Children need attention

Rainy or sunny, a few minutes past eight, an autorickshaw draws up in front of Preeti's house. Her mother comes out and hands over a school bag and water bottle to the driver and bids goodbye to her daughter off to the school in chaste well-ironed uniform. Preeti is seven years and reads in Class Two in a fashionable school nearby, hardly twenty minutes away, so long, as two such others join her on the way to the same school. Raju is younger, five years old, lives on the other side of the street and is enrolled in an expensive international school, a good fifteen km away. He is picked up and dropped back home everyday by a sleek yellow bus which zooms through the morning traffic as if it were on an urgent mission to the rocket launching pad. Yes, the auto and the bus are on their way to launch children of some affluent parents into the future. Preeti's father is a software engineer and is rather content with his wife fully engaged in their home and looking after their only child. Raju's parents, both work twelve-hour days with multi- national companies while their aged parents take care of the young ones. Both Raju's and Preeti's families almost dote on the children and they are taken proper care of. Preeti and Raju had no material needs unfulfilled promptly. Preeti's father is too busy to have spent some time together with her and her mother, some occasions to play with, talk freely laugh loud and play those childish pranks are rare. Preeti's relation with her father is more factual than bound by emotion. Raju's world may be of a generation or two behind. Preeti and Raju may mature into able and well-groomed professionals one day, but, they will miss the finer bond of family relationships, cultural identity and emotional understanding of one another. Doubtful, if these children will make good social beings as they grow up.It is not enough for the parents to pay attention to the material needs alone of their children, but also need to take care of their emotional needs of caring and sharing of the joys and sorrows of the family life. Worst crimes and evils are committed by men and women with no emotional maturity and fellow feeling. Think of the less fortunate children whose parents are have-nots. Both parents are daily wage workers. No work, no pay. The parents have no material means to meet the basic needs of food, clothing and shelter for their children. Faced with lack of opportunities in life and frustration overtaking, those children can be drawn into social and class based tensions. They stare at those fortunate children in exquisite uniforms rushing to schools and back home and at other times playing games in the open. They also wonder at those parents driving past in gleaming automobiles. The poor children have to be in the footsteps of their parents, at most of their tender age, labouring hard in the rain and sun in the farms or in unhealthy factories to eke out a living. A school and the niceties of childhood life are beyond their reach. Yet, their parents do take care of them however half-fed they be as every parent dreams of a better living future for his or her child. Born into poverty and inferior social conditions these children easily fall victims of social evils like child abuse and other criminal activities. Parental directions are lost on them. Theirs is a struggle for existence by fair or unfair means. They have no hope for the future. The society punishes those children for every little aberration they make knowingly or unknowingly which drives them further into wrong doings. Despite adequate attention provided by the upper crest of the society to their children, a good many of them go astray and mature into the worst

possible enemies of the society. This is largely owing to the excessive greed and utter selfishness of the social circles to which their parents themselves belong. Some parents put undue pressure on their school going children to achieve higher ranks in the examinations. So much so, it becomes an obsession with the children and their parents. The Kerala Government has taken note of the unusual increase in the number of suicides amongst children soon after the announcement of public examination results, either for failure or for poor ranks in the examinations. The Government is thinking of replacing the marks card with a grading system, A, B, C, etc.The parents should refrain from exhibiting high expectations on their wards. Proper parental attention to child development is what makes the child grow into an able, self-esteemed, loving and caring adult, conscientious of his or her role in society. If we measure the parents' involvement with their children by the quality of the Indian youth, there remains much to be desired. Had the parents paid ample attention effectively to inculcate in their children good human qualities like love, affection, compassion, fellow feeling, caring for others and helping the needy, India would have had less poverty, deprivation and wants amongst its millions of citizens today.” All for my child, and, none for thine" is the motto gaining ground. Forget not, "Child is the father of man".
Are children getting proper attention from parents in the world of today? We can see this on a day to day basis on how children run across the road while crossing it, most of them stand on the footboards of the buses unaware of the dangers, drive their vehicles at top speed without wearing helmets especially in the case of two-wheeler riders. Some of them do exceed smoking and drinking limits too as the parents of these children maybe working full day or socializing with others mostly during the weekends like kitty parties,parties,etc. which tends to the children becoming neglected.