June 25, 2008
UK clothing firm Primark sacked three of its suppliers after a BBC report found out that they were using children in India to make some of their clothes. All this to benefit the children of India. I am not sure sacking the suppliers alone can help Indian children. In an ideal world, children should not have to work and they should all go to school and play. Unfortunately we are not living in an ideal world.
The children should be provided with alternative means before stopping them from work. Kids who were working for these suppliers were working to feed their family, their survival is now at risk. If not for Primark they would be doing it for others, because their circumstances leave them with no choice. The focus should be on the real issue of poverty, and the reasons why these children have to work. Ways should be found to provide these children with free education and more importantly enough food should be ensured for their survival. Till that is done working under tough conditions seems like a better option than starving on the streets. It is better than begging, prostitution or other such means of feeding themselves and their families. Denying these kids the opportunity to earn does not mean they will go out and play or attend school. It might result in starvation, malnutrition, sexual exploitation, even death.
The government needs to wake up. If we really want to do something for the deprived children, the wages of the parents of the concerned children should be increased so that kids can go to school. Family planning should be enforced and people having more than 2 children and forcing their children to work should be punished. Their ration cards taken away and more importantly their voting rights taken away. No politician will create hindrances in punishing the culprits, who procreate more mouths than they can feed, if they are not vote banks. Political will is the single most important thing if want to improve the lot of our children. Taking away their jobs and leaving them and their cause after that, does more harm than good.
June 21, 2008
All those feminists who complain and protest about women being portrayed as sex objects please pay heed to the woes of the women who are expected to behave like the females of the daily TV soaps.
Imagine what an average woman has to compete with-
The actress in the daily soap is beautiful, sexy, well dressed and smiling even in deep slumber. A lot of effort goes into those beautiful looks. Imagine sleeping in a sequined designer saree with a Kundan necklace and heavy earrings. She is an excellent cook and takes minutes to cook a tasty and wholesome meal for her kids, husband, in-laws and extended family. Her time management is perfect, rather unbelievable. She dresses up the kids for school, drops them at the bus stop, rushes home, cooks and packs lunch for her husband. Sends him off to work with a romantic peck on his face all this without a sign of fatigue. She sleeps after making everybody else comfortable and wakes up before anybody else has opened their eyes. Her house can compete for the the first prize if there was a competition for neat, contemporary and practical homes. Everything in its place both aesthetically and practically. At the end of the day when her kids are back from school and husband reaches home after a tiresome and sometimes frustrating day she is ready to absorb all their tensions with a smile. if the husband is not able to run the business for sometime due to certain inexplicable reasons she steps in his shoes. In her 2nd or 3rd meeting closes deals worth thousands of crores of rupees. The Ratan Tatas and the Ambanis will get inferiority complex if they watch this happening. The Ramu Kakas and Shanti Bais are well trained and well behaved (don’t know why she cooks herself with so much help available) and she doesn’t need to shout at her husband or kids to vent her frustration. For those of you who are wondering why not vent out stress on the domestic helps, any Indian woman can tell you that you can’t risk that.
Her children, are either thoroughly well brought-up and very well-behaved or villains who have to be made a part of the social main stream by sheer patience. At no stage does she lose her cool, her smile is her biggest asset. A perfect hostess to her husband’s friends and relatives and her children’s friends. The most capable and patient nurse if God forbid somebody in the family falls sick. Her prayers are most touching and moving. God has no choice but to answer her prayers and perform miracles when the doctors have given up hope.
Compare this super woman with your mother, wife, sister or anybody from your neighbourhood, town or city. You will find the real woman incompetent, haphazard and lazy. This is what you call maligning the good name of an average Indian woman!
June 17, 2008
Where there is a will, there is a Jugaad. Indians have innovative and personal ways to get things done; this is called jugaad. Jugaadu is a person who can find his way through any system and get things done even when the path is blocked. The Jugaad I am talking about is the result of this jugaadu spirit. I clicked these photos on my recent trip to Western UP.
If you are wondering what this vehicle in the picture is, this is a JUGAAD. It is near impossible to miss the sight of this innovative piece of engineering if you have ever visit Western UP. For the villagers of UP It is a popular vehicle of mass transportation. All you need to assemble this vehicle is a pump, a wooden plank and old tyres. A bullock cart trailer is attached to its rear, a steering attached to the shaft and a 12-horsepower pump engine added to this collage (all this is easily available locally), and lo and behold this vehicle is ready to carry 20-25 people. There is no registration required so it doesn’t have a number plate. According to the law any vehicle on the road needs to be registered with the transport authority but Jugaad is above all rules and regulations. A proof of Indian ingenuity and creativeness, jugaad demonstrates that Indians can find a solution out of any problem.
