Exclusive India

Please don’t go by the title this post is not about anything that make us exclusive. It’s about how little we do to include everyone in mainstream. Ever since I became a mom I have been increasingly realizing how little do we think about inclusive society? Everywhere I go I am rarely able to navigate my baby’s stroller end to end.  Almost everywhere I have to physically lift and carry the stroller at least once. Every time I do so my brain goes to people on wheel chairs or to old people who are unable to navigate on stairs. This is gross neglect on the part of government and law enforcement to include differently abled or aged or little one in the regular life.

A few months ago I visited one of the very famous tourist spots in north India, with my family, which includes my infant. Almost for the entire trip to that place we had to carry baby in in our arms and stroller separately. The paths were not navigable. In fact I doubt my parents or any old people can visit the place. The place is huge with no resting places, no mechanism of early exits, only one way in and one way out. How does anyone expect anyone with difficulty in walking or small kid to visit?

Forget the tourist place I can’t even take my little one out for a walk beyond the premises I live in as most places are not accessibility friendly. What goes through the brain of the engineers who plan such places? All it takes is to build a few ramps instead of stairs. All the malls are accessibility friendly internally but there is no way to enter most of them on a wheel chair. Or to walk to them with a baby on stroller.

Sometimes people even go to the extent of saying that why do you want to go around places if navigating them is so difficult. What they fail to understand is that more often than not it’s a necessity.  All these people have a right to carry on their business on their own. Why does anyone think it’s okay to have places which can only be accessed by able bodied young people and everyone else does not need to visit them?

Who is responsible for the children of road?

So often we come across children selling flowers, pens, toys at red lights. We also see children cleaning cars at red lights. I fail to understand how this is happening right in front of eyes of the government.  This is everyday sight in the national capital region, makes me wonder about situation in remote areas. There are so many laws made about child labor and raids are conducted at homes, factories to save children from working. But still the menace persists. The root cause is that we blame the employers for employing child labor. Why are the parents of children left free? They are the biggest culprits in this whole mess. After all people should be made to realize the responsibility that parenthood brings with it.

Our country is the strange land there is so much emphasis on having children. Almost immediately after marriage couples are bombarded with questions about “Good News”. But no one bombards the parents about the upbringing. It is assumed that parents make the best decisions for their children even if children’s childhood is ruined. Parents should be made liable for their child’s future safety.

A man living in a shanty next to highway has had 4 children in last six years. All of them came into this world in the same shanty. None of the kids go to school. What are these parents thinking? What kind of life will they provide to their children? In my opinion they are committing a crime against humanity. The kids sit in dirt all day, they are suffering from malnutrition, they will never have access to any kind of education, their life is in danger all the time as they sit next to highway all day and now the eldest one who is not even a teenager has started working with his dad.  They say children are God’s greatest gift. Is this how you treat the greatest gift of God? By denying the child a healthy childhood one is denying them a healthy future.

Many developed countries have rules where they fix the responsibility of parents. Neighborhoods, schools, and hospitals play very important role in making sure that children are not harmed. Seems like in our country children have no rights and no one wants to fix this issue. I urge government of India to criminalize such negligent attitude of parents. 

I want to Thank God but Newspaper does not let me

Every morning I wake up and I try to thank God for giving me another day but as soon as I open newspaper I feel like going back to bed. Newspapers are doing a good job of convincing me that I live in the crappiest place. People in the region are the worst and everything is going down the drain. From the first page of newspaper to the last page every news is about shit happening around. There is no way one can feel good about life when you start your day with newspaper. For many years every morning a lot of people like to wake up with their cup of hot tea/coffee and latest newspaper, this might change. For quite some time I have been opening newspaper only to throw it away in disgust. All these large publication houses who have army of reporters never have anything good to report.

It’s not just print media news reporting on TV is also the same. We are in a serious shortage of genuine reporters. Last night I surfed through 9 news channels and eight of them had exact same shows. All of them had panel of four “experts” who are not so expert discussing the same problem. It was unbelievable. Was there nothing else to discuss in the entire country? Where is the originality? Right now while I am typing I surfed through the news channels and some of them are showing news others are shoeing recap of TV shows, some have some Babas solving people’s problems on phone, some news channels are showing the horoscope. It’s sad that none of the channels is showing any documentary. There is no investment by anybody in news business on unearthing realities. All the news is about sensational news.

