I met a human… (2)

8 December 2009,

Blind People’s Association, Ahmedabad

It was truly heart rendering to meet all those enthusiastic job seekers with physical disabilities at Blind People’s Association! I was so lucky to be the part of this employment fair organized by BPA as I represented Cybersurf India where I work. The auditorium was filled with more than 300 aspirant persons with disabilities, and there were more than 10 representatives from different companies who wanted to hire these people according to their needs. Safal Group was one of these companies who have recently received an award for employing the most number of persons with disability.

Mr Bhushan Punani, Executive Director of BPA, hosted the event where they allowed all the companies to present their needs and the types of jobs they are offering. The count of jobs being offered reached to 250 jobs within a few minutes and the job seekers were thrilled to receive such offering on the day of the fair itself.

I interviewed more than 20 candidates for the computing and data processing related jobs. The amount of readiness and enthusiasm was really amazing in those candidates. Many of them could not walk and made their way into the room moving on the floor. More I was touched when I was being looked as a ray of hope for them! They thought I will give them a job and they will start sustaining a good life ahead. I wish I could employ them all in any way…

The event arranged by BPA is really appreciable and also the companies who are actively taking part and hiring the persons with disability deserve a great deal of respect. Here, in a bit different context, in the context of equality; these were all humans whom I met and I was delighted with the positive energy they had and also the companies and organizers who did put an honest effort to gather both on a platform.

One more incident which really touched me inside out and really made my belief strong that one does not have to be an intellectual or a scholar to be a good human being!

One of my good friends insisted me not to tell this to anyone, but I really want to put this here without mentioning his name…

There is a little boy of around 15-16, and he was working at his office as an office boy for Rs. 900 a month. He lost his father earlier and his mother works as domestic help in neighborhood.  That boy’s willingness to work hard and learn new things got noticed by my friend. He talked to him; put him in a computer class for 6 months. He and his girlfriend collected some 4,000 rupees for the course and now after a year that boy is earning 4,500 a month. The little boy is also more encouraged to work hard, to learn more and lead a better life.

I met a human again…

We Do Not Need GUJCOC!

Although I witness these issues closely around us, in my state Gujarat, in India, I closely relate this to each country, each society and community. The increased violence through out the world is the biggest concern.

Could any law or could any police stop a person who decides to kill himself to kill other people? No. Gujarat government is insisting on implementing GUJCOC, a proposition of an anti-terrorism law. Mr. Modi did not have time to educate people about GUJCOC because he has been very busy in preaching for writing post cards to the Prime Minister to advocate GUJCOC. It seems, only one person would decide what “sada 5 karod ni janta” should do.

I call this person as a man with the metal chest; Lawyer Anand Yagnik has shown the excellent example how to be in complete senses regarding political happenings and policy making from which normal people are alienated. (Ahmedabad Mirror, 26 September 2008 | “Do we need GUJCOC or a collective will to respond?”) He has tried to bring in this issue in the best possible way that people can understand GUJCOC and decide themselves that is it really needed? In further, it also doesn’t seem to be a law to control terrorists as the definition of organized crime (for which GUJCOC is proposed) is quite contradictory from what terrorists do. As per the Statement of Object given by Gujarat Government, “The organized crime has been for quite some years now come up as a very serious threat boundaries and is fuelled by illegal wealth generation by contract killing, extortion, smuggling in contrabands, illegal trade in narcotics, kidnappings for ransom, collection of protection money and money laundering etc.” Give it a thought; do terrorists want to do these killings for wealth generation? Do they place bombs for extortion or is this contract killing? Poor reasons!

Now let us put some light on provisions of GUJCOC (As Anand Yagnik brought them for us):

·         Every offence punishable under GUJCOC is cognizable

·         No Anticipatory Bail

·         Provision of bail is excessively stringent so as to keep accused behind the bars for a substantial period of time without trial

·         Confession made before Superintendent of Police is admissible evidence irrespective of how much an accused is tortured

·         Valid intercepted communication is also admissible evidence

·         An accused can be kept in the police custody for up to 60 days

·         The failure of police to charge sheet an accused does not create a technical ground for bail

·         Special courts permitted to have summary trials

·         Protection for witnesses

·         Property of the accused on a reasonable ground liable to be forfeited

There are two affecting factors of GUJCOC. First is the Statement of Object from state government. The definition of organized crime and actual terrorist activities are quite different. Let us come back to that core issue after we get to know powers and authorities requested in GUJCOC for the police.

Each of the provisions can easily be abused by the authority and we know how much we can rely on government and police authorities!!! Keeping an accused in custody for uncertain time up to 60 days, no bail, no trial and tortured confession is evidence; it is questionable if these clauses are not violating the human rights. Apparently, they are insisting on more power over society by proposing this law. The initial picture suggests that GUJCOC is needed to target some particular people and community and making them easy targets with the name of law. Well Done! Even if it is not so, then it is an apparent threat to each citizen. Who knows if your son, your brother would be taken to custody without any reason, just on the basis of suspicion!? We may not feel secure in our home, in our own city.

