by Anuradha Bakshi | Feb 14, 2007 | girl child
When manoj’s mom came to us a year back carrying her tiny awkward child, we knew she was a woman in need of help so not only did we take her son in our creche, but gave her a part time job at home.
Madhu is a tiny chit of a woman with a strong spirit and she quickly adapted to our ways. A hardworking woman she went about her work quietly. We were shocked beyond words when we realised a couple of days back that she was 7 months pregnant. She has hid the fact too scared that she might lose her job.
Madhu slowly shared her story, and told us about the drunk husband that beat her with obsessive regularity, about how he threatened to throw her out if she got rid of the unborn child. She spoke about the numerous days when they went without food as the husband flittered his money at the watering hole, she told us about the windowless and airless room they lived. She said it all without bitterness or anger but with the strange fatalism that is the rule with many a woman in India. No she had not chosen this man but had been married off by her parents at the tender age of 16.
Madhu is resigned to her fate as she knows that she has no option. In a few weeks she will have another child who will feed on her already emaciated body. Her husband will beat her some more and she will bear it all as she has no options.
Women like Madhu are examples of the plight of the girl child who is seen to be a burden from the time she lands on this planet and is got rid off as soon as possible. And yet there is a spirit that lives in her tiny body one that will never get the chance to manifest itself.
Like many women Madhu will survive, that is the best our world has to offer.
by Anuradha Bakshi | Jan 6, 2007 | girl child, noida children, two indias
The past week has been marked by the terrible plight of children in India, something we can in no way be proud of. The horror of the NOIDA missing kids seemed to be a catalyst of sorts.
Yesterday a nine year old Nayan was found dead, his parents still busy trying to get the ransom together. Yesterday again in a hurried drive to rid our capital city of the bad and the ugly, a 12 day old baby was bulldozed in a slum demolition drive as the mother only had time to save her other child.
The feeling of total helplessness and hopelessness gnawed at my very soul. The sense that all the hue and cry raised in these cases would soon die down after everyone had got their piece of the action was evident. What could one do..
As I sat lost in my thoughts looking for some sign of hope, little Anisha entered the room breaking the dark spell that surrounded us. Anisha is 8 months old but weighs a mere 4 kilos. her emaciated body looks line a new born’s but her eyes sparkle to show that she is a big girl who responds to her name, claps her little hands and is filled with a desire to live. But there is a catch, she has a cardiac congenital malfunctioning and needs open heart surgery.
This would be our 10th case but somehow little Anisha seemed special as she came at a time where we all needed to be reassured that hope still existed. In helping fix her heart, we would perhaps be able to heal ours a little and find the now sagging courage to carry on.
I do not know if we will be able to raise the 55 000 rs needed to give Anisha a tomorrow but somehow we feel we will. This little child who came after two sisters and was not the boy that her parents wanted needs to be saved to vindicate our belief that every child is worth fighting for and saving and that each one of us has the power to do so if we truly care.
by Anuradha Bakshi | Dec 26, 2006 | girl child, reservations
Have you ever wondered how much a handful of spinach costs? A few coins on a market place, a little more in a fancy store… and a few leaves picked up in a field would not be missed by its owner.
Not quite. In a remote village in the state of Bihar a little 10 year old girl lost three fingers as she dared to pick a few spinach leaves from a field. Before you express indignation let me simply add that the little Khushboo is a dalit and the owner belongs to a higher caste! And if that was not enough the girl and her father are too scared to open their mouths.
At times like these I am left speechless as nothing one can say can even begin to explain this horrific equation: a few leaves of spinach = three little fingers! I hang my head in shame as I try and look for the beginning of an answer that would explain this..
One has heard ad nauseum about the reservation issue that is threatening to destroy our social fabric. One is led to believe that the creamy layer of the so called lower castes will hog up all our place in the sun. But nothing can make up for the three tiny fingers cut off in a fit of rage for a few leaves that may have just wilted and rotten had they not been plucked.
