Have you ever thought about this?

Even though India’s children account for more than one-third of its population, their interests have never been given priority. And their rights have been violated every single day. CRY has compiled some statistics on the situation of children in India. This is based on its experience of working on a range of children's issues across all regions of India.

The statistics are grim. What is worse is that very little is known of what it means to be part of such horrific numbers The task before society is huge and we at CRY believe that every member of our society should take responsibility to change the lives of these children permanently.

The situation of underprivileged children in India

• 40% of India's population is below the age of 18 years which at 400 million is the world'slargest child population.About 60 million Indian children under the age of 6 live below the poverty line.
• Children from 100 million families live without water at home.
• Children from 150 million families live in households without electricity.
• Less than half of India's children between the age 6 and 14 go to school.
• A little over one-third of all children who enroll in grade one reach grade eight.
• One in every ten children is disabled in India.
• 95 in every 1000 children born in India, do not see their fifth birthday
• 70 in every 1000 children born in India, do not see their first birthday
• Only 38% of India's children below the age of 2 years are immunized
• 74% of India's children below the age of 3 months are anemic
• More than one in three women in India and over 60% of children in India are anemic
• Acute respiratory infections are leading causes of child mortality (30%) followed by diarrhea(20%) in India.
• One in every 100 children in India between age group of 0-14 years suffers from acuterespiratory infection
• Almost one in every five children in India below the age of 14 suffers from diarrhea.
• 30-40% of the India's population, which is largely economically deprived, spends over 70% oftheir total expenditure on food.
• Amongst married women in India today, 75% were under age at the time of their marriages
• While one in every five adolescent boys is malnourished, one in every two girls in India isundernourished
• 23% of India's children are underweight at birth
• 58% of India's children below the age of 2 years are not fully vaccinated. And 24% of thesechildren do not receive any form of vaccination
• More that 50% of India's children are malnourished.

Child Labour

Children are often treated as the "property" of the very adults who are supposed to care for them; they are ordered around, threatened, coerced, silenced, with complete disregard of them as "persons" with rights and freedoms.

• 17 million children in India work as per official estimates.
• They work for 12 - 15 hours a day and earn less than Rs.3 per day.
• They work with explosives, metals, and poisonous gases from the age of 3 - 4 years.
• A study found that children were sent to work by compulsion and not by choice, mostly byparents, but with recruiter playing a crucial role in influencing decision
• When working outside the family, children put in an average of 21 hours of labour per week
• 19% of children employed work as domestic help
• 90% working children are in rural India
• 85% of working children are in the unorganized sectors
• About 80% of child labour is engaged in agricultural work.
• 25% of the victims of commercial sexual exploitation in India are below 18 years of age.
• Millions of children work to help their families because the adults do not have appropriate employment and income thus forfeiting schooling and opportunities to play and rest.
• Children also work because there is demand for cheap labour. High incidence of child labour is a result of high incidence of adult unemployment.
• Large numbers of children work simply because there is no alternative - since, they do not have access to good quality schools.
• Poor and bonded families often "sell" their children to contractors who promise lucrative jobs in the cities and the children end up being employed in brothels, hotels and domestic work.

Many run away and find a life on the streets.All children have the right to be protected from work that interferes with their normal growth and development. Abandoned children, children without families and disabled children need special care and protection.

Child commercial sex workers

• There are approximately 2 million child commercial sex workers between the age of 5 and 15 years and about 3.3 million between 15 and 18 years
• They form 40% of the total population of commercial sex workers in India
• 80% of these are found in the 5 metros
• 71% of them are illiterate
• 500,000 children are forced into this trade every year

Mentally/ physically challenged children

• 3% of India's children are mentally/physically challenged
• 20 out of every 1000 rural children are mentally/physically challenged, compared to 16 out of every 1000 urban children
• Mentally/physially challenged girls are at a particular risk to violence and abuse .

