by Anuradha Bakshi | Sep 24, 2006 | Uncategorized
The airing of video images of AIIMS student’s burning Dr Ambedkar’s books sent a chill down my spine. Images of a doom-laden future flashed by my mind.
The reservation issue is going out of hand and unless it is addressed by non-political citizens our land may become unsafe. I would like to ask the students who committed this horrendous act whether they remember Dr Ambedkar has being the main author of the very constitution that allows them to express themselves, albeit negatively. I would like to ask the pro reservation students whether they realise that no child asks to be born in a particular family? Can I ask them to remember that all Indian children are born in the same way, after a gestation of nine months and are protected by the same laws? And finally can I ask them where this hatred will lead in an already electrically polarised society.
I have seen that a mere fight between two ladies over the issue of a petticoat to dry turned into a caste riot in seven minutes. Is not the duty of educated and supposedly high caste students to heal rather than aggravate. Can I also ask the students to look at their other caste peers with their heart and not with borrowed vision and find if there is anything to hate. Or in a gandhian way can I ask these angry children of India to take one tiny dalit baby and give him or her the same childhood and teen years as they had and then to see whether they are still worthy of hate.
My mind boggles at all the questions that are choking me. I am neither pro nor anti reservation. I just want every child to be given the same opportunities and then find his or her place in the sun.
is that asking too much?
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Sep 24, 2006 | Uncategorized
The de-recognition and thereby shutting of over 1000 schools in karnataka as they did not comply to a law passed many years back brings to fore once again the reality that education and the welfare and rights of children ranks very low on the political agenda of our country.
After the festivities a myriad of kids will find out that they do not have a school left. The debate of mother tongue versus English is an adult’s debate, children follow what they are told to. True that an English divide exists in our country but then can one forget that after 60 years of linguistic debate the problem of a national language has not been solved.
Today many parents living in slums plunge in their meagre pockets to get their children, sadly often the boys, in to what boasts to be an English medium school, even if it is a commercial teaching shop where no one speaks English.
When Ataturk decided overnight to change the Turkish language script as he felt that the children of his country did not need to be burdened by two scripts, he was traveling in the future.
Of the many commentators who spoke on the issue, one rightly felt that all children should go to the same kind of school where maybe 3 subjects could be taught in English and the other 3 in the regional language. makes sense to me, as I agree totally to what the same person said when he pointed out that those speaking the loudest on the issue have their kids study in up markets English language school!
When I came back to India after 16 years of living in other lands, it was a matter of pride to say that you had scored low marks in your lower Hindi paper, and all Hindi speaking peers were called Behanjis or Bhaiyyas.
I have always been comfortable speaking Hindi as my mother devised the best way to teach a child growing in a host of lands her mother tongue: she just spoke Hindi to me from day 1 and I was very surprised to know that she did she did speak English when I was six!
The great English divide has to come to a long awaited end, but it can only come when the upmarket people accept to send their children to the government run school down the road!
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Sep 23, 2006 | Uncategorized
When I look at little Komal who can barely see or hear, I wonder how long it will take her to learn the value of words.
I am sick and tired of words: words of praise, words of anger, words that hurt, words that hang without meaning, words that vanish into thin air as they are uttered.
Someone said: Words should be used as tools of communication and not as a substitute for action”.
Frankly I have started to doubt everything I hear. My inbox is filled with words that remained words for as soon as they need to be translated into action, a myriad of reasons spring from nowhere as grim deterrents. The one reason that seems to always be at forefront is mistrust.
It is a sad reflection of our society that we are ready to mistrust everyone and everything. We stop looking with our own eyes, be they that of the heart or that of reason, and conveniently apply the a foregone conclusion. So even if you have shown staying power of over six years and adequate results, helped children stay in school and repaired broken hearts, you are still not be trusted. And why should you, everyone around is screaming the contrary, be it our rulers or our peers.
A quirk of fate has suspended one of our main accounts, and it is strange that rather than fight it tooth and nail which is what I would have done barely a few months ago, I have almost welcomed it. It has enabled me to put my team to the test and find out whether they have understood that you have to fight for your right and prove yourself. No remuneration for the past two months and a challenge thrown to them of meeting half the running cost if they want me to check back in again or they risk having their sections closed down.
Much as the story of the wolf that never was till the day it actually came and no one turned up, it has taken them some time to realise that unlike the past, this time it was for real.
Unless everyone realised that they are responsible for what happens around them, change can never come. So shock therapy is sometimes needed.
What will be the outcome only time will tell. The worst case scenario is another trip to the labour court aptly prompted by hidden enemies, but how has always become used to it, the best is my team taking on the responsibility of collecting funds and moving out of their torpor.
I wait and watch from the wings, a sometimes amused smile on my face..
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Sep 21, 2006 | Uncategorized
yesterday two children died in the cross fire the police resorted to, to quell angry mobs.
The mobs were exercising their democratic right to dissent against what has become a Kafkaesque cat and mouse game between the authorities, the courts and the people of Delhi.
For the past year the citizens of not quite understood the urban laws of this city that has grown defeating all rules. But were there rules one may ask?
Maybe they were, but a host of options were graciously made available provided you were ready to ‘pay’ for them. Once in a while a cosmetic drive was undertaken but to no avail.
