Tag: india

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Trends

Mumbai school students are heading overseas

Exchange programmes are slowly becoming popular with school students and parents alike, widening their horizons and enhancing their cultural experience.
by The Editors | editor@themetrognome.in

Students these days have several things going for them – unconventional work options while they study, a multitude of courses to choose from, and most importantly, the opportunity to travel to foreign countries on short stints as exchange students.

Shubhra BharadwajIt is this last that is slowly picking up pace in our country – and Mumbai is particularly responsive to the trend of students travelling to distant shores to gain life experience and a chance to study other cultures up close. The Metrognome spoke to Ferriswheel’s founder Shubhra Bharadwaj (in pic on left) to gain more insights into the trend.

Excerpts from the interview:

What is the response from Mumbai students like, to the CEPs (Cultural Exchange Programmes)that you plan?

The response is phenomenal. We have used word of mouth as our marketing tool and it has offered extremely satisfying success on all fronts. Schools have supported us whole-heartedly and even the feedback from the people has been great.

Currently, students in Mumbai or any other part of India are not completely aware of such student exchange programes except the ones who have already gone on such programmes. We hope to create more awareness among kids, schools and parents about the benefits of our CEPs for children.

Can you describe the first CEP you planned? Which was the country the students visited?

This first International Children’s Festival was organised in 1996 where the children’s group was taken to Turkey to celebrate the National Children’s Day on April 23. It is the Ferriswheel Youth Ensemble presents- Ticket To Bollywood (5)world’s largest children’s festival that has seen participation from over 30,000 children from 116 different countries since its inception by Kamal Ataturk. Each year close to 50 countries participate in this festival. The gala performance is and was telecast live on all Turkish channels.

The prestigious event bestowed the honour and privilege on individually selected Indian children representing the team, to meet the Prime Minister and President of Turkey, the Honourable Mayor and Governor of Gaziantep, as well the Head of Turkish Parliament, a moment of pride for India.

So children also get to meet heads of State in the countries they visit?

Every time we travel under our CEPs, the children are taken to meet various dignitaries like the Governor and the Mayor of the host city and other heads of States. Every year one child from each participating country is chosen to meet the Prime Minister and President of the host state and is flown in a chartered aircraft. The event gets covered by the local press and media followed by a special dinner for the children.

A few of the heads that we have met earlier through our CEPs are the Prime Minister of Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdoðan, the President of Turkey, Abdullah Gül, the Mayor of Izmir city, Aziz Kocaoðlu and Governor of Izmir city, M Cahit KIRAÇ.

What do students and their parents look for in a programme of this sort?

They are looking for education through travel, friends, carnivals, different cultures, sports, fun and international exposure. These exchange programmes are short dream lives that children and youth experience towards a future that is wholesome, open-minded and confident. Children get the unique experience of living with the host families and experience their culture on a first-hand basis. More importantly, they get an opportunity to exhibit their culture and represent their country on an extremely prestigious platform.

The objective of every parent and every school is to provide a child with the experiences and tools to develop holistically and learn to be a ‘global citizen’. While parents look for learning and their child becoming more responsible, students look for it as an opportunity to meet children of different countries, broaden their horizons, learn to adapt to new cultures and having fun.

Ferriswheel Youth Ensemble presents- Ticket To Bollywood (2)Thus, such programmes help children develop holistically and learn to be ‘global citizens’. The child learns to be independent and confident, becomes responsible, overcomes prejudices and pre-conceived notions about people of different cultures, gets to intermingle and make friends with children from all across the world. Also, the cultural exchange programme certificate is a great addition to their resume as it helps them in admissions abroad.

Of all the States and cities in India, from where do you see maximum participation? 

We have a strong base in Gujarat