Can’t forget the time when every news channel in the country was reporting about a child who fell in the pit. After that every second day similar news followed. Then there was the day when for one full day all the news channels were showing news of tiger killing a man in Delhi zoo. There was also a week when every news channel was showing news about government of India Digging up earth in some village because some Baba claimed that he dreamt of gold hidden there. Later there was no update about it. Whether they found gold or not nobody reported.

There is little to no world news reaching Indian audience who do not speak English. And there is no local news reporting either. All the news is about Delhi and politics, films, cricket and scams. I would like to believe that there could be more to news than these four elements. The world is constantly changing and we hardly get know about the world. When people talk about foreign countries they talk about USA, UK, Canada and Australia. There is much more to the world than just that.

It’s time to wake to better news reporting.

I would love to wake up with the newspaper in hand one that has a positive, happy headline. At least the news that makes me thank God for giving me this day.

Let's play

Recently there was a lot said about Olympic medalist Vijender singh joining professional boxing instead of continuing with amateur Boxing and playing for the country. What’s the big deal if a person wants to move to a different ladder when the old ladder is broken? Everyone is criticizing him for not waiting till Rio-Olympics as he was one of the very few people from whom we expected a medal. Looking at the direction Indian boxing is heading one can say Vijender made the right choice. He took the risk and showed the young boxers who sit there cribbing that IABF is doing enough that make your own way. Even the Government of India will probably wake up and provide better facilities to players when it sees a few good player quit playing for the country. What’s interesting is that no one questioned the cricketers when Indian eleven did not play at the Asian games 2010 and 2014. Seems like it’s acceptable that cricketers can make money for themselves but all other players are not allowed to think like that.

We often see the how badly are our players treated. Some of them are able to get laurels not because of the system but despite the system. That’s the exact reason why many players quit and never want their children to be sports person. Players do not have all their life to play. Their sports career is limited by age. If they do not make enough money in that short span they will probably have to suffer later. We can see numerous examples of national level sports players living in poverty. Its time they all decided to take things in their hands and change direction and start playing for clubs or other leagues to make money. After all sports may be their passion they still need money for living. Often prize money is announced but rarely do the players get their real share. the prize money us not released or is tied in bureaucratizes. Why will anyone care to play for the country when the country does not care for them?

Interestingly with all the corruption allegation IPL may be maligned but it has paved way for many players not just in cricket but other sports to get fame and money for their talent. Looking at success of IPL many more leagues have been launched like Hockey India league, Indian Super League, Pro Kabaddi League, Indian Badminton League.  These leagues help raise money, bring fame to the talented players, give exposure about games other than cricket to our younger generation and above all provide a chance to our players to play with international players and get insight into their style.

This is history in making. When government failed to provide support, commercial interest of the league organizers helped the players get necessary support. These players are now becoming house hold names and it’s nice to see kids be interested in sports. As the pro kabaddi league season begins I can see children in the park playing kabbadi. When we see children getting connected to the game that was invented in our country and the one where we are the undefeated champions at Asian Games one cannot help but smile. 

Discounts Discounts everywhere not a thing to buy

It’s raining discounts all over the real and web markets. Everything seems to be on discount and everyone claims selling at lowest price ever. It’s all becoming so damn overwhelming and the next discount announcement will make me nauseous. The discount percentages are also mind boggling it starts at 50%off and goes up to 80% off. Sellers are complaining that it’s getting unsustainable for them to offer such heavy discounts. But it’s not making the buyers happy either. Every time I buy something I have the feeling that I have made a bad deal I would have got the stuff somewhere else for a lower price. The joy of getting something new is masked by the anxiousness of making the right decision.

At first I thought I was saving time when I was shopping online. I was saving time by not physically going to the markets and wandering from one shop to another. But now I realize that I am spending more time while shopping online. The amount of time and energy I am spending researching for the deals of products that I don’t even want to buy is far much more than what I would have spent had I gone to a market. I spend hours going through the website window shopping and sometimes adding stuff to cart adding anything that like not necessarily need. At the end of the numerous hours wasted I simply close the window and forget about the cart.

Sometimes the websites remind me about the items in my cart and sometimes they don’t either ways I rarely go back to the cart and buy stuff.

