by Anuradha Bakshi | Feb 14, 2006 | Uncategorized
In my previous post I wrote about meals in loos.. there were some comments on this post and one that disturbed me. It said:
…to me its quite OK ,i am sure there are many more schools in India which dont get anything to eat, let alone the ones stored in toilets…
Yes I agree there are things much worse but does that make it OK..
The same person also wonders why one has not done something, made a noise, gone to court, to the media.. my answer may surprise many but here it is for whatever it is worth..
I think that all of us know that making a noise does not do much good… the noise lasts till a louder one silences it… and then what do you make the noise about.. it is not a matter of meals in loos, it is the larger issue of government assuming the responsibility of giving education to children as per the 92nd amendment of the constitution..
It takes two to tango, so only when the other side of the spectrum is empowered to demand for its rights will things change.. it is a long and silent road, but is one that will reach its destination..
Today government schools are feudal and the teachers lord over his fief made of illiterate parents and vulnerable kids, where sticks and insults are the weapons used to silence anyone that dares say anything..
In the past years we have taken on many issues but often found that the making a noise has often had adverse effect. Some time back, we tried to tackle corporal punishment in schools by brandishing cour orders and seeking media support.. it did make front pages but what ensued was the targetting of all pwhy students by teh school authorities..
It takes two to tango and change can only come when the end users are able to stand for their rights.. armed with all the knowledge that have been kept away from them and the tools that they can have access to be it the Right to Information Act or the simple ability to read. So my answer is yes, we are doing something.. our way!
by Anuradha Bakshi | Feb 9, 2006 | Uncategorized
Many may have seen the evening news programme that showed a municipal school in Delhi where midday meals were stored in toilets and even classes were held in bathrooms.. a shocking revelation for sure.. but as I looked at the pictures of this resettlement colony school on the outskirts of delhi, I saw much more..
What some may have not noticed was the number of eager students, their eyes shining, a touching proof of their desire to be there.. in this temple of learning where their eyes did not see what was missing: they had a school and that was what mattered..
Slums get relocated to areas where there areno schools or school such as this one. Many of these children must have attended a school somewhere in Delhi where their homes was earlier.. on paper the authorities will show that the restelement colony has all amenities and necessities..never mind if the school is too small, does not have teachers, drinking water or electricity.. there is a school and the paper work is complete.
The children in this picture come to us in the morning after a cup of tea and maybe a bad quality rusk.. they carry no tiffin boxes and will go to their municipal school at 12.30pm where they will eat their midday meal: often a small bowl of rice or two poories. That will be the only sustainance they have till they reach back home around 6pm. Many may not know it but for many children the midday meal is not an addition to a normal diet but simply replaces one meal. The government was right when they said that the midday meal would incite children to attend school but what one sees is a something else.. I was told that in Bihar a district official had decided to hand out dry rations as an incentive. Often the collected rations of siblings provide the family with a decent meal.. maybe a better option that one should look at..
What makes one sad and angry is that where children are concerned every thing offered is short of.. something.. why can we not go all the way and provide the children a school with all amenities, many guaranteed by the Constitution..
In the same news bulletin there was an item about the enormous amounts of MPs unused funds, funds that should have gone to build infratructure.. and when funds are used as we have seen in our own area, they are used to make a skating rink where no one skates, while schools are without toilets..
This is a time where people like us should ask questions and see that the gap between laws and implementation is bridged: be it the court order on medical care or the constitutional right to basic education..
It was heart wrenching but also heart warming to see a little girl say in the very programme that depicted the sad state of her school how she enjoyed coming to learn her alphabet and her tables.. for that is why she came to school..
The children of India are the best you can have, we do not have the right to let them down.. and if we do we must be prepared for consequences and ready with answers..
by Anuradha Bakshi | Feb 6, 2006 | Uncategorized
Last week bulldozers raised MG 1 or the mecca of the fashion industry in India’s capital city and our page 3 went up in arms.. TV programmes, newspaper articles, impassioned debates abounded.. even divine intervention was sought as pujas and yagnas were held…
Let me take you back to a couple of months when tens of thousands of homes were reduced to nought on the banks of the Yamuna.. and families and belongings carted on trucks and sent to barren land almost 50 kilometers away..
In the first case it is true that there has been great visible loss of property and immense erosion of pride but in the later case the loss was far far greater, albeit invisible: it was the anhilation of dreams and hope: many children could not sit for their Boards, families lost their livelihood let alone their shelter…
Let us be realistic what applies to Peter must to Paul.. and the culprits are the same: vested interests, vote banks, corrupt individuals – the list is endless.. and as was evident in a high rated talk show, the solutions seem few and hazy..
But one has to realise that whatever solutions come they have to be applicable to both ends of the spectrum. One must not forget that the high profile designer and the slum dweller are protected by the same constitutional rights and both have roles to play in the life of the city. If one stopped to think for a second one would realise that many of those who made MG 1 exist and thrive are probably people who live in slums under the threat of bulldozers…
Every city has to have a housing policy for the poor within the city; we are talking of the press lady, or the ones that come and help you in your home.. it is simple people who are an integral part of our every day lives… So let us hope that out of the high profile destruction will emerge solutions that will benefit all.. and that for once vested interest will think beyond the next election and the quick buck..