Some of us stuck to the law and were often made fun of, as one’s old house stood amidst the new builder’s monster that mushroomed around us, even taking away the rays of sunshine that use to stream every morning in our rooms.
To say one was not tempted would be an untruth, but then the old precepts one was taught came rushing to your mind. the law will catch up one day, you must stick by the rules, even it means waiting at a red light in the dead of the night when no cars ply; but how can one forget the death of a dear friend when a truck came rushing a deserted crossroad breaking a red light and keeling a young mother.In today’s India sticking by the rules lands you in labour court, earns you unpleasant attributes and labels, and makes you the laughing stock of cocktail parties.Today in the prevailing confusion no one knows what will happen.
I know for a fact that many small shop keepers ear a day to day life, and if deprived of their income will have none at all. Laws when broken with impunity land you in situation when sifting out the honest from the guilty becomes an impossible task. but one must remember that when it is a question of livelihood, seemingly placid people turn violent, the French revolution is a sad reminder of that.
Two children died, but would there death solve anything or will they become a sad statistic in Delhi’s history. what frightened me yesterday was the reaction of the powers that be of were trying to explain the situation away with priceless inanities: politically motivated, passing the buck to those who ‘paid’ for services etc…
We all know that justice the symbol of justice is a blindfolded lady, but can we beseech her to open one eye and see with her heart before more children become sad statistics.
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Sep 19, 2006 | Uncategorized
I could not resist writing about an experience I had today when I took myself off to the District Courts to register my will.
After being mobbed by all the notary and lawyers who sit at little tables with antediluvian typewriters in a neat row, like a bunch of crows waiting for the prey, we selected one who looked kind, though I do not know whether that was true.
I had printed my will and I think the man felt a little let down as he tried to show me the formats he had, all written in the language of the raj.
Then we proceeded to the signatures and I fell of my chair when he brought out a used ink pad and asked me to put the prints of my thumb then my four fingers under my name.
Thinking I had heard wrong, I told him that actually the document would only be read after my death and that by then my ashes would have been blown in the wind so how would they check my prints in case of doubt. He looked at me with extreme seriousness and told me that it was required. I dutifully did what told.
Later I realised that probably this was probably a legacy of the raj, where buried bodies could be exhumed. And no one had bothered to amend the rule, just as the other law that allows the state into bedrooms of consenting adults in the name of morality and that is being challenged.
I wonder why we are still ruled by a penal code that is over a 100 year old and was made by erstwhile rules. Maybe it is time to think about it as the only way a person of Hindu faith can have finger prints on record is to become a criminal.
Not my cup of tea!
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Sep 13, 2006 | Uncategorized
I have often wondered what is it that makes pwhy such a menace to local powers that be. Why is it that we get dragged to the labour court, accused of nefarious activities, ranging from pandering to stealing. Why is it that each time we solve a problem and start thinking that things are behind us a new problem arises, a true hydra headed monster with an elusive neck!
I have been mulling over this not quite finding a satisfactory answer. It hit me yesterday like a bolt out of the blue.
Education, a threat says who? Says ‘they’ say I is my answer. How can the little boy and his copy book can be a danger to anyone. The answer is that if he is given an empowering education than he is a huge threat to the existence system.
Let me elucidate this. Since the reservation issue aptly referred to as Mandal II raised its head and the issue of the creamy layer came up, I decided to ensure that all pwhy kids who fit into any reserved category should have the certificate to prove that. As usual I asked one of my staff members to find out, as he too is a contender. The answer was the usual I get, one that till date I did not doubt: I will check up with the local corporator’s office. Why should I question this, is the corporator not the representative of the people.
The next day I got my answer which was something like: there are no forms, they have not come picche se (from behind), they may come soon. Normally I do not dispute such answers but this time it disturbed me. No matter how badly executed we have a sound democratic system, at least on paper so of I went to friend google and of course in a matter of seconds found the forms waiting to be downloaded as well as the required information on how to apply.
That is when I realised the power of the kind of education I dream of, one that empowers. The cynics will say how can you teach everyone to search the net. My answer is simple yet sound, till we cannot get the kids to, we can show the parents the way: find someone to check for you!
Today I will walk to pwhy with the forms in my bag ready to be photocopied in as many numbers as wanted. When they reach the local politicians for countersignature I know I would have jumped a few places and be closer to the top of the wanted list, but I also know that I would have walked a huge step in the right direction and someone would have lost a bit of his hold.
It is another matter that some of the required stipulations have to be challenged in court as to get a caste certificate your family is required to have lived in Delhi since 1951. What about the 10 million who came after. Well they have to go seeking their Patwari. My question then is how come you are willing to give voters ID cards or whatever else is needed for your benefit and not what might help your potential voter. the answer looms larger than life.
No wonder that no one wants to get the creamy layer excluded.. wonder who would apply for the reserved categories in med school , IITs or IIMs then?
Somehow it maybe easier to call the bluff for by campaigning for the right to a certificate for every potential beneficiary. Is caste not an intrinsic part of a population count
P.S. while browsing the net for programmes for handicapped kids, I found out that most apply to those whose family earns less than six hundred rupees a month. Wonder which planet they live on
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