Musings for a responsible society




Amidst the dark and grey shades increasingly engulfing, invading and piercing deeper and deeper, let me try to enjoy the little smiles, genuine greens, and the gentle breeze. Oh! Creator! If you don't exist, my life...in vain!
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20130316

My midday break with the pearls from the slum




Change brings fresh exposure and experience to life.  The most positive aspect of my present office is that it is surrounded by a lot of greenery and is located beside a large beautiful park. One good habit I started since last one year is to take a 20 minutes’ walk inside the park on every working day after lunch. People relax on the lush green ground, couples engage in sweet conversations, rare birds chirp and fly around gigantic trees, a few loners read books or plug to their favourite music, a handful of vendors sit quietly with large baskets of peanuts and churmuri, and some people plunge into deep thoughts and stay in an introspective mood, stimulated by the positive vibes of the natural serenity.

What really makes me happy and creative is none of the above. Last several months of midday break in this park, contributed to my personal enrichment, gave emotional satisfaction, and triggered a sense of fulfilment  thanks to a group of innocent children. This group of children are brought all five days of the week from their ‘homes’ located in a large slum 20 kilometres away in the Nayanahalli village. They come around 11 am and stay till 4 pm in a specific place inside the park.That is their school; a real open school.  Their parents are illiterate people and earn their livelihood as construction labourers, sweepers and vegetable vendors in various locations in and around the city.  They want these kids, who are between the age group 4 to 10 (none of them have any document to prove their birth or age), to do hard labour along with them in the site. They say, ’our  5 year old can fetch us about fifty rupees per day, when he is sent to the nearby marriage halls or restaurants for cleaning the utensils or when he comes with us to the site and helpss us in picking up bricks’. An NGO ‘Balutsav’ (an initiative of Child Empowerment Foundation India) started by the couple Ramesh Balasundaram and Binu Verma, has mustered the courage to talk to the parents and convince them about the need to educate these children
.
Encouraged by the success of the museum school in Bhopal,these children are taught about the country, its history, and about the nature, through regular visits to the Visvesvaraya museum located near the park. Padmini who was a trainer with Spastic Society of India for the past 15 years, supervises the children by spending her entire day on all the five days of the week. She is a successful mother who transformed her spastic child to a software graduate.  A typical day starts with a secular prayer, ('asto ma sadgamaya, tamaso ma jyotirgamaya, mrtyorma amrtam gamaya (click link for meaning)). This is followed by a few minutes of physical exercises and meditation. They are made to sit in groups of 10, each under a teacher. The teachers are girls in their early twenties who are also from the same slum. They are the few who know to read and write in the entire colony of about 1000 odd residents. These girls were given training by the NGO and they were happy to be called ‘teachers’. These ‘teachers’ along with the children pack two large containers containing rice and sambar and they are picked up from the slum in a van. Money is given every week to the ‘teachers’ to buy rice and vegetables to prepare the meal. These ‘teachers’ are also given a monthly honorarium.

Padmini with her students

Children in the slum hated schools earlier, because of a bitter experience. The teachers from the nearby government schools caught them one day from the slum and locked them up in class rooms for the entire day. That was the date of inspection in the School by the officials from the Department of Education for a physical head count of students. Once the exercise got over, these children were let go by the teachers. But the ‘imprisonment’ and mental torture made them hate the School, blackboards and teachers. The classes, the play, the food and the singing of national anthem in the open park have excited them and they have started liking slates, pens and alphabets.

My midday re-charging


I myself get my energies charged through my interactions with them. I found in their eagerness to learn reading and writing, a strong desire to come up in life. Children who were used to filthy words and messy life have suddenly become well mannered. They go back home spreading the positive messages to the parents and the neighbours. This has brought in attitudinal and behavioural changes in people living in that slum.

There are millions of children like the above group, who are unaware of the world beyond the hard labour in construction sites, vegetable markets, and back yards of hotels and marriage halls. Parents, feudal lords, labour contractors, and local goons exploit and abuse them verbally, physically and emotionally. They grow up with similar culture, behavioural patterns and character and propagate the same to next generation too. Fascinated by the prosperous lifestyle all around and yet deprived of the basic necessities, the younger generation who grow up in the slums would explore avenues to have quick money and enjoyment through any means. The present day system of schooling is unable to attract these children. Rather they prefer to run away from it. (Forget about them! Are our children in schools really enjoying the type of teaching there?) There is a need for more committed individuals, organizations and officials in the mission to rescue innocent lives from cruelties, abuses, exploitation and misery. 


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                                                                                          (c) Sibichen K Mathew

10 comments:

  1. Wasn't this type of school first conceptualised by Gurudev. Open air, amidst nature, freethinking educations that interests kids and is not something that is forced upon.

    Locking away kids in rooms to earn some brownie points with authorities! It happens only in India.

    Very inspirational post, somewhere, some good is being done which is making this earth spin.

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  2. Imagine sending all private school kids to the open park and allowing these slum kids entry into those posh class rooms!! Indian Government's 'Right to Education' Policy envisages compulsory admission to 25% of seats to the poor children residing near the school. Not sure, whether it is going to succeed as minority institutions have claimed exemptions from this. Yes, Meenakshi, such strange things happen in India. But I am optimistic.

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  3. I think children in America have more than they need and are not dedicated but in India slum kids are dedicated and are more into learning.
    From,
    Deepak

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  4. Thanks dear Deepak! You are absolutely correct. When there is prosperity all around we tend to forget about the value of every single blessing in the form of facility, resources or opportunity. Slum children, since they have nothing, value even a small kind gesture extended to them by the mainstream society. Thanks a lot to Deepak for reading and commenting and Prakash for sending it.

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  5. Beautiful idea. Unfortunately main stream certificate is needed for any job in offices or institutions in India..May be they'll take up their parent's jobs and do it with a difference and bring dignity to those jobs. Education makes a man dignified and knowledge brings light to his soul..God bless those who create a world for the 'forgotten' people of this world.

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    Replies
    1. Let us not wish them jobs of their parents! It is not that there is no dignity for that job. But let us wish them something better! I am sure NGOs along with the government agencies will find them suitable career!
      Thanks a lot Sindhu for your comments.

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    2. I don't wish them their parents' jobs. I said, they may end up in it... I wish them the job of their dreams, whatever it is. But at the same time, I still have faith in all the jobs of this world and I would never say one is better than the other. I assess people with their knowledge and wisdom. And I wish that the society will change for the better to know that it is not the job, but it is the society's hierarchic evaluation that puts people down stealing their dignity. And this is the reason why everyone aims for a job better than their parents'. I may be wrong..but I believe that an educated mason or carpenter or cleaner is the one who has the most to contribute towards the development of India. Skilled hands are assets. Society must know how to value them and reward them

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    3. You are right! Skilled hands are assets. And skilled people are scarce commodities (read: persons) these days. Like in many advanced countries, skilled workers like carpenters, plumbers etc would become the one of the highest paid people in all countries.

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