Towards a bright future

I have been regularly watching this programme “Achamillai Achamillai” in Jaya TV. The meaning of the title is “Fearless Fearless”. This line reminds me of the great poet Subramani Bharathiar. Mrs Lakshmi, Film actress hosts this program very well. She involves herself so deeply with the participants and questions them with great love and passion. She could put herself in the participant’s shoes, and delivers the message very clearly. I am sure that this program should be reaching the mass in the South India, since this covers success stories, struggles and the real situations of many families and people.

I was very moved by one of the recent program. The highlight was that today’s parents are giving their best to give good education to their children, for their good future irrespective of their present income.

Mr X is a pavement dweller. He has not studied school after 5th standard. He has been working from then and he must be in his 40’s now. He loved a girl and married her in his late 20’s. She was not educated too because of poverty. Mr X works as a security in a private firm, and Mrs X is a rag picker. That is how they earn their livelihood. They do not have a house to live and they dwell in the streets with their two little children. Their daughter is studying 7th standard in Church Park School, Tamil Medium, and son in 4th standard. Mr X explained that his aim is to give good education to his children, since he could not study well. Their daughter was also interviewed and she said that her aim was to become a policewoman. When questioned why so, she said that she wanted to punish those who are bad in the society. Their son said that he wanted to become a doctor. Mrs Lakshmi asked whether it is not difficult to live in the streets with school going children. Mr X replied that the children start studying after 8.00p.m, in the night since the traffic calms down, and the noise lessens. He said that his daughter wakes up around 11.00p.m in the night and does homework and studies until midnight. He came to know this through few auto rickshaw drivers who are in the nearby auto rickshaw stand, since the parents used to be half asleep after their day’s hard work.

The children were looking cheerful and confident. Suddenly there were tears in the girl’s eyes and Mrs Lakshmi too was almost in tears. Probably the girl who is growing up realised the difficulties with which they are growing up. During rainy days, they run towards the nearby bridge for shelter. This really brought me tears. The daughter also teaches her mother to read and write in the evenings. Mrs X said proudly about this. I am sure that these parents will definitely succeed in bringing up their children.

It made me to feel guilty about the way we live. Those children are studying in Street lights. There are hundreds of families living like this in metropolitan cities in India. There are one sector of people who are running their Air conditioners with nobody inside the rooms.

We have been proudly boasting about so many schemes to eradicate poverty. What are our so called Munnetra kazhagams doing? Are they only worrying about their power and wealth? Is there no scheme to help those who are in real need? I honestly feel that they should cut down expenses on all pomp and show and concentrate on those people who do not even have their basic facilities rather than boasting about their Government’s achievements.