Breaking the Cycle, Filling the Void

           Its ten am in Gurgaon. While many of the inhabitants are just waking up in their luxurious apartments, the construction workers have been up since 6 in the morning trying to build them. In most construction sites, their children would be with them, among the machinery and debris, or locked indoors with their siblings at home. As a mother, Shakti Rai laments “I used to tie my children to a post nearby and work at the site”. An Indian construction site is dangerous, and often does not adhere to safety regulations. Above all, it is no place for a child. But there is no easy solution for many of the parents who work in construction to make a living for their families. On the one hand, their children need to be cared for, but if they do not go out to work they cannot feed their families. 

            Last week was my first time visiting a Mobile Creche. The idea was developed in 1969 where the founder Meera Mahadevan witnessed the brutal conditions of workers children on the building site of Gandhi’s memorial. The Cente-in-Charge for this particular creche, Prem Chawla has been a Mobile Crèche volunteer for over thirty years. “There have been a lot of changes”, she says, “it’s a much bigger organization and we’re getting a lot more funding and recognition now”. In addition to structural changes in the organization, Prem has seen many children from the time they were babies to when they come back to visit as adults with jobs and families. Some of the children who went through Mobile Creches as young kids come back to volunteer as adults. “It makes you feel good” she explains, “as though you’ve done something right”.

            One such example is Renu’s son who as she describes “looked like a skeleton”.  He came in vastly underweight, but now with a medically recommended diet of eggs, milk and khichadi, he is back on track. Malnutrition among other health problems is very prevalent among the young children at Mobile Creches. As a result of this, the ‘Right to Food’ movement is strongly backed by Mobile Creches, as a way to ensure that India’s children are well fed. Infancy is the most important periods in a child’s life. Children if left unattended or uncared for develop a plethora of mental and emotional issues that could stunt them well into their adulthood. It’s when they develop cognitively, where they learn how to speak etc. During this crucial period, it is especially important for children, especially young ones to be interacted with, and played with on a daily basis.

           

            On my way out I walked past the gritty reality of the construction site. There were huge cranes, people carrying steel rods and welding metal. I saw some of the mothers, balancing bricks on their heads and mixing cement. It was impossible and inhumane to imagine a child playing among the tar, bricks and mortar.  India is a land of contrasts and economic based stratification. The apartments which these workers are building will be bought for lakhs of rupees, the type of money the workers couldn’t even dream of. It’s an unfortunate tale; the poor build houses for the rich, and are paid next to nothing for it. With the aid of mobile creches, maybe their children will find a way to break the cycle and fill the void.

This article has been written by Kalpana Mohanty, Std X student from American Embassy School who volunteered with Mobile Creches in Dec'12-Jan'13.