Stop the World a Second

GET ready for a minute with 61 seconds. Scientists are delaying the start of 2006 by the first "leap second" -- a timing tweak to make up for changes in the Earth's rotation -- in seven years. At midnight Co-ordinated Universal Time (11am Melbourne time), atomic clocks worldwide will read 23:59:60 before hitting 00:00:00. A leap second is added to keep uniform timekeeping within 0.9 seconds of the Earth's rotational time, which can speed up or slow down because of many factors, including tides. "Enjoy New Year's Eve a second longer," the US National Institute of Standards and Technology said in an explanatory notice. The first leap second was added on June 30, 1972; from 1999 until recently, the two time standards have been in close enough synch to avoid any need to add a leap second. Precise time measurements are needed for high-speed communications systems, among other modern technologies.

Okay, now this's certainly an interesting piece of news. Truely, it's the first time I've ever heard of such a concept. And to think that a minute actually consisted of 61 seconds a few years before my birth, it certainly seems astounding! First came the Y2K bug and now this! Oh boy, for the sake of technology, dunno how much precise we need to be. I'm certainly blown!

Reminiscence of Tsunami - December 26, '05

(Move the mouse pointer over the pics to know more about them)

Kiran More... Indian Cricket Selection Committee Chairman

Okay, things have been pretty bad with Sourav Ganguly for the past few months, right since a Mr Greg Chappell had been introduced to the team. Okay, I haven't got anything against the Aussie. But is it utter coincidence that the moment he's here, our captain gets replaced, Ganguly gets axed and Yuvraj is referred as a better alrounder than Ganguly? Sourav had been picked up in the national team, axed & picked up again n again. If Mr. More thinks Ganguly isn't worth the salt, then why the hell is he even considering Ganguly for the team, ever?

More's been Serving googlies for quite some time now. Here's what the selection committee Chairman had to say each time former skipper Sourav Ganguly was axed and picked by his five-member panel :

MOHALI, OCTOBER 14 Sourav has performed outstandingly for the country and captained also very well, but definitely things are not in his favour. He hasn't done very well. We're looking at some of the youngsters doing very well. We want to give them at least about 30 games before the World Cup. - After Ganguly had been dropped from the ODI squad		CHENNAI, NOVEMBER 21 Okay, he got a hundred against Zimbabwe, but he hasn't performed that well in the last two or three years and we're not happy with that. - On the eve of the selection meeting, hinting at the end.
CHENNAI, NOVEMBER 22 There was a suggestion to take him as an all-rounder. We discussed the matter for a long time and finally we decided to have him as a batting all rounder. - After picking Ganguly for the first Srilanka Test		NEW DELHI, DECEMBER 14 To have Sourav in the squad and then put him in the reserves is not done. We are basically keeping the future in mind. - After dropping Ganguly for the Ahmedabad Test
NEW DELHI, DECEMBER 14 We are looking at the future. We felt we have a player who has been playing better. He has shown the potential and we want to give him more opportunities for Pakistan and England. - On why Yuvraj Singh is good for Indian cricket.		MUMBAI, DECEMBER 24 Sourav has experience and runs behind him. If you see the recent records and statistics, he hasn't done well but we needed his experience on this tour. We wanted to give younsters a chance on the Sri Lanka tour. - On why Sourav's "good" for Indian cricket

MUMBAI, DECEMBER 25 I am not saying he will play in the XI. That wll be selected by the team management and one selector who will accompany the team on the tour. The best XI will play. - After picking him for the three tests against Pakistan.

Well...just notice his two statements given on December 14th and on December 25th. Don't you think there's a hint of hypocrisy in them? First Mr. More says that it certainly doesn't make sense, to take Ganguly in the team and then keep him in the reserves. And then again, he says that despite Ganguly being in the team, there's no guarantee that he'll actually paly any match out there. Desn't now he think that Ganguly will be wasted keeping in the reserves? And well, if he really wants Sourav for his experience, why doesn't More just invite him as a guest advisor? I'm sure that should do enough justice to More's purposes.

Something else that gets me thinking is that when was the last time a selector travelled with the team during the tours? I won't be surprised if that selector turns out to be Mr More himself. I just don't realise how this man got to become the Chairman? What exactly are his qualities? How much cricket did he himself play? How many of today's youngsters actually know his name? How many of us can actually say without any guesses if he was a bowler or a batsman...or mebbe a wicketkeeper? And here is this man, judging on one of the greatest captains India has ever seen. Kudos to you, mister...and kudos to the ones who selected you as the Chairman!

