by Anuradha Bakshi | Dec 28, 2006 | utpal
It was a very special day, Utpal was to visit his mom. He got up early. wore his new sweater and shoes, and was all set to go. He has asked his best friend Kiran to accompany him.
His little head was filled with confused images. there was a time, only a few months ago when he and his mom and the man he called dad lived in a tiny room together. True that those days were sometimes not the best, but everything was bearable when one had a mom’s love, even if it was punctuated by drunken violence. Then one day, that little world came crashing. A long trip across town resulted in mom going to a rehab centre, and Utpal learning to live alone. he was just four!
His new world was filled with nice people, and pals and open spaces and song and laughter and though at first it was not easy, utpal the ultmate survivor set out to play his part with perfection. He made friends, walked into many hearts and stood first in his class. His mom fought her demons and in spite of all stuck to her programme.
Last month she was moved to a midway place where she was reunited with her daughter and ready to take te first haltinf steps into a new existence. Little four years old do not know how to express their inner most thoughts in words. If you want to know them you have to look with your heart.
I did not go with him, but six pictures said it all. We adults who have thought that a four and a half year old meeting his mother after some months would rush into her arms and smother her with kisses. Not quite. Utpal is not your regular four year old.
When his little world came to naught, it was Utpal who emerged as the man of the house. He let his mom go, not creating a scene and settled in his school knowing intuitively that this was the only way to heal his shattered family. But the long nights in a lonely place were not easy and even f he did not have the words it was time to show what he felt. As he entered the premises of karam marg he suddenly detached himself from the little group and walked on alone, like any little man would. And as his mom tried to hold him as if nothing ha happened, Utpal resented this attitude. What did not wash away the hurt s easily.
The silence was overflowing with emotions and unsaid words as he held on for a while, keeping at a distance, trying to make his mom understand. And then when he was ready, he walked towards her telling her that he cared and loved her but conveying at the same time that in this new journey they were beginning, he would show the was and set the boundaries.
They had reconnected but this was just the beginning…
by Anuradha Bakshi | Dec 24, 2006 | common school, reservations, two indias, utpal
Xmas has always been a time of joy and giving, of cheer and even miracles. As you grow up you stop believing in Santa, but there is always the anticipation of finding out what the little packets around the tree contain.
My xmas gift came a day earlier and in the most unexpected way. I had gone to fetch Utpal from his boarding school and attend his PTA! His teacher handed me his result and as I read it I realised that this was undoubtedly the most beautiful Xmas present one could get.
57/60 were he marks he got and an appreciation that included the word ‘excellent’. To some, my reaction would seem silly as Utpal is only 4+, but those who know him and have followed the journey of his life, this piece of paper is much more.
What a story of survival it has been. Barely 9 months ago Utpal had lost everything that makes a child secure and safe to the demon of alcohol. He had no home, no mom, no extended family and no support. Previous to that fateful day in April 2006, he had survived third degree burns and lived a life where each evening meal and night’s sleep depended on whether his mom had tippled nor not. Strange visitors, descents by cops and drunken brawls were usual occurrences.
When we found a school that would take him, there was an initial resistance: Utpal did not fit any mold, did not have the appropriate labels and social origins. But a young director took on the challenge and we waited with bated breath.
Six months and two school terms later, Utpal showed us what survivors are made of: he has a great support network in school ranging from the gently forbidding gatekeeper, to the class XII students and includes the hostel staff, the kitchen staff and even the principal. He still had one more point to prove, the one that rebuffs all the divisive policies that are kept on the boiler by dubious agendas and bear names like reservations or affirmative action. In the right environment, and with a peer group that cut across social and economic backgrounds, little Utpal topped his class in an English medium boarding school.
I have always said that the answer to India’s is a common school where children of all origins would learn together and from each other. Then each child just like little Utpal, will have the ability to make his place in the sun. It is not by creating a parallel school system, or by handing out a few seats and a few grace marks to humbler children that we will solve the now suspect education for all dream.
Utpal was an ideal candidate for begging at a red light. Drunk parents, a nicely scalded body and yet and incredibly beautiful face, and endearing ways. A little help from Mr God , and lots of help from friends who held on to our dream with us, made it possible for little Utpal to vindicate project why.