Sometimes I really need to buy something and I spend not just hours but days researching about the product and then its deals and buy the stuff hoping that I have made the right deal only to realize the very next day that i could have wasted some more time and found a better deal.

All this is crazy. If time is money as they say, I am really wasting a lot of it shopping for things I don't need and in return getting some discount. The sad part is I will still continue with the madness because I feel I will be saving money.

Great Expectations : Indian Parents

My heart goes out to all the people in business of educating children, be it school, tuition, or training kids for any sports or activity. Parents have becoming soooooooooooo demanding that it’s impossible to meet their standards. Every parent I come across is complaining about the school, the teacher, the facilities. When did we become such a whining society? Not too long ago or may be long ago parents taught kids to worship teachers.

I met one parent who says I don’t like “X” school because they pressurize the kids to study a lot leaving no time for any of the other activities. The other parent says my kid’s school is all about activities and they don’t pressurize students in relation to academics. One more mother says the school is good and everything is fine except that the classrooms have no air conditioners. About another school they say it’s a nice school but classrooms have about 40 children. To top it all I met a parent who said I am to not happy with my child’s school because my child is always very happy there, they make the environment to happy for the kids and they will not realize realities of life. Life is difficult so the schools should teach even that to the kids. Then when I suggest the name of one very famous school they say it has everything right but it’s expensive.

“OMG! if was a school I would have killed myself.”

So basically parents want a school where the teachers are very very good, extracurricular activities are world class, class rooms and bus air conditioned, not more than 20 kids in a class and all this at a nominal fees. Just that nothing much.

 I agree that everyone has a budget and everyone has a set of expectations. So make a list of your expectations, make another list of schools that meet the expectations and in budget and choose the option. If the list of expectations is unending you will never be satisfied and will constantly complain. When parents talk negatively about the school or teachers in front of kids, kids pick that up and stop respecting them.

I remember being taught

“Guru Govind dono khade, ka ko lage pain;
Balihari guru aapko, govind diyo bataye.”

It means: - if I meet both God and my Teacher at the same time and would be in dilemma as to greet which on first, one would choose teacher first as he is the one who showed the path leading to God.

That is the great place of teacher in our mythology.

Without realizing the harm parents are doing to the kids by complaining about their school or teacher in front of them parents keep doing it. Kids idolize their parents and when they see parents have no respect for school or teacher kids also have no respect for them. Every parent wants the best for their kids and it’s absolutely right, and it’s very good to take an interest in kids’ education. But always looking for the negative side does not help. So make an informed decision when choosing your child’s school and try to understand school’s limitation also.

We may never find Utopia

We are probably the only species that can be accused of hypocrisy. Often our drawing room conversations are about topics that make us sound intellectual, secular, and sometimes even leftist but when we move out of the drawing room to the road of realty we follow the path of me first. We will fight for equality of we are the ones getting the advantage but as soon as we are the ones losing our slogan turns to be each one for himself. We are the species that respects no boundaries. I have heard stories that animals define their areas and sometimes battle for it but once decided they respect the boundaries. But we are the gifted species we have the gift of greed. We want everything for our own consumption.

“The world has enough for everyone's need, but not enough for everyone's greed.”-by Mahatma Gandhi is so true.

The culture where everyone every moment is running the marathon called BEST. I want the best dress, the best school, the best college, the best job, the best holiday, the best blah blah blah, all this nonsense without having any idea about the best. Why can’t we be simply enjoying every moment with what we have.

It’s always good to improve and to compete with one’s own self but to run behind a mirage called success, or BEST is a waste of time, health and energy.

Interesting historical incident comes to my mind. The Government in one country (I don’t want to name the country coz the news channel news could be biased) wanted to bring equality in society by introducing equality in education. So all the neighborhoods had government run schools. Simple assumption would be that as all kids go to government run schools they get to mix with kids of all backgrounds in their school and the playing field will be leveled. But it did not happen so. Eventually people started realizing that some schools had better results. Reason could be any maybe a few teachers were better and schools that had those teachers were lucky. Now everyone wanted their kids to go to those schools where results were better. Eventually the property prices in those areas began to rise because of the demand for houses in the areas. And the society segregated itself into rich and poor neighborhood. Again we had a situation where kids of rich people went to a particular school and got better results creating inequality.

Unless the fundamental frame of human mindset changes inequality is the bitter truth we will have to learn to live with.