make her journey back!
Then on a fateful day in April things hit rock bottom and made us take a tough decision: we had to separate mother and son, Utpal went to boarding school and J into rehab. It was not easy for this woman who was a free spirit. But she held on the nine long months needed to heal.
Next week J will be taking her first hesitant steps towards a new life as she goes to work in a institution where her daughter is waiting. It is time for this mother to make up for lost time with a daughter she has walked away from to live her own private hell. And during the Xmas holidays Utpal will join his little family for a few days.There are still many battles to be won, many pitfalls to avoid but somehow I feel that they will be. It is just a matter of time!
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 17, 2006 | Uncategorized
A few weeks back we were contacted by a organisation asking us to participate in a national effort whereby young bankers of a leading multinational bank would come and spend a day at pwhy as part of the CSR effort.
A draft programme was sent to us and we were asked to send a concrete proposal which we promptly did. The idea was that about 10 such persons would ‘spend the day’ with our kids and participate in various activities.
Then as usual we got caught in our day-to-day life. Yesterday we remembered that the programme was scheduled for this week-end and having not heard from anyone we decided to call them.
Why was I not surprised when we were told that though Bombay and Calcutta had met the required numbers, Delhi had failed to do so. No need to wonder why, Delhi will not give up its Saturday spent mall crawling, star gazing or partying to walk filthy slums and play with poor kids.
Dil deke dekho– dilli – try spending a little of your heart!
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 16, 2006 | sealing
It has been along time since one has written a blog about pwhy children. Somehow the sombre mood and events of the past few weeks had hijacked much of these posts.
But while the city was being held to ransom by the sealing saga and numerous bhands, life did not stop for an instant on planet why. We have had some new admission and one of them was little Himanshu in the creche.
Himanshu and his younger sister are orphans being brought up by their aunt. Right from day one Himanshu seemed a little different and unlike his sister who took to her new friends like a fish to water, Himanshu remained withdrawn, locked in his world, banging his head occasionally or sitting in a corner.
Today we shifted him to the special section so that our very efficient team would assess him. As soon as he entered the room, Himanshu suddenly felt at home. He smiled, and settled down as if he belonged.
After some time, he decided to sit by Nanhe and soon rested his head on Nanhe’s lap a broad smile on his face. Nanhe of course rose to the occasion suddenly as this was the first time in his life that he felt responsible for someone.
We all watched in silence as this was a huge moment for us all.
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 16, 2006 | sealing
I asked my old acquaintance Mishraji why our local DDA market had so many cars parked in front. Mishraji and I go back a long time, when he worked at a provision store in M block market GK1 and I shopped there for my daily needs. That was about 25 years ago!
Today Mishraji works the local chemist in the DDA market the store he worked in then is now a lingerie boutique!
“behanji, did you know that there were 34 provisions stores in M block market in those days, now there is only one, so the many residents of diverse blocks in GK 1 come to the two provision shops here”, was Mishraji’s answer.
A zany thought crossed my mind: will they one day seal this tiny complex because of traffic snarls!
Thinking back I do remember many such stores; they all disappeared giving way to showrooms that sell jewellery, fancy shoes, fancy apparel, sports goods, crystal ware and more of the same. And shoppers comes from across the city and even across the country, in their cars and create those terrible traffic jams.
This blog is not about rules and the breaking of them. It is an epitaph to days gone by, days that remain forgotten memories in the now tired heads of the likes of Mishraji and I. With malls, and showrooms the bond that existed between the shopkeeper and the client is gone and in its place is a business like exchange. I guess one has to move with time but some of us still long for the days when things were different.
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 16, 2006 | girl child
She is 11, goes to school but there is a catch; she has been married to a man more than twice her age who is also the husband of her handicapped sister.
The future of children and particularly girls with disabilities has always been a source of concern.
Often their already grim lives turn to nightmares after the demise of their mother when the reins of the home passes on to a new entrant: the elder daughter-in-law.
It is for this reason that we try at pwhy to teach each and every special child basic living skills so that he or she can remain within the home. Often we have to argue with parents who try and see the child as normal and chart out a life for her which leads to marriage as the very Ponce Pilatus option: I would have washed my hands off her. No one ever thinks of the plight of the girl in a new home.
Yesterday a TV channel aired a story that disturbed me a lot. A father had married his deaf and dumb girl to a much older man; only there was a catch: he also married his 11 year old second daughter to the same man! His explanation was brutally simple: his disabled daughter would find a home.
The understanding was that daughter no 2 – still a child – would remain in her parental home till she finished school. Only that is not what happened, soon after daughter no 1’s wedding, the in-laws started abusing her and insisted that daughter no 2 come immediately. Apparently this case is not unique, many parents of disabled daughters have had recourse to this.
I know that everyone reading this blog will be horrified, but seven years in pwhy have taught me to look at the larger picture before condemning anyone. True that the authorities have moved in, the father is behind bars, the younger daughter still in school does not quite understand the situation, and the handicapped young woman is back home, her future as bleak as ever.
