India’s Children of a lesser God: A Not So Royal Story
- Arijit Bose
- May 24, 2019
- 4 min read
India is a land of myths and legends, but if you look closely some paradoxes are hard to miss. Even as the world watched the pictures of the Royal baby being beamed across TV stations, wrapped in silken linen, little babies covered with dust and muck were playing with gay abandon on dusty roads in front of their slum dwellings across Lucknow city.
Be it Akbarnagar or other dwellings of the poor folk, tiny tots from humble households are seen either licking mud, crying on a sunny summer afternoon or playing without anyone watching, even as speeding cars whizz past. There are also the poor beggars who would occasionally be spotted carrying their little one on their lap, only to pitch for alms.
On one hand is the royal welcome for the royal child. Best of arrangements and extra care for a little one are ensured. Then you also have the constant media attention. While the British royalties saw minute to minute developments and the world waited with bated breath for that one sight of little Archie Harrison Mountbatten Windsor; back home in India’s Lucknow the reality of the newborn is quite different.
As latest as February, a member of the Uttar Pradesh State Legal Services Authority heard a baby cry.
The lady in question found an abandoned baby at a garbage dump.
Before that on January 29, a 10-day-old girl was lying abandoned at Lucknow’s Sachivalaya Colony in Mahanagar.
Recent reports have highlighted that rate of kids dying in the first month of life in India’s most populous state is double that of sub-Saharan Africa, as per WHO.
Research brings to the fore that about 41 out of 1000 newborn babies die in UP.
As UNICEF statements show that the annual child mortality rate has gone down in past few decades, around 56 million children under five will die until 2030 – half of whom are newborns if actions are not taken.
Notably the rate of infant deaths is highest globally in India, followed by Nigeria, Pakistan and Democratic Republic of Congo.
Shockingly three infants die in two minutes on an average in India for lack of access to water, sanitation, proper nutrition or basic health services says a report.
On the contrary, the Economic Survey 2017 – 2018 says about 63 million women go missing from the Indian populace owing to alleged abortion of female foetuses.
This is the case despite, India passing a Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques Act, 1994 making the disclosure of sex of a foetus illegal.
Even as India has bettered the annual mortality rate of children under five years by 9 per cent, the improvement was better for boys as compared to girls say estimates.
Repeated reports shed light on how preference for a son causes complete neglect of girls.
The world is talking of the Royal Baby. Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex has brought to this world a handsome little kid. He is named Archie Harrison Mountbatten Windsor, weighing 7 pounds and 8 ounces.
Presented to the world at St. George’s Hall at Windsor Castle, the royalties see something really magical about the royal son.
With the little one being the first British American biracial baby to take birth in the royal household, he becomes seventh in line of succession.
Things have been really royal, when it comes to welcoming the royal heir to this world.
But ironically, not so long back, an independent report by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) showed Britain’s record on tackling poverty was poor, with nearly over 400,000 children living in poverty as compared to five years before.
Government officials in UK have been quoted saying – “We’ve doubled free childcare – worth £5,000 per child each year – while our £2.5bn pupil premium programme is supporting two million disadvantaged schoolchildren across the country.”
In UK, half of the children are reportedly living in poverty reveal figures. There are growing concerns say publications that there is a “emerging child poverty crisis”.
Turning the gaze to India, despite the ruling dispensation in India bringing about a Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao programme, the success of the initiative is far from satisfactory as per latest assessments.
Girls are more vulnerable to verbal and physical abuse in Lucknow says a report.
A survey shows half of all children on streets work for a living at construction sites or hotels skipping education. Children on streets earn less than Rs 200 per day.
As per a joint study by Save the Children India, New Delhi, an international NGO, Rainbow Homes, a NGO in Kolkata, and UK Aid, around 63% of street children are illiterate. The proportion of illiteracy is topmost in Lucknow at 82%.
The study corroborates that the poor children are lured into joining an academic course by scholarships and mid-day meals, but with attendance not compulsory, they eventually work than study.
At 16% ragpicking is a much sought after work for kids on streets.
Children left at the mercy of the employer are physically abused, made to work over seven hours a day and beaten. In Lucknow along with other cities, 39% children worked seven days a week.
At times when Stop Child labour and the safety of infants has been a rallying cry, India is in dire need of proper education to eradicate the root of this evil.
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