11 Legged Understanding

Long vacation about to end, leaving in the afternoon for Delhi.

This time when I had started for my home from Gurgaon, I was highly apprehensive. Fear was obvious, I had to keep myself ready for numerous expected questions & explanations which earlier I had clarified to my parents were now supposed to be shot from my relatives  and sample of questions :) ranging  from "why u didn't rejoin corporate after masters when u had such deep interest in automobiles", "we thought after master's u would be earning more but why do u earn less when your peer group who did graduation along with u is earning more" "why r u wasting ur time on this work" .............. [at times i feel as i hv done a really bad deed that i need to explain myself everytim...may be even a murderer would not be questioned by so many people for his act :( ]

After passing out of IRMA, I had two visits back home but I didn't step out of my home, didn;t meet any of the  relatives, "intentionally". Possibly the fear of explanations stopped me!! . But we being social creatures cannot escape "eternally" from them, though "momentarily" its possible and Now this "momentarily" escaping was over.

Reached home on 19th and 22nd was my cousin's marriage and so meeting the relatives was imperative. For a moment I thought let me not share what I am doing and either remain silent or tell a lie which will avoid all that apparent embarrassment emanating from explaining everything, to some who will understand and to many who won't.

 On the way to Jabalpur where marriage of my cousin was scheduled I was accompanied by one of my distant cousin whom I met possibly first time. She is studying in kindergartern. To hide my anxiety, I started chatting with her and asked what all she  learnt in "nursery" and what's new in "KG-1" and like a parrot she narrated everything. And then among the numerous questions on alphabets and numbers which I bombarded on her, one was how many legs we have and came a stunning reply- "11". I was kind of shocked, I tried to explain her, its not 11 but 2. She replied see my miss told me when we put "1" on the side of "1" it becomes "11" and our legs are like that, in Nursery it was like 1 and 1 make 2 but now in KG-1 "1" and "1" make "11". My goodness, she was right in her own way, but our age-old mathematical and conventional mindset can never accept this fact that we have 11 legs instead of 2 and so I continued the argument. She like a valiant fighter stood firm on her view. Discussion which followed must have appeared very childish except for the fact when she said " See  my miss told that 11 is bigger than 2, if one leg has pain or is removed, we will have to walk on support of stick or someone's shoulder and if our legs were only 2, removing one should not make walking so tough but since we have 11 legs removing 1 makes us "budha" (old), ". 

I was speechless, who else other than me knows how i spent last two and half years with those recurrent acute leg cramps, when Suman, Shashank, Sajid, Rajat and many other friends used to shoulder me. I accepted her argument and so as reader u also better accept "we have 11 legs" :) or else she might complain to her miss!!!.

This "11 legs" saga gave a big lesson. She in her own logic knew she was right. She was convinced with her current understanding and there was nothing wrong in the way she viewed the numbers, she might later on contradict herself but that would be her own new "experiment" and a new joy of learning ( or Unlearn in word's of Prof. Raju). My lost faith on my convincing skills got resurrected and I decided to face the questions and answer everything to the best of my "11 legged" understanding and today when I am leaving home, I am happy, leaving few, most of the relatives are now convinced with the decision and some even intend to support the cause.

तेरे सपनों कि उडान अभी बाक़ी है
अभी तो केवल हार हुई है, जीत का असली मुकाम अभी बाकी है


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PS: For those awaiting news on personal front, Its "almost" final, in a few days from now when "almost" gets removed and only final remains will share the news with everyone!!.

