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Sonia Guha
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In
the early days of my childhood, whenever things were not done my way, I always
felt like running away from home. “Home” seemed to be a tiring place where
people cared too much for you. The soul wanted to go out of the room where you
were cornered by so many books waiting to be devoured by you. Or rather waiting
to devour you, taking you away from your wants, wishes and your fun and frolic.
For
me and for most children like me, I think, it would be more welcome than a
million dollars if parents and teachers would say, “From today you don’t
have to study and you can do anything you like and enjoy to your heart’s
content.” Well, it is just a utopian idea. This something never happened
before and may never even happen in the remote future.
So
one can weave a network of dreams, where they are influenced by the life of
these children whose house is the station or the pavement, whose bed is the
platform or the footpath, who work to make ends meet. The eyes staring out of
the windows of the multistoried buildings make these children their role model
as was Huckleberry Finn to Tom Sawyer and his friends. I always feel these
children so lucky, their life is like an adventure, alluring and fascinating for
me. So when I run away from home, I will take a job as a child worker somewhere.
The money I earn I will spend on forbidden things like chocolates and ice
creams. Then no one will run after me anymore telling me, “Eat your Food.”
No one tells the child worker, because they can hardly manage two square meals.
So I can eat as little as I want.
As
I will be staying down in the streets. If it rains I can get wet without anyone
to scold. As for studies, no mind puzzling math problems, no mugging up of
history answers. Life will be too good to be true.
But
the story is totally different on the other side for Babu, Rakesh, Bishu, Sanjay
and their other friends, who are all staying at Apan-Ghar, a rehabilitation
center for deprived children. When asked what they love to do the most, the
answer comes as a shock -- “Studying.” A surprising answer.
Most
of them were child workers who worked in households, as drawers of water for
their livelihood. So when they were offered an opportunity, they grasped it
gratefully and made it fruitful.
Child
labor and the life of street children will remain attractive until one gets the
real taste of it. These children are fettered with bonds of responsibility that
rob them of their childhood and makes them more like adults. They are not an
unruly pack of irresponsible renegades. They are a very struggling bunch of
children satisfying their family responsibilities in limited resources and
difficult circumstances.
These
children, from the early ages of five or six, are burdened with the worries of a
35- year-old man.
Their
work may range from rag picking to working in tea stalls, factories, etc.
Whatever may be the job, it is laborious for them, as these tasks demand long
hours for little reward and push them towards a dark and uncertain future.
They
are penalized in this way for faults unknown to them. It was not their fault
that they were born into poverty-stricken families or families where members are
addicted to drugs or alcohol. No doubt it is not our fault either.
However,
we the more fortunate can at least endeavor to dissolve the barriers between the
haves and have-nots, because the root cause of child labor lies in poverty.
Child labor must be eradicated from its very roots because it is no use chopping
off branches only.
We
boast so much of how we have progressed. Men can now create a human clone, walk
on the moon, and control the forces of nature.
But
do we even stop to think what good these countless achievements -- the discovery
of a new star so many light years away or a new moon of Saturn -- can bring in
the life of these innocent child laborers?
Is
it worth boasting about a civilization where so many children, deprived of their
basic rights, have their life getting darker and darker every day?