Why did little Khushboo commit that offence? Was it to ensure that her family would not go hungry, was it because she could not bear to see her mom beaten by a defeated and helpless father, was it because it had been so long since she had tasted the freshness of a green vegetable. This is something no one will know as the little girl will keep her secret locked away inside her.
When someone decided to divide human beings into what is known as castes, I am sure that the reason was not to give one caste the licence to snip off fingers. So we before we battle about the right of one caste to accede to higher learning, maybe we would address the question of Khushboo’s finger and take on the responsibility of their loss. Khushboo’s fingers, Priyanka’s life are just two examples of the countless tragedies that some of our own suffer because they were born in the wrong caste.
It is not reservation or affirmative action that will right his wrong. Neither is it the few fleeting expression of indignation that cross our minds as we see or hear such stories. We need to go deep within ourselves and to see what made us lose our human compassion down the line, what hubristic demon took possession of us and made us lose all sense of reality. What gave us the right to treat another fellow being in such a barbaric manner.
Khushoo’s fingers will heal and her father may have to pay a few more rupees to find a man for this child. The perpetrator may or may not be caught. At best he will spend a few days in jail as all he took away were three little fingers. And all of us will move on with our lives till the next tale of horror jolts us back into momentary compassion.
by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 24, 2006 | girl child
Every morning before I set out for the day, I watch the news on TV. A old habit become more relevant since pwhy began as one has to be anchored in the reality that surrounds us.
One is prepared for news about violence and bombs. one is even resigned to the fact that a large chunk of the bulletin will be hogged by sports and bollywood. One even braces one’s self for some item on child abuse…
I switched on the idiot box expecting to see yesterday’s Baghdad blast and was in no way prepared for what was about to hit me. The lead news today was about three little girls age 6. 7 and 11 who were rescued from an upmarket home after 3 years of torture and abuse. They were domestic workers..
As one of the girls relived the belts and sticks, the chili in her eyes, and the camera zoomed on her scalded badly healed hands, I was unable to stop the tears that ran down my cheeks. Soon I found myself weeping uncontrollably: they were tears of anger, of rage, of extreme sadness, of helplessness, of shame..
The ordeal of the little girls did not stop there. Yes we have a child labour law, yes we have a juvenile justice act, we boast of child protection legalese, and are signatories to the UN convention for Children’s Rights but once rescued by an NGO the little girls spent 5 days in the cop station. The state of H does not have a juvenile home, the district magistrate – a woman – refused to comment, the law did not allow them to come to neighbouring Delhi. The perpetrators however were released on bail.
The disturbing image of the little girl with scalded hands refused to go away. 2 and half years of torment , that meant she was just 5 when the descent to hell began. And the tormentors,they lives in a city not a barren island, did no one see their plight or did everyone turn their face away as usual. And how could people treat children this way. Why did these tiny children have to work. Why are the laws made for children so full of gaping holes. How can we hope for redemption when we are not able to protect our children. Who gives us the right to shatter children’s dreams. The little scalded hands were not meant to scrub, and clean but to play with a doll, be held and caressed.
Questions that need answers but who will answer them..
God of Lesser beings are you listening
by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 19, 2006 | girl child
Seeing the aftermath of the Bhandara tragedy cannot but bring to mind what bob Dylan wrote more than 40 years ago
Yes, ‘n’ how many deaths will it take till he knows
That too many people have died?
I will not write about the horror of that night, the shattered dreams of a brilliant girl, the agony of the surviving victim. I will not delve on the pitched battles that are played over and over again when the brutality of the police beatings which reminds us of the British raj, neither will I wonder why such a horrific incident had no witnesses.
I will just ask why in a land that has been freed for over 60 years justice does not come to victims that are children of a lesser God, I will just ask why factions cannot unite in the wake of such human tragedy, I will just ask why protesting in a democracy leads to brutal beatings, I will just ask why people are not allowed to dream big!
Delhi just witnessed the abduction of a rich child and the media bltz that ensued. I wonder wether it would have been the same if the child was poor? And yet the agony of a mother is the same be she rich or poor.
So many questions and no one to answer them
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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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