Note:
Three years ago, on xmas eve, we faced bulldozers that brought down a simple tent we had erected in what was orginally a MCD slum wing children’s park but had gradually eroded into a pig’s park filled with garbage and excrement.. that was the space MCD officials had given us to teach in.. thinking we would run away.. but we had painstakingly cleaned the park, and planted trees and erected a happy yellow tent where over 300 kids studied.. I am not reviving this incident to settle scores, but simply to tell one how shattered one feels when bulldozers destroy something you have built with hope..
by Anuradha Bakshi | Feb 4, 2006 | Uncategorized
It’s back.. the smile that kept us going through many ordeals…it’s back after five weeks in hospital wards, and operation theatres and more such places, and even if nanhe is a little tired and a little thinner, the smile is beaming and larger than ever..
You guessed right, nanhe is back in his tiny home, not larger than a dining table but huge when it comes to happy thoughts and positive energies.. True he still needs an operation but that is later..
The few minutes we spent with him and his radiant family were some of the most beautiful ones I have known for long.. Nanhe just hugged me and nodded his head at everything I said; he just had one request: to come back to pwhy! So he will, from Monday onwards..
I sat and watched, through blurred eyes, this brave little family: the mother who never gave up and patiently and tenderly tended to her frail cherub.. Mamta the 16 year old sister who held the fort while mama was away and even ran the vegetable cart.. the bewildered granny who had come from the village to help her brave widowed daughter… what a bautiful picture they made cluttered in the room where there was no place to breathe..
How blessed we were to be with them.. and I am sure Chauncey Olcott & George Graff, Jr. will forgive me if I substitute a few words and share with you their famous song: when Irish eyes are smiling:
When nanhe’s eyes are smiling,
Sure, ’tis like the morn in Spring.
In the lilt of nanhe’s laughter
You can hear the angels sing.
When nanhe’s heart is happy,
All the world seems bright and gay.
And when nanhe’s eyes are smiling,
Sure, they steal your heart away.
by Anuradha Bakshi | Feb 2, 2006 | Uncategorized
Hours after I sit and wonder at how exposed and vulnerable you feel when faced with the death of a child… a life taken away before it even begins..
You try to find answers that would help comprehend.. you need those answers to carry on, even if you have to invent them… In India we have a convenient panacea to all that defeats logic.. so if something is not the way it should be it is bad karma, and if another has windfalls it is good karma.. and then you delude yourself by saying that all will be well in the life yet to come..
Now Chetna’s loss would be her parents bad karma.. but what karma explains this little life of barely a hundred days that were replete with jabs, pokes and pain..
Lat week a woman was beheaded in the jhuggi next to the one where we hold our secondary classes.. a muslim woman who defied social mores and left husband and child to marry a hindu man years younger.. they used to make stuffed toys and rarely mixed with others.. wonder what karma that was..
For a long time I wondered whether I could have done things fatser.. but from the day I met Chetna she was under medical care… and in her case funds that are normally long to come by, were raised in no time… how smug I felt thinking that this child would get her surgery at the right time and not have to gasp for years before fate conjured the right stars..
I guess this was maybe a way of ensuring that I do not start having delusions of grandeur and understand the limits of what I can do.. and yet it does not deter me from knowing that I have to carry giving it my very best..
by Anuradha Bakshi | Feb 2, 2006 | Uncategorized
You would all agree that terminal examinations are meant to assess performance and help improve the same. You will also agree that an exam has no relevance if marks are not given to the student… well not so in our city….
In December all municipal schools held terminal exams but the children were not given their marks..we needed the marks was to prepare the children for the end of year examinations which are round the corner.. we asked pwhy kids to request the teachers to give them their results.. we were horrified by what ensued..
The children were not given the marks. Two of them were even slapped for having dared ask!
Our staff did a round of the municipal schools our kids attend and except for one girl’s school which extended full cooperation, all others refused.. it was almost as we were asking for state scerets..
The worst experience was in the boys school where Jitendra and Hemraj, the two boys who were slapped study. This temple of learning seems to be set in the dark ages and the teachers out of a sombre dickensian novel. Chaos reigns amidts aggresive behavior and total apathy.. Our little team was treated with contempt and absence of courtesy.. what infuriated them was that no one seemed to comprehend why one was asking for marks.. Jitendra, a good student, was dismissed as a worthless one, defying all principles of basic child psychology…
The school was filthy and as teachers chatted in a group, children were busy fighting and using bad language.. the whole atmosphere was one of belligerence..
A perfect place to learn bad language, aggressive behavior and bad ways.. so why wonder when children from slums turn out the way they are..
The most important element in the adventure call learning is the teacher.. this is something that our law makers and leaders should understand..