As I hold his result sheet in my hand, I stand very tall and believe in miracles!
merry xmas to all!
by Anuradha Bakshi | Dec 5, 2006 | ghaziabad girls, utpal
Once you choose hope, anything’s possible said Christopher Reeve and he knew what it meant.
In the past few days many have written about the plight of the ghaziabad orphans. Most have expressed anger, outrage and their desire to help the girls and see the abuser punished. Some have expressed their helplessness and hopelessness. This post is for these very people.
When project why began I chose hope. And it has not let me down though sometimes it is a long time coming. It is hope that saw many broken heart repaired, it is hope guided us through our worst moments when all seemed lost, it is hope that led me to act when I first came to know about the girls despite the fact that many had failed.
Tomorrow another story of hope crosses an important milestone. Utpal’s mom comes out of rehab and goes to very place where her daughter is now, a lovely NGO where she can learn many skills and prepare for her new life. And that is not all in a couple of weeks little Utpal will hoin them and the little family will be reunited.
All this because when I first saw Utpal at a time when everyone and everything had given up on him, I saw hope in his beautiful eyes, a hope I held on to..
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by Anuradha Bakshi | Nov 27, 2006 | two indias, utpal
Too many people are suffering
Too many people are sad
Too little people got everything
While too many people got nothing
We wile remake the world
With love and happiness
Remake the world
People, put your conscience to the test
Jimmy Cliff
Is this what these two little lads are singing. Maybe. Yet there is something wrong in this picture. Abhishek and Utpal should not be sitting together. If we had played by the rules, then one of them should have been far away in a dingy slum with his alky mom.
Yet today they sit side by side dreaming huge dreams in a world where everything is possible as no labels have been stuck to their heads yet.
Yes Sir, we are in India, in the one we all know, the one torn by caste, creed and shady agendas that hijack children’s hopes and aspirations.
Wonder where: in a little school tucked away on the fringe of the city, where the sun shines, and winds blow, where buffalos roam, and fields are green. Here children of all origins come together and discover each other. They learn, eat, play and sleep together and dream of remaking this world, their way.
When time is ripe for learning about labels, and differences, it will too late, or so I dare hope.
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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 | Oct 27, 2006 | two indias, utpal
The past two months were the most difficult in my life as I almost saw pwhy slipping away for no fault of ours and though the battle was uneven, the adversary formidable, there was an imperceptible force that egged me not to give up as hope was waiting at the next corner.
For the past seven years I have been overwhelmed by the love and affection that project why has been able to garner from every corner of the world and from the humblest to the greatest. With every passing instant I could sense an incredible web of goodwill being woven to protect us from each passing storm.
It was no mean thing as I stuck to my guns and maybe went against every rule in the book to the point that the only way pwhy could be qualified was by borrowing words from St Exupery’s Little Prince: a project that saw with its heart.
Amongst the battles I fought was my stubborn refusal to accept help that seemed to be rigid and ironclad or one that entailed complex administrative paperwork.
I had first stumbled upon Asha while browsing the net and liked what I ead. Who else could be better inheritors of pwhy then young successful Indians living away from their homeland. Unfortunately time was not ripe as my first forays into the land of hope were not quite successful as we met with hurdles though every time a wonderful and warm person was at the other end of the screen.
Somehow I could not puts across the very transient nature of the community I worked with where hidden enemies abounded be they social taboos such as caste or creed, violent and aggressive people or the powers that be that were hell bent on seeing me flee. So how could I ensure that one year down the line we would have the exact profile we began with. What really frightened us was when one day a person came and spent 2 days counting the kids! What would happen if we did not meet the specs?
Then one day a tall lanky man landed on planet why, armed with a camera and an incredible smile. In my usual style I drowned him with all that was bottled up inside me and he listened patiently. The man left promising to help and we carried on surviving as usual.
Last week while driving Utpal back to boarding – always a difficult moment – the phone rang. It was our tall lanky man telling me that Asha had agreed to help us in a substantial manner and above all that he would be the one we would interact with.
I cannot begin to covey the multitude of emotions that ran through me, but I think that the most important feeling was that my stand had been vindicated and that my seven long years battling alone had ended and that I had now reached safe shores. pwhy was safe and my swan song would live beyond me.
To all that have made this possible a big thank you, to all those that I may have inadvertently upset my heartfelt apologies and to Kannan Iyer simply that I believe in miracles.
Our Asha page is here
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