[nukkad] Street children : Untold Saga

[Satya <>]

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Constant kindness can accomplish much. As the sun makes ice melt, 
kindness causes misunderstanding, mistrust, and hostility to evaporate. 
-Albert Schweitzer, philosopher, physician, and musician (1875-1965)
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Street children : Untold Saga
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Daily Excelsior 
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http://www.dailyexcelsior.com/web1/03jan01/edit.htm#1

By Aarti
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Children roughly constitute 38 per cent of the
country’s population. Their cause has been enshrined
in our Constitution. India is also a signatory to the
World Declaration on the Survival, Protection and
Development of Children. Most of the recommendations
of the World Summit Action Plan are reflected in
India's National Plan of Action. According to the
National Policy and Charter for Children, 2001, the
rights to be ensured by the State include the right to
survival, right to health, right to nutrition, right
to a standard of living, right to play and leisure,
right to early childhood care, right to education,
right to be protected from economic exploitation,
right to protection, right to protection of the girl
child, right of adolescents to education and skill
development, right to life and liberty, name and
nationality, right to freedom of expression, right to
freedom to seek and receive information, right to
freedom of association and peaceful assembly and right
to a family. Besides the responsibilities of the
parents in rearing the children, the State is to
ensure that all refugee children, with or without
parents, receive due care and protection.

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the
Child (CRC), ratified by India on 2nd December, 1992,
states (Article 39) "that all children who have been
neglected, abused or exploited should be assisted in
their recovery and re-integration into society and
that this should take place in an environment which
fosters health, self-respect and dignity."

But apparently we don’t seem to have given a serious
thought to their future. Otherwise, scores of young
children would not be frittering away the best part of
their childhood at railway platforms, traffic lights
and public places. Nor would hundreds of homeless
children be literally sleeping on the streets of our
cities. Probably because very little is known about
their struggle to lead a dignified life, the saga
continues, often silently.

While sipping iced water from an insulated cart
recently, I happened to meet twelve-year-old Sonu.
Unable to put up with his stepfather, he ran away from
him home six years ago. After having worked in a
number of places including a highway motel, tea stall,
tyre puncture shop, he started selling ice water near
a bus stop from 8 AM to 10 PM. Orphaned Shanker and
his twin sister Shipra aged 8 who perform household
jobs in a residential colony supply Sonu with water
drawn from a hand pump. All of them take shelter
during night inside an abandoned large water pipe and
manage to cover themselves with a plastic sheet.

Sonu is not alone, there are at least 18 million
street children in India, up to 40 million in Latin
America and over 100 million worldwide. According to
official statistics, it is estimated that there are
314,700 street children in Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai,
Kanpur, Bangalore and Hyderabad combined and about
100,000 in Delhi. Street children are broadly
categorized as children on the streets and children of
the streets including those who live or work on the
streets without reason or reference to the time they
spend there seldom have any family contact. Studies
have shown that children end up on city streets
because of poverty, dysfunctional families, neglect,
physical or sexual abuse, alcoholism or abandonment
because of mental or physical handicap. Among them,
most vulnerable are abandoned and neglected children
who are often deprived of education, healthy
recreation. Working children who have occasional
contact with their parents and spend most of their
time on the street or public place are humiliated and
rejected by the society. Some of them, apart from
reacting by delinquency, get involved in illicit
liquor, drug trafficking and crimes, which sometimes
lead them to remand homes or jail.

Street children, according to the UNICEF definition,
are those for whom the street (in the widest sense of
the word - unoccupied dwellings, wasteland, etc) more
than their family has become their real home, a
situation in which there is no protection,
supervision, or direction from responsible adults.
According to some estimates, the population of street
children in eight cities has been pegged at abut half
a million. A large number of such street children, for
a plethora of reasons, are forcved to take shelter
wherever they can be it under trees, flyovers, in
culverts or in large water pipes. There are no
reliable estimates on the total number of homeless
children wh live and sleep on our streets. Studies
ahve concluded that street children who learn to cope
with life on the streets are not a happy lot. Forced
by circusmtances, though such children may attempt to
lead normal lives off the street, many are lured into
bonded work, roadside dhabas etc. besides activities
and occuaptions like begging and pickpocket.

Most street children who are exposed to dirt, smoke
and other environmental hazards, suffer from avoidable
health complications, yet their constant exposure to
intense sun, rain and cold compounds the problems.
While scabies, gangrene, broken limbs and epilepsy are
common, they are also vulnerable to chronic diseases
like TB, leprosy , typhoid, malaria, jaundice and
liver/kidney disorders. The cause for concern is not
only veneral disease is rampant among older ones over
14 years, but HIV & AIDS cases are quickly catching
up. Be it a cold night, a rainy day with thunderstorms
of scorching sun, these homeless children have the
easiest alternative to sleep at the railway platforms
mainly because of public utilities.

A scheme for the welfare of street children was
launched throughout the country in 1993 to provide
community-based car to such children. A government
scheme also provides night shelters and sanitary
facilities for pavement dwellers who have been
identified under the National Housing Policy as a
target group but how many children have been covered
is unknown. Three years ago, a grant of $100,000 from
USAID is said to have helped many shelterless and
deprived girls, surviving at the rail/road platforms
in Delhi find a safe overnight shelter.

Notwithstanding governmental measures, in order to
nurture, protect, enable street children to grow in a
halthy/conducive environment to become productive and
model members of the society, much needs to be done.
It would be worthwhile to replicate the recent move
initiated by some schools in Delhi to go beyond just
providing night shelter for homeless children. Such
less privileged besides being offered with facilities
such as hot water bath and blankets plus almirahs to
keep their meagre belongings are also taught various
arts and crafts including peer education twice a week.
While the National Commission for Children, almost in
its final stages of formation, is expected to ensure
that no child sleeps hungry and shelterless, at the
community level it is imperative to step up the
awareness and sensitization efforts so that street
children are able to grow up into responsible adults.
 



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You shall know the TRUTH and the TRUTH shall set you free. 

John 8:32

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