Let’s make India better!

Shaheen Mistri runs Akansha; a non-profit organization working towards improving the poor children’s lives. There is a great article about her and her dream, her Akanksha. The article is at rediff.

Something about Akanksha from the home page:
“The Akanksha Foundation is a non-profit organization with a mission to impact the lives of less privileged children, enabling them to maximise their potential and change their lives. Akanksha works primarily in the field of education, addressing non formal education through the Akanksha centre and also formal education by initiating school reform.

Over the past 15 years, the organization has expanded from 15 children in one centre to over 2,600 children in 51 centres in Mumbai and Pune, with an additional 2100 children in 10 schools. A commitment is made to support each child by giving him or her a strong educational foundation, a good time, self esteem and values, and to help them plan how they can earn a steady livelihood as a step towards improving their standard of living.”

I had the opportunity to meet Shaheen in Pune. My wife is interested in being part of Akanksha and she got an appointment with Shaheen. The sheer exuberance, confidence and the passion to do something for the kids was so obvious. We were swept by her dedication to reach out to as many under privileged kids as she can. Shaheen is not just trying to educate these children, but she is taking more holistic and practical approach to actually spread the model. She is trying to bring changes in the educational system that can help these kids. She told us that she is working with Anu Aga (Thermax Foundation) to run a municipal school.

I am sure few will disagree that good education and inculcating good values in our children is the key to a developed India. Of course we need many more Shaheen Mistris all over India. But what we can do to make our education system better? Any thoughts?

Support Akanksha and be part of a good cause!

I have for a long time now, been upset with the kind of upbringing Indian children are getting. This refers to children born in the 90s and after. Things like the ones below simply disgust me, cause me pain and despair.
1) Children watching violent/ explicit movies that even adults feel horrified to see
2) Kids fighting with parents for the latest toy/ dresses/ gadgets.. what have you!
3) Teenagers sitting in Coffee Parlours….sipping a cappuccino worth 60 bucks
4) Teenagers surfing the net on the behest of ‘studying’
5) Students carrying mobiles (latest ones mind you), ipods, owning personal TVs
6) Children eating junk food and not good old Indian Cuisine of roti, dal and sabji.

This list is almost endless for me. I get this extremely discomforting feeling inside whenever I witness these things. And for those people who say that upbringing is better in the eastern cultures as compared to the west, I think it’s about time they realized it isn’t so, at least not now. I have observed so many families where at least two of these things are pretty much an everyday affair. And these are regular, normal, happy families.

Less than six months ago, I met this teenager who according to his parents surfs the net to get more information on his subjects. This kid now has his own profile on orkut. He goes to school, is about 16 years old and I wondered if he has ever read even his own books. I wonder why a kid his age would need to be on a social networking site. If you tell me, it helps keep in touch with friends, isn’t email good enough? So what is he doing unmonitored on the web? I shudder to think of the possibilities.

I have seen teenagers sit for hours on end in café’s. I don’t understand how these kids manage to get that much money. As a child I never got pocket money. And any money I did get for small kiddy parties used to be monitored. Now I am not saying that we should curb all freedom of youngsters, but I fail to understand how gossiping in coffee days’ and barista’s helps improve their lives. To add to this, some kids even smoke. Why if you ask them, answer just spats out you ‘Its Cool!’. Cool??? I will let you decide.

Even worse is young girls (I can’t even call them young, these are toddlers below the age of five) dancing to really invigorating Hindi movie numbers. And parents actually feeling proud! What has happened to the parents?? Have any of you seen the boogie woogie dance show, the kids version. Man, how I hated it. I could not stand it for a second. I don’t get why kids need to dance to numbers like ‘Dhak Dhak karne laga’ when many sweeter songs like ‘Imli ka boota’ exist. Isnt it time for children to dance to ‘Clap your hands’ kinda rhymes. I mean they have the rest of their lives to dance to other songs. I wonder what happens to moral policing when it comes to these shows. And historical movies like WATER get the axe….

I could go on and on about how every thing is dark and gloomy. Thankfully, I have come across two (yes, only two) families with amazing parent child bond. The relationship is open/ honest and I have never seen kids of these families needing to lie or hide stuff. I wish that one day we stop hiding things below the carpet, and have more open parent-child relationships. I think the clock is ticking away on this. I worry for the child of tomorrow. Save the children, Now.