जिंदगी की दौड़

परिश्थितियां सदा  किसी के लिए एक सी न थीं न कभी होंगी

जिंदगी की दौड़ में कभी धूप कभी छाँव लगी होंगी 

छाँव के पलों में तो सभी दौड़ जाएँगे 

बात तो तब होगी जब भरी धूप में भी कदम नहीं रुकने पाएँगे

जंग कोई हारता नहीं बस कुछ लोग मैदान जल्दी छोड़ जाते हैं

परिश्थितियों  के लड़खड़ाते हांथों को देखने से पहले हथियार छोड़ जाते हैं

परिश्थितियां सदा  किसी के लिए एक सी न थीं न कभी होंगी

जिंदगी की दौड़ में कभी धूप कभी छाँव लगी होंगी 

क्या लगता है भगत सिंह या मदर टेरेसा कभी मुश्किलों में पड़े नहीं

या आइन्स्टीन की खोजों में असमंजस्य के बादल पड़े नहीं

अरे इंसान क्या राम और यीशु का भी बुरा वक़्त आया

परिस्थितियों ने उनका भी विश्वास आजमाया  

परिश्थितियां सदा  किसी के लिए एक सी न थीं न कभी होंगी

जिंदगी की दौड़ में कभी धूप कभी छाँव लगी होंगी 

उनकी जीत के किस्से इसलिए सुनते हो क्यूंकि वो मुश्किल छड़ों में रुके नहीं

असमंजस्य के घने बादलों तले झुके नहीं

यदि ये सब  जानकर भी तुम  हार मानना चाहते हो तो  मानो

पर फिर ये न कहना की खुद को हराने वाले लोगों के किस्से तुमने सुने नहीं 

परिश्थितियां सदा  किसी के लिए एक सी न थीं न कभी होंगी

जिंदगी की दौड़ में कभी धूप कभी छाँव लगी होंगी 

15 million

Here is an excerpt from the article written by Mr. GopalKrishna Gandhi in HT*


"here is one intersection of life in metropolitan India where ‘life’ indeed goes on. It flows in a ribbon of continuous movement that is required, every now and then, to take pause at what are called ‘traffic junctions’ or ‘traffic signals’...........Some months ago, in Chennai, my three-wheeler had stopped at one of these junctions. In that throbbing wait of no more than a few seconds, a little girl wove her way into the road, twisting her tiny frame in between lorry, tempo, taxi, three-wheeler, two-wheeler, cart and limo. I was about to shout ‘Watch it, kid!’ when she fell flat onto the steaming tarmac. I thought she had fainted in the heat but no, she was up in a trice doing, in the narrowest of spaces between the traffic, a perfect somersault. I realised that this blithe girl with limbs of rubber was a street acrobat....I could see she wore a thin coat of make-up that is not to be expected in a girl of her age. I shuddered at the thought of what the future held for her. Perhaps the ‘future’ had already taken hold of her. Perhaps the traffic signal had already signalled another ‘traffick’ for her? On the other hand, who knows, she could become an Anna Pavlova. But Pavlova was not born to the street...............................But the sheer numbers — estimates put the number of streetchildren in India at 15 million, the world’s highest, at a 15 per cent of the global count of streetchildren — make the challenge mind-numbing." 

And this is not something new, which will surprise anyone of us. Daily while commuting to our offices we come across these kids either begging or picking rags. It would sound hard to say but have we become so insensitive that it no longer bothers us?? If in place of those unknown kids, our siblings were there on the street,, would our response be the same !! If not, then Are we waiting for someone from heaven to come and assist them live a better life ?? 

I don't have an answer, but it really pains from within. The number "15 million" is just a misnomer, m sure it would certainly more than that.

What's the way out. My limited cognizance shows  two ways...one is preventive other curative. People in villages have meager income generation opportunities and so they come down to cities in search of work and then how these kids come down to street to earn(beg !!) petty sum is not a story which needs an intellectual explanation. Preventive solution is to create income generation opportunities right at the village level which ensures sufficient money to live a decent life, provide education to children, meet their medical expenses etc. The experiment of Mayurbhanj is a small step in this direction. As is emerging in Disha it will take not just months but years to set a sustainable process (cooperative) of income generation for the people within the villages (and that too in just 100 villages of one district of one state !!!)) , preventive solution will take time to  reverse this process of migration of unskilled (less skilled) people to cities. By the time preventive solution starts delivering its results , Curative solution possibly should be brought in to provide immediate assistance to the one's whom Mr. GK Gandhi termed as "Anna Pavlova" who are already on street. As I see, it will not be possible for everyone to put many many years of life and take on with the preventive solution but Are we willing to take start work with atleast curative solution

 My experiment started with the curative solution in Orphanage of Baroda on weekends while working in GM. And believe me its not so hard, all it would need is forming a small group of friends, spare few hours of weekends for these kids instead of malls and movies...who knows this small support can help those kids "relive their life".

Are we ready to take the baton or will keep blaming the systems around?

*Full article can be read at http://www.hindustantimes.com/Walking-a-tightrope/Article1-554056.aspx