Now go back to the long term concern, as a few brutal minds are spreading terror and targeting innocent lives, anytime anywhere without any glitch. Again, can hard laws stop these people? I don’t think so. This is no more a matter of crime, violence and police. It has gone far out of the reach of law and order. Have we ever realized and related these incidents with naxalism? Although unpopular, it is a modern way to fight for existence and self-respect. The actors of recent incidents claim this as a revenge of Gujarat riots of 2002. Yes, revenge itself is immoral. But how long and how much one can tolerate? Terrorism is not a monopoly of Laden anymore. This is the age of home grown groups who drive these bomb campaigns from one city to other, another characteristic of naxalism! We may not be aware of the complete truth, but we can see what is clearly apparent. We have chosen not to see and not to consider some aspects of it, but in this case ignorance is sinful. We cannot undo what has happen; we also can’t keep blaming and keep moaning about the injustice prevailed and also that how legal authorities applied its stamp on it recently. Let us forget and forgive all those people who wore knives and swords as ornaments and danced over blood of thousands.

Society starts from home and the strongest instincts get developed in a child from its own family. Family is the most important and primary institution of a person in his social life. Parents do have to pour in right values in children from the beginning. Not only skills of singing, dancing and drawing are the parameters of a better person. We have to develop better citizen because after being a student for a few years, a person lives rest of her/his life as a citizen in the social context. How strong and how determined is this citizen who would never involve in such activities? How could a bunch of people preach us and overshadow our learning of life, which we received from our parents, schools and colleges? This is what we need to learn and teach. If they preach for revenge and killings, why can’t we teach to forget and forgive? Why can’t we teach to accept others? There are endless conflicts in diverse communities, from among the countries to families. But we have to live with it, as we live in our own families.

Let us start afresh. Let us concentrate on our own selves and find out, do we contain any bit of such poison within us? If yes, you really need a treatment. Open eyes and open arms, a lot would get better. If we see it real, it is real. We have to support and be with those people and communities who are suffering the most. To blame is easier, to give a hand of courage is what does matter!

We do not implement rule of stick if our child, our brother or sister is being stubborn, violent and out of control. We always keep patience and try to nurture them.

I would like to present this as a petition and want to know and show that we really don’t need GUJCOC! Please leave your name, email address and also your comments in order to sign this petition. Also forward this if you feel it is worth preventing our state from ghost of GUJCOC.

Morality Declines!

Children are the real asset of the country. How much care we are taking of our national wealth? The beauty of childhood has lost over parents’ hyper-sensitive approach for their children’s success, be it in school examination or in a curriculum competition. Success at any cost! There was a time, mothers sang poems and fathers swung their children in parks. Sparing designated time to children’s study as a part of daily routine for parents. Utmost they could do is to provide extra tuitions and expecting more hard work from kids in order to reach the top results. But the appetite for success has gone beyond limits.

Students are at immense pressure and it is more than ever. They spend hours at school, go for tuitions, spend their evening at learning swimming, cricket, singing, dancing or playing piano and then piles of home work and practice. Parents do not want their child to fall second in anything. We made up our minds before some time believing that it is a competitive age with the growing population and flooding opportunities in our country. We understood the seriousness of the contest in every domain. But we are facing moral decline against achieving success. It has been observed over the years that human morality is touching grounds in some cases, where people are vulnerable to any inhuman
act. Money can buy anything and anything could be done to make money. This modern philosophy is seemingly eradicating moral values in this generation of people.

As we have seen in recent board examinations in Gujarat, how money and power tried to rule over the ethos of education system. Last few days were completely shocking which ruined the trust over education system and teachers. We are yet to come over the pain of Patan incident. Teachers are playing evils and parents train their kids how to get success at any cost. Most basic sources of learning in a human’s preliminary life are not performing pure. Provocative media, conspiracies in public life, nudity served in news papers, pushing boundaries of entertainment world, and hardcore technological life style – all these have made our children grown before time and have left them with no ethical and disciplinary education. ‘Innocence’ has been isolated from children. Being responsible entities of the society we all – parents, teachers and all of us are accountable for it. It is in our hands, what we want our kids to be. The society expects and we are to decide between raising a clean human or encouraging corrupted success.

Sneh
Ahmedabad | 19 March 2008

NUDE CUISINE

Your eyes may remain wide open when you would hear the children secretly, who are as little as 9 or 10. You must have also seen sharply speaking and amazingly loaded little champs on television. All thanks to our ultra metro media and news papers, who help them grow very quickly. The biggest responsibility of the media is to evaluate any kind of material before they present it to the people. They are often the carrier of social issues, trends and accurate news not stories. Let’s blame the media some other day, but have we ever raised our voices against the nudity they serve in your daily news paper? No!

Times of India have been an authentic news group for long and now their supplementary edition Ahmedabad Mirror is at your doorsteps every morning. What you get is more than a few celebrities from Bollywood and Hollywood posing in two pieces. This has become the regular content. Why would you need them at all? Before nearly 5-6 years, even adolescences used to hesitate to touch the Gujarat Samachar’s Friday supplement ‘Chitralok’ contained with full size multi-colored celebrity pictures, in presence of their parents. But at present it is unavoidable as the leading news papers print them openly and every single day. They may argue, it is the news and we want to sell. There could be news about anyone but does it really need an attached nude image only? Accepting globalization, urbanization and being open-minded is good, but does it mean we get over our inherited culture and tradition of feminine respect and ethical preservation. How many of our parents do think seriously that what they want to give their child apart from education (which is also constrained to paying fees and hiring a school van only), food, clothing and other comforts? Most of them want their children to become an engineer, a doctor or a CA – how many of us think to pour in some values, ethics, public behavior and civic responsibilities to their children? Why don’t we protest against the local media for providing such immoral material!? I think we must. We need to open our minds rather than being over-open-minded.

Sneh Bhavsar