Gandhiji would have been proud of you, Kailash Satyarthi


My father, who was one year senior to this electrical engineering student, vividly remembers him as that shy, reticent, modest young man, from a middle-class background, who would come to the college in his staple kurta-payjama with a muffler tied around his neck

“Simple living, high thinking,” was his philosophy, recalls my father, a civil engineering student in 1970, adding that “he was different”

Mr Satyarthi would be aloof and would rarely mingle with others

One thing was clear to my father that Satyarthi was a true follower of Gandhiji and was ‘famous’ in college by virtue of his revolutionary views

This is the reason, perchance, why he also tried his luck in student elections in college, but unfortunately lost

Nonetheless, he would not give up

He founded the Bachpan Bachao Andolan (save the childhood movement) to fight the scourge of child labour in 1983

But, it was perhaps the Bhopal gas tragedy – which led to the death of hundreds of innocent people – that broke the camel’s back

It was at this point of time that he decided to quit his job as an electrical engineer and dedicate his whole life for the protection of child rights, my father recollects

Since then, he has not looked back, rescuing more than 70,000 children from slavery and the clutches of child traffickers

Moreover, with the help of NGOs and activists, he has organised a great many raids on factories and warehouses where children were being forced to work in deplorable conditions

“Whenever I would hand over a rescued child to his or her parents, the first smile on their visage would seem like that of God

I do not know where God dwells

But, I see God in children,” says an emotional Satyarthi to a journalist

After years of struggle, his efforts seem to have paid off, finally

The Norwegian Nobel Committee has awarded the 2014 peace prize to this child rights activist from India along with Malala Yousafzai of Pakistan

Thorbjorn Jagland, the committee’s chairman, whilst announcing the peace prize said: “The Nobel Committee regards it as an important point for a Hindu and a Muslim, an Indian and a Pakistani, to join in a common struggle for education and against extremism

Children must go to school and not be financially exploited

It is a prerequisite for peaceful global development that the rights of children and young people be respected

In conflict-ridden areas in particular, the violation of children leads to the continuation of violence from generation to generation

Showing great personal courage, Kailash Satyarthi, maintaining Gandhi’s tradition, has headed various forms of protests and demonstrations, all peaceful, focusing on the grave exploitation of children for financial gain

He has also contributed to the development of important international conventions on children’s rights

” This is no duck soup

Only a Gandhian endowed with an indomitable will and a passion to bring change could achieve this feat

In Satyarthi’s words: “If not now, then when? If not you, then who? If we are able to answer these fundamental questions, then perhaps we can wipe away the blot of human slavery”

Today, my father is proud of you, sir

Gandhiji would be proud of you



Date:11-Oct-2014 Reference:View Original Link