You have got to be really dedicated to the work of development to really pick up on things. It is not a matter of how much you have studied, what matters is how much we can catch up with the differences that lie beneath the upper crust of inequality.
While working for the mobile movie that we were supposed to make as our project, I realized that no matter how much we would want to try and help these people and connect with them, there can never be a perfect connect until and unless both the sides are on an equal footing. So, we either need to bring the other side to our level (which is what we want to do in the long run) or come to their level. It is difficult to do so, but it is the most effective way. It gives the other side a sense of leveling and in turn makes him feel comfortable. The big gap between the sides often leads to the intimidation of the receiver end and hampers proper discourse of information.
Considering we are at the end of our course of development communication, I thought it would be a good idea to blog some random stuff that I have learnt or tried to implement while taking up this class.

Child Labor

I often wonder, how deeply do the people understand the problem of child labor? Whenever people talk of child labor they often talk about it in a detached and from an observer’s point of view. How many people actually put themselves or their children in the place and try to feel and realize the problems of this menace. As a matter of fact, we always tend to look at the problems of the downtrodden or less fortunate from the practical or objective angle because somewhere down there we always know that this is not going to happen with us and so, we don’t have to think about it with a personal tinge.

And that I think is one of the biggest reasons why all our efforts to eradicate or address such problems go down the drain. Well maybe not exactly ‘down the drain’, but yeah we are having very limited success in matters of awareness and accountability within the upper middle and middle class.

We know it is wrong, it is against the law, but now employing this one child at your work place or home won’t solve the problem. So, well why not employ the kid. Anyways we are doing a favor to the family of the kid by providing them an extra source of income.

We so easily manage to bluff the law; we know that one kid employed at our place won’t dismantle the whole law and order institution (because until and unless the law threatens to kill us, we do not bother to mind it).

We refuse and ignore child labor. We refuse that we are involved in the crime and we ignore all the crimes we do in context to child labor. We ignore them when they come selling magazines and flowers on the traffic lights, we ignore them when we see them in small restaurants and garages serving us and we ignore them when they are washing utensils and doing chores around our houses.

From what I have understood regarding the issue of child labor, the problem need to be solved on the psychological level rather than the practical because no matter how much you argue that these problems are more of a practical nature, they all melt down to our approach to these issues.

Disabled People- In or Out of our lives

Today we had the screening of movies by the third year students. One of the movies was on blind people. We by the end of the movie had a lot of issues coming up about whether talking to blind in terms of normal human beings who experience the sense of sight was acceptable, right or insulting or underestimating them. I realized how less we knew about them and how we categorized all the blind into one thought process. The fact that every year the prime minister on the ‘world disabled day’ gives a speech where he always and forever seems to repeat the sentence that this should not be the only day when we address these people. But nonetheless, he always seems to forget about them the next morning he wakes up.

I really wanted that common community groups and institutions should have a system in which interaction with the disabled is not a ‘big’ and ‘novel’ deed. when all sections of society are being included in the mainstream in view of making an egalitarian society, these people should not be left behind and still treated as specials or guests in our lives. 

Poverty Elevation

The recent Commonwealth games raised a very big and obvious question about what the govt. is planning to do with the slums at the end of the day. If a big international event cannot help rehabilitate the slum dwellers, then possibly nothing ever will. I had all my hopes pinned on to this one games event that had come our way that finally our honorable govt. will have enough time and resources to elevate these slum dwellers. But unfortunately, as the govt. has it, out of all the aspects of the development of the city, this one they chose to neglect and hide behind banners and billboards.

The question that came to my mind was that precisely what will it take for this segment of the society to be addressed?

Although many NGO’s have dived into the big ocean of ‘being rescuers’ and elevating the poor, not much is being done, mainly because of the lack of funds. The government cannot ignore something that is there on the face.

A movie named, Q2P, addresses the same concern as mine, questioning the sanitation program of the city of Mumbai and particularly in the slum areas. The problems of people living in slums are multi faceted and interlinked they all start and end at their poverty. Getting these people out of the slums or making them shift into a better place may be good on the basis of health but over all I do not believe it to be a remedy of any kind.

Mobile Movie

This is the link to the mobile movie titled 'Khel Khel Mein...'. It deals with the issues rekated to child labour:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_tRFDStsuA

Population Woes

Yes, India’s population is one the biggest and the most disturbing problem of India, according to me, at the moment. It not only gives the scope of the development of the race of ‘the survival of the fittest’ which gives rise to the extinction of the poorer population of the country but it also makes the process of development more complex and full of obstacles.

The most widely used and popular methods of trying to control population are, giving incentives to smaller families, disincentives to larger families, educating people in regards to the benefits of small families, encouraging the use of contraceptives, etc.

However, the biggest and the most important facility that can affect the birth rate is the availability and access to good health facilities. Making health facilities more accessible and affordable can actually make people believe in the power of these facilities to extend life expectancy. Although education plays a major role in all developmental processes but in case of population it has to be given special emphasis.

The poor people should also be shown and given a hint of what a better living condition means and how nice and lucrative it has. They should be shown the world outside their locality and also a ray of hope is to shown to them that probably with a smaller family you can have better living standards than what he has. Hope is poor man’s bread and this is how we need to make them understand the importance of population control.

Maharashtra to unveil HIV-friendly pvt sector workplace policy - TOI (14.09.2010)

This report i read in todays times of india. IT was a report on the step taken by the maharashtra govt. to introduce 'HIV-friendly workplace policy'. According to which the employees will be given the facility to conduct an HIV test and also that those who are tested positive will not be given the pink slip. In this way they would like to ensure that the HIV positive employee would not face stigma. Financial help will also be given to those who would like to follow up for treatment.

However, no special measure was suggested to be taken for those who do not wish to further  take treatment.

Despite this one loophole, the project seems to be very uplifting and will encourage those who do not take the test for social reasons.