Now had the ‘deal’ worked, it would have remained a secret and the sisters would have lived together. The larger question nobody seems to be addressing is: what will happen to them now and what is the future of the innumerable young women with disabilities in a country that has no option for them?
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 15, 2006 | okhla, sustainability
One of the devious ways to disrupt pwhy in the (mistaken) hope of wishing it away that local politicos have adopted is to first get some simple minded staff to commit a serious lapse that forces us to take action and then edge that person to take us to labour court.
This often makes many friends and detractors question my decision of employing people from the community. And each time I find myself wondering whether that very stubborn and intuitive decision needs to be reviewed.
There are many reasons for my decision ranging from giving employment, raising social status to ensuring sustainability if and when slums are relocated.
But the incident with babli took care of the last vestige of doubt, if any. No matter how much we help people, there is no guarantee that they will continue to follow the course charted for them. The only way to ensure that children remain in school, are not used and abused, and so on is to have your own staff right there almost 24/7.
Babli is now back in school in the morning and at pwhy okhla in the afternoon and many hawk eyes now ensure that this continues.
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 13, 2006 | two indias
When Sitaram came to us three years ago seeking monetary help for his son’s cardiac surgery we never knew that he was heralding a new avatar for pwhy, that of fixing hearts quite literally.
It took us two months to get the needed funds and raju today is a strapping young lad in secondary school and top of his class. Then came Arun, Babli, Nandini and the others setting up what we affectionately call our heartFix hotel.
And with each little broken heart came a huge wave of support. What used to take months and loads of emails, now just takes one or two phone calls.
So when little Anil came by asking help for help for the placement of a Pulmonary Artery Band, no emailing was required, not even a blog saying who he was. But little Anil does deserves his place here. He is 8 months old and has spent most of his life on this planet in hospital. Each breathe he takes is an effort, but the little soul fights to live on. His father makes bamboo blinds and barely enough to sustain his family. We pray that the PA band will settle Anil’s congenital problem and he will spared bypass surgery.
Recently a TV channel had a talk show on medical tourism whereby the Rajus, Anils, Bablis of rich countries come to India for medical help. This leads one to think about where our Anils go! The answer is brutal and ruthless : normally they are left to die!
This is another side of the two Indias. When Raju came by many thought we were insane to take on another mantle. Were we not and education programme?
Well maybe there is another answer to the question we asked. Some of our Anils and Bablis are gently directed by the God of Lesser Children to people like us.
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 12, 2006 | sealing
Welcome to the land where small is not beautiful..
Wonder what I am getting at?
Two recent news items caught my eye. One pertains to sealing and its effect of small traders, and the other on the proposed amendment to regulate foreign donation to NGOs. In both cases the big fish will get away but the small will suffer and ultimately die.
Keeping an eye on nefarious activities is understandable but believing that those who engage in such activities will not find other ways of doing so is naive.
Those who are engaged in trying to make a difference by reaching out to the many who have been let down – children, women – know how difficult it is to get help from within the country. Somehow the word NGO is circumspect and viewed with extreme suspicion and disdain, making people like us wary of even using it to identify one’s self. True that it unfortunately conjures in the minds of people the image of huge organisations with large budgets and heavy administrative setups . It is also true that many are just that. Now with the added scare of NGOs being used to fund terror, mistrust will grow.
The flip side that there are some people who set up projects with an honest approach and are engaged in good work. The flip side is also is that funds normally come from across the seas, where even our kin become more charitable.
I spent the first years of pwhy trying to get support from friends, relatives, school buddies of spouse etc watching personal funds whither as very little was forthcoming. Everyone always had a good excuse, one more ludicrous than the other. Must add that what I sought was tiny, something people would flitter away in an evening. I even came up with my one rupee a day pitch, thinking that what I was asking was actually so tiny that it became invisible. But to no avail. Then our famous FCRA got cleared and the same story was sent out on the net reaching people I did not know.
Distance makes the heart larger I should say as I was overwhelmed by the support that came from young students and professionals over and above friends that I had known for long. The sums were not big, as many took the rupee-a-day option that translated into a tiny 8 dollars a year. But we survived month after month and year after year. We survived and hundreds of kids did not drop out, 20 different kids spent a few hours a day laughing and being loved, 30 people got employment and could feed their families, 7 hearts got repaired..
Now with the new law that will soon come to force, we may lose much of this support. Not because we are dishonest or dubious but because meeting the requirements will deprive us of the spontaneous support of small donors who often react to appeals from the heart. Moreover, the new law also states that a tab will be kept on whether or not the money is used for development. This will open the doors to witch hunting, settling of personal scores not to forget new avenues for under the table payments as who defines what development is!
