The heat is on

by Anuradha Bakshi | Apr 19, 2010 | Uncategorized

The heat is on. Boy it is hot. 44 Celsius and climbing and it is only the ides of April! I should be complaining but I am not. Wonder why? Please read on…

I decided to get my old rambling and falling apart house repaired this year after almost 2 decades. The idea was to begin in April and have all finished by May when the heat is really on. Little did I know that this year Nature had another plan. And as usual even with supposedly sound planning and the best of intentions of doing things in an organised way floor by floor, room by room, I suddenly found myself in the middle of a construction site with workers everywhere. You see the plumber had finished his work on floor 1 so needed to move to floor 2 and so on. Within the batting of an eyelid the whole house was under wraps and we were banished to two rooms. The cooler was of course out of commission, hot air blew from open doors and windows and my resolve to never use ACs in the day to limit my carbon foot print resulted in a fans only situation, and that also when the electrician had not cut the power!

Sunday then should have turned out to be a miserable day. Quite the contrary. It was a huge reality check. As it was terribly hot, I was unable to stay put in one place so I ambled all over the house watching the workers. There were many, of all ages, each one of them busy in their work, some on the terrace under the scorching sun, some carrying loads, some hung on the terrifying rope basket painters use in India for painting outside walls. They were busy with their work, chatting, laughing, fighting when needed! Sometimes one of them would run down to the kitchen to get bottles of cold water. But there was no complain about the heat. Heat or no heat they had to work. Most of them were daily wagers, and work meant food in the evening. It was as I said a huge reality check and somehow it did not seem so hot!

I remember another reality check I had last year when I had reacted rather unreasonably to the amount of kids that were packed in the creche in the hot summer. I had not realised that our seemingly hot classroom was far better than a tiny jhuggi with a tin roof!

So this year I for one am not complaining about the heat!

I am just a housewife

by Anuradha Bakshi | Apr 17, 2010 | Uncategorized

For the past few months I have been receiving annoying calls from my bank each time we receive a donation, even a tiny one. The caller fires questions like: what is the money for? who is it from? (even of the said person has been sending money for years)? what does donation for Meher mean? and so on. And each time such a call comes, you are filled with silent rage as you try at best to find suitable answers knowing that if you do not, your MNC Bank will send your donation back. This was not the case a year ago.

For a long time it is true that each time I am asked by someone new – thank heavens this is not the case often as I have limited if not stopped socialising – what do you do? and I have to mumble, albeit reluctantly, I run an NGO, I am met with raised eyebrows and strange looks. The acronym NGO seems to conjure: impropriety, dishonesty and more of the same. You are suddenly branded and no one is willing to hear what you do or even give you a chance to vindicate yourself. At best you are one of the society biddies who do charity as it seems the done thing, at worst you are into some dirty money game. never mind if you have saved lives, educated children, created jobs, empowered women, no one cares a hoot! Once you have been given that knowing look your only option is to retreat into your corner and hope no one asks you what you do for the rest of the evening and you find yourself swearing that next time you are asked that question you will remember to say: I am a housewife. That is your safest option.

Running an honest charity is no easy task, believe you me. Sometimes I do feel like giving myself a silent pat in the back for having survived and hot landed in a loony bin! So even though I was shocked and riled when I heard on the news that the IPL (Indian Premier League) was a charitable organisation registered under the same Act as us, I cannot say I was really surprised. I am sure that many of the team owners do engage in some fashionable charitable activity – it makes good copy, good PR and good promotional visuals – but for God’s sake is it really necessary to put us all in the same basket and force small fish like us to swim in the same waters? Now you know why I will say: I am just a housewife!

through her lens

by Anuradha Bakshi | Apr 14, 2010 | Uncategorized

Lorianne is a young photographer from France who came to volunteer for a few weeks. It is amazing how everyone sees project why through different eyes, and Lorianne saw it through her heart. She captured some very unique moments that are a pure delight.

You see she saw the project through her heart and ferreted some very special moments that we are too inured to see: children sleeping in the creche, or simply enjoying a private moment; things on the wall or shoes lined up neatly; children having a ball and teachers joining in. All snapshots of the spirit and vibrancy of project why.

Thank you Lorianne for this treat and I urge all to take a few moments and browse through these lovely cameos of life at project why

education from 6 to 14

by Anuradha Bakshi | Apr 13, 2010 | Uncategorized

I have been perplexed, angry, confused, bewildered and even apoplectic at some of the aberrations of the much awaited, much delayed and still far from being implemented Right to Education Bill. The bill has many aberrations. And to the uninitiated they may seem incomprehensible. Why only from 6 to 14? What about preschool which is so important? And is 14 is the right time to be freed of compulsory schooling? Many can also question the wisdom of no failing till class VIII particularly keeping in mind the state of education in schools today. And there are many more questions…

I cannot answer these as I am neither competent nor privy to the hidden agendas of that steer such legislation. I can only share some of my experiences and observations gathered over the years, from the time I decided to dirty my hands educating the poor. Our dream and objective to start a children centre where children would come and reclaim their usurped childhood and spent time doing what children do after school rather than aimlessly hanging on the streets (read boy) or being overwhelmed by house work (read girls). But when we saw that children studying in class III and IV could barely recognise their alphabets, even though at that time no law stipulated that children were not to be failed, and this was probably because stakeholders wanted to look good and field workers shirk their work, we had to put our dreams and goals on hold and bridge the gap. We thus became what is normally called a tuition centre, something I abhor. Now with the new law I do not see us retrieving our dreams in a hurry.

