The growth of a child into an adult is much like the ageing of human skin. Skin at birth is petal smooth, it slowly hardens, till it gradually and eventually becomes crumpled up into a pile of wrinkles. A child begins his life with a crystal clear heart.
As time passes and he/she grows, the purity gets soiled by negative forces. These could stem from a plethora of emotions like lust, greed, desire for power and fame etc. And thus begins the gradual transformation from innocence to corruptibility.
When a tiny tot loses innocence, we call that adulthood. When he loses simplicity, we call it maturity. And again when patience and tolerance fail him, we misconstrue it to be his confidence.
The point I am trying to make here is that what we teach our children are only those things that matter to us. For example, how he/she must conduct himself/herself in public. Little do we realize there has never been and there never can be anyone, as polite as a youngster because he is like that from within.
The best expression of humanity is the most vulnerable life-form. And the need is to invest in his/her protection alongside spending billions in creating nuclear weapons.
Statistical justification to disburse more funds on them is also clear from the fact that about 100 million Indian children don’t go to school, nearly 35 million are homeless and over four lakh are reportedly victims of sexual exploitation.
Apart from these evils, there exists child rape, data for which is not collected on a monthly basis; then there is child labour and the problem of starvation and malnourishment to mention just a few more.
The shades of cruelty can be subtle as well. This is reflected by instances of coporal punishment and leaving him exposed to violent tendencies in his youth. Also other tyrannical acts may also result in instilling terror in a toddler’s mind, which subsequently may shadow him in the form of fear psychosis in his adult life.
Please remember your own childhood before you lay a finger on this bunch of sweetness. Get in touch with the child that is hiding in you. Don’t be at pains to keep it under wraps. What we call ‘a bundle of joy’ is the only saving grace in this stern world steeped in hypocrisy.
November 14 is Children’s Day. Let us make a vow to never let the child in us die.
This will be the best tribute to Chacha Nehru and his vision of India.
(The views expressed by the author in the blog are his/her own)