For organisation like ours who do not believe in corpus funds and think that money given for a cause should be used as soon as possible, any blocking of funds to answer queries would mean no money for the next month. For organisation like ours which have very restricted small administrations, a point appreciated by our donors, it may mean increasing that budget to meet the new requirements. It alsomeans retructuring our donor base in a way that may jar with what we believe in.
But above all it will mean losing the warmth and spontaneity that characterised pwhy as its number of supporters grew across countries and lived the joy and angst of our little effort with us.
Small is not beautiful in our land!
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 9, 2006 | Uncategorized
Over the past six years I have had to fight many battles. Lost some, won some. Sometimes the adversary is too formidable as was the case of the MLM people who came with their rehearsed pitches, their alluring promises and their fast track to riches!
They came, saw and conquered many young men and women promising them a quantum leap measured of course in gleaming bikes, and natty cars. My sensible words fell on deaf years: some listened by respect, and others just took the longer road to avoid the babbling old lady telling them to take one step at a time.
I felt a pang of guilt as pwhy boys and girls were naturally selected to lead as their social and communication skills were well honed by years of tender grooming. I watched with despair as some dropped out of colleges to be able to sell more computer software to gullible slum dwellers. The MLM gang was quick to scale down their minimum qualifications to ensnare more lads. Graduate, to class XII, to class X and even less.
I prayed my favourite God to make the pyramid crash sooner than later but to no avail. I have to confess that all the ex pwhyans have gleaming bikes and some have even bought cars, leaving me even more uncomfortable as I know the inevitable outcome.
So R got his brand new Innova. It is parked on the other side of the Giri Nagar road, in front of his tiny shack that is barely sufficient for the family of 5, next to the tinier shack that is the bathroom. Every morning his teen age sisters open the car, switch the AC, put on loud music and happily brush their teeth and have their morning tea. The car is also often used as a sitting or even sleeping space!
That is what happens when cars land in slums..
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 9, 2006 | sealing
I watched the sealing drive yesterday. The targets were big fish be they showrooms, offices of even government institutions. The government suddenly took the rule of law very seriously.
Later in the day I read an article ringing the death knell of small NGOs located in areas identified as seal-able!
The logic presented by the author was simple: such NGOs had chosen those premises as hey were often cheaper. This enabled them to present their donors with small admin bills. Were they to move into commercial areas then the rent and other charges would often be higher than the amount spent of the development work they do.
NGOs normally do not break laws, however when those are poorly defined then they may inadvertently do so. It is a well known fact that donors are weary of inflated admin costs, so it stands to reason to think that were small NGOs asked to move out, they would have no option but to cease their activities. It is true that there are some NGOs who are not quite what they seem , but small NGOs like ours have a role to play in a city where the government has abdicated many of its duties. Not many alternatives are left for takes.
At present we are on safe grounds, but who knows one day laws may change or be suitably modified to meet numbers and the sealing gang may land on us. I have been thinking of this and have come and realised that pwhy is maybe not in such a bad situation as most of our activities are nomadic. The solution will be to turn every activity into a nomadic one and become a jhola – satchel – NGO. Each one packing the need of the day in a satchel and taking off for the garbage dump, road side, shanty assigned to us and ending the day in your own drawing room to take stock and plan the next day.
I remember many of my detractors criticising my stubborn resistance to enclosing pwhy in the confines of four walls, but somehow I held on and feel vindicated.
So jhola days may be round the corner…
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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.
by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 1, 2006 | Uncategorized
Come November and it is time for me to get off the spinning earth and look at time gone by as a rank outsider…
November never held much significance in the first for decades of my life. But the year 1992 changed it all. November took my father away and brought the most difficult closure in my life. For six long years I sought every crutch possible just to the fragile vessel of my life from sinking.
But November is also the month when life came full circle with the setting up of pwhy’s first class in Giri Nagar and somehow with the intuitive realisation that I had embarked on the last chapter of my life.
The last six years have been the most rewarding ones of my life. A barely formulated wish of paying back a debt turned into a discovery of India. What began as an effort to give Manu a life with dignity is today a throbbing project where over 500 children reclaim their right to be a child.
It is a matter of utter joy to walk every morning and be greeted by smiles and laughter filled ‘ morning ma’am’, when each child tries to get one’s attention. It is a matter of outright joy to see my staff dressed in their smartest outfit bustling around efficiently redeeming their lost identity. And above all its is a matter unqualified pride to see Manu smartly dressed sitting with his pals and solving a puzzle. And to say that just six years ago I sat in front of our one room centre trying to rid him of the maggots that infested his much abused body.
A deep sense of peace fills me as I relive these last six years, but I cannot allow myself to sink into a comfort zone, there is still so much to do. Pwhy is still a six year old child that needs to learn to survive independently.
And if I allow myself to dream about the future I see the November when pwhy will be sustained by the community itself, run by some of our ex students, the day when Manu will proudly show his identity papers as he sits in his own kiosk, earning his living with the help of his spirited younger sister.
That day I will allow myself to retreat into a comfort zone.
So help me God of the lesser ones!
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