But before I go one let me share an incident that happened just yesterday. A friend who is also an eminent CA had dropped by to discuss some legal matters. In the course of our conversation I discovered that his wife was a Government school Principal and that she too seemed to share some of my views and musings. He told us a story that had happened recently in her school which is located in slum area. A young boy, all of 13, came one hour late to school every single day. In spite of much reprimanding by his teacher he never changed his ways, and never gave a reason for his lateness but retreated in sullen silence his eyes smoldering with anger. He was, as is always the case, hauled up to the Principal for further action. She asked him the question again and was met with the same taciturnity. She then asked the teacher to leave, sat the child down on a chair and gently repeated the question. The boy revealed that he sold eggs every night near the local watering hole till 1 am. After some more gentle prompting he said that he was the sole bread earner of the family as is dad was a drunk and his mom did not work.

The Principal did not call child labour activists or officers. She just told the boy to try and wind up shop and hour earlier and get some sleep and come to school in time as education was the best way to better help his family even if it was selling eggs! You see unlike insensitive and uncaring law makers she understood the plight of the child and the importance of finding a middle path. Laws for children are often made in haste, to look good, to get international kudos, to meet world standards and in that haste the stark reality of survival is too often forgotten. It seems though that some like this kind Principal apply the laws with sagacity and humanity. Thank God for that!

Sorry for the digression but I had to share this story. I must admit that it also opened my eyes in some way. But let us get back to where we began. The 6 to 14. Now imagine the scenario I child gets into school in class I at age 6 and leaves in class VIII at age 14. During these years there are no Board examinations that are externally assessed and by law (s)he is not allowed to fail. Now in a good school this is not and issue. Honest assessments and internal examinations will ensure that (s)he learns what (s)he is meant to. But in the kind of school where our kids go this will not be the case. Even if there are examinations – as stipulated – the answers will be written on the Board and diligently copied. This happens with impunity. The 14 year old will come out of school as illiterate as ever and nothing will have changed. Had their been had of at least one final Board exam. things would have been wonderful. Wonder why our eminent law makers forgot that? Call me a cynic but my answer is that no one really wants education for the poor, it is part of a hidden agenda. Our 14 year old class VII will just join the teeming millions he was born in.

Is this the right to Education that the children of India deserve? Where is the elusive common school? Why waste money in another futile exercise? And finally how many more generations will the children of India have to wait for a real Right to Education?

From five to seven

by Anuradha Bakshi | Apr 9, 2010 | Uncategorized

Seven kids now study in boarding school so from famous five we have now become secret seven. Meher and Yash andhave now joined their seniors aka Utpal, babli, Vicky, Nikhil and Aditya and taken their first step towards freedom as Epicteus decreed: only the educated are free.

My mind zips back to the times when I was desperately trying to convince people that sending these very desperate children to a ‘good’ boarding school was the only way to allow them to break the circle of poverty they were lots in, the only way to ensure that they would not become child labour to help the family survive, the only ensure that they would regain their lost childhood and be freed of the absurd labels that our society sears on your soul the day your are born. True it came at a price but not an astronomical one, not one that was in excess of a meal in a posh eatery or the pair of shoes bought at a branded store.

I never expected the stiff resistance I got from all and sundry, people who could afford not one but multiple meals or shows in a single month! There were the cynics, the skeptics, the Cassandras of all shade and hues and even prophets of the doom. At first I could not understand anything as to me the fact of sending children to a good school was a win win situation, something that should be lauded and applauded. Then it slowly sunk in that in our society, one which is carefully and absurdly divided in hermetic boxes you do not cross over or step out of line and there I was committing the cardinal sin of crossing lines and breaking impregnable walls. All kinds of reasons were given to make me change my mind and not commit what was thought to be a social aberration. I was told that the children would never integrate, would never do well and more of the same.

Well dear detractors today I stand vindicated. The results have juts come and all our children have done extremely well be it in academics, extra curricular activities or simply conduct. And I am terribly proud.

You can see the results here.

Well done kids!

To greet the happy boy!

by Anuradha Bakshi | Apr 8, 2010 | Uncategorized

The child comes toddling in, and young and old
With smiling eyes its smiling eyes behold,
And artless, babyish joy;
A playful welcome greets it through the room,
The saddest brow unfolds its wrinkled gloom,
To greet the happy boy.