An Arbitrary Road Sign

Christmas Carol

Well, while talking of Christmas, suddenly remembered the times when we were li'l kids and used to sing carols on the Christmas Eve in our school. It was really sweet. Although the lyrics were completely by-heart in those times, they've gotten pretty rusty now. So, had to make a li'l use of Google to get them flawless. Anyways, here it is :


Jingle Bells (listen to it)

Dashing through the snow, in a one-horse open sleigh
Over the fields we go, laughing all the way;
Bells on bob-tail ring, making spirits bright
What fun it is to ride and sing a sleighing song tonight

(Chorus)
Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way!
O what fun it is to ride in a one-horse open sleigh
Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way!
O what fun it is to ride in a one-horse open sleigh

A day or two ago, I thought I'd take a ride
And soon Miss Fanny Bright, was seated by my side;
The horse was lean and lank, misfortune seemed his lot;
He got into a drifted bank and there we got upsot

(Chorus)
Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way!
O what fun it is to ride in a one-horse open sleigh
Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way!
O what fun it is to ride in a one-horse open sleigh

A day or two ago, the story I must tell
I went out on the snow, and on my back I fell;
A gent was riding by, in a one-horse open sleigh
He laughed as there I laid but quickly drove away

(Chorus)
Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way!
O what fun it is to ride in a one-horse open sleigh
Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way!
O what fun it is to ride in a one-horse open sleigh

Now the ground is white, go it while you're young
Take the girls tonight, and sing this sleighing song;
Just get a bob-tailed bay, two-forty as his speed
Hitch him to an open sleigh and crack! you'll take the lead

(Chorus)
Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way!
O what fun it is to ride in a one-horse open sleigh
Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way!
O what fun it is to ride in a one-horse open sleigh!!

Jingles all the way...

Hmm...it's certainly been over a month now since I've last posted something out here. Well, it's true that I've been a very regular blogger. But, I don't know why, these days I just don't find the zeal to write anything out here. Okay, this's festive time, the Christmas Eve...and I really don't have any right to pull your spirits down...but then again. I don't know, it seems I've lost myself somewhere. On my personal front, life's been really a ruckus. It seems just because I like my drinks on the rocks, fate too wants me to live my life on the rocks. Things just aren't moving the way they are supposed to be. It's not really the first time that I've been facing problems...issues have always been indetterent in my road of life. But somehow, I've even lost the urge to fight back...to let the world know that the Champion's still here, he might be down, but not outta the game.

I remember, just yesterday, I had been talking to my girlfriend, Sakshi. We were discussing our respective 'tolerance levels" in our relationship. I remember asking her never to lose the zeal to live, never to forget to fight. It's not as shameful to lose than to accept defeat. And now, here I am, actually resigning myself to my fate, to this big bad world. A very dear friend of mine, Sukanya, had noted the other day that probably the so-called God above has actually meant me to be a fighter. Well...I ask this God of hers that why ME? Why do I have to fight all my life for my comforts? Can I never get anything easy? Why can I not expect the minimum of consideration? What's my sin to get punished the way I have been? Okay, the year didn't really start too well for me. I anyways was in a problem last year. Somewhat got through that...I was recuperating pretty well...was hoping real bad that probably things've finally smoothened out for me...but no, how can it be? And now this! Okay, I admit that even I myself had been a li'l responsible for it...but then, what the hell? Am I not entitled to even an ounce of luck?

To look at it all from another angle, it was one of the best years I've ever lived. Got the cutest gal I've ever met as my girlfriend. Kissed for the very first time in my life :-p. Got a job. Though part-time, a job's always a job. Got a chance to evaluate who my real comrades are, something not many people get the chance in their lifetimes. Had a close brush with Death. Did a course on programming on the .NET platform, something I believe shall help me a lot in future. Working on a college website. Drove around 120+ kms in a single day, my highest as of now. Well, the year have certainly been pretty eventful.

Anyways, it's hardly 2 hours left for Santa to arrive...and I think it's high time that I wished all my freinds, be real or virtual, Merry Christmas! Have a great day and yeah, a great year ahead too. Have fun!!