TOWARDS A MEANINGFUL CHILDREN'S DAY

                                                                    -MILAN K SINHA

Nelson Mandela, former president of South Africa said, “There can be no keener revelation of a society's soul than the way in which it treats its children".

This year too, on the eve of Jawaharlal Nehru's birthday on 14th November, Children's Day will be  celebrated; routine functions to be held on this day where all kinds of promises for the welfare of our children will be  made (and  possibly forgotten too as usual) by the ruling political class and their followers- the officials of related departments. Some schools and some NGOs too will organize functions on this occasion and reiterate their concern for the children which is to be covered by newspapers as per the available space for such normal routine activities.

Ironically however, in our country it doesn't make a news if poor and destitute children are found working in roadside tea shops, hotels, dhabas or selling gutkha, cigarettes etc. in running trains/buses or doing household jobs for high ups of our society in their Gareebkhanas (read luxury homes) or picking up waste foods outside the wedding premises or begging in front of a temple, mosque etc. May be because this can mar the country’s make belief global image of one of the fastest growing economies of the world for which everyone in the government is busy improving the prospects of GDP growth by hook or by crook. No doubt, all distressing facts related to our children will be seen later on by them, if time permits.

Notwithstanding the thoughts and actions of power that be with regard to future of country's large children population, it would not be out of place to know about  the present status of two major issues seriously impacting children's wellbeing - education and health.

There is no denying the fact that education of our children is very necessary for cultural, social and economic development of diverse sections of society like ours. Keeping this in view, two major initiatives namely Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) and Right to Education (RTE) Act 2009 were taken during last one decade. The aim of SSA has been  to bridge social, regional and gender gaps, with the active participation of the community in the management of schools, while RTE Act  which actually came into force  from 1st April,2010 provides for free and compulsory education to all children of the age of six to fourteen years.

Both SSA and RTE Act put lots of emphasis on universalization of education at the elementary level. As a result, enrollment rate in schools improved to a reasonable extent. So, the protagonists of government policies may very well claim that education has been on the Centre stage of our national politics for some years now. But when we take a look on the ground realities in totality, we encounter with the following facts:

Our literacy percentage is only 74%. Kerala being highest with 94% and Bihar being lowest with 63%.School dropout percentage is still more than 40%.The drop out percentage is even worse than that of Bangladesh and Vietnam - countries that got independence more than two decades later.

We spend less than 2% of our national budget on education for the children who constitute 25% of our total population.The dropout percentage is higher among tribal, economically weaker sections of society etc., the main reasons being: prevalence of child labour as means to supplement parents' income, poor management of Mid-Day Meal Scheme, lack of adequate infrastructural facilities in schools etc.

In spite of constitutional provisions regarding Right to Education and government's repeated declaration and promises for providing basic education to all children, our performance on this count is still dismally poor.

It hardly needs reiteration that how important it is for the country's real development to have a healthy population, more particularly of women and children. We talk and promise so much on the issue of child and woman welfare and do roll out so many plans and strategies. But malnutrition and under-nutrition have not stopped taking its toll in our country.

So far as child nutrition and overall health is concerned, it hardly needs reiteration that how important it is for the country's real development to have a healthy population. Can we think of a strong India without healthy and strong citizens, present and future? Undoubtedly, many programs including ICDS (Integrated Child Development Scheme) are being implemented across the country, the pace and effectiveness needs to be substantially improved in order to address the following shameful and equally painful facts:

One in every three malnourished children in the world live in India.8.8 lac children die every year, more than 100 deaths per hour in India.The IMR (Infant Mortality Rate) in many states is still more than 50 per thousand for children up to the age of 5 years where as it should be at least below 30 per thousand. About 50% of all childhood deaths are attributed to malnutrition.26% of the world's childhood vaccine preventable deaths take place in the country.Anemia affects 74% of children under the age of three.As high as 44% children under five years are underweight.

Malnutrition in early childhood has serious long term consequences because it impedes development of vital life organs.

These are few revealing facts which raise many nagging questions to be replied by the ruling establishment at the Centre as well as in states and union territories in this sixty three year old sovereign republic along with thousands of NGOs reportedly working for the welfare of these less fortunate children.

If anybody can even estimate, if not calculate the amount which has been expended on such show off celebrations on children's day last year and years before, we can have the figure running in hundreds of millions. Can a country which lobby for international borrowings for funding welfare programs for disadvantaged section of society, afford to waste public money like this?

Can't we stop all such unnecessary and avoidable expenses drawn from public exchequer to make the same fund available instead for addressing effectively the serious child related problems mentioned here-in-above? This may be one small tribute to Chacha Nehru in real sense and also to his political mentor Mahatma Gandhi who on one occasion said, "If we are to teach real peace in this world, and if we are to carry on a real war against all ills in the society, we shall have to begin with the children."

As always, I am keen to know what you think on this subject. Hence, request you to post Comments to share your views and experiences.

                           Will meet again with Open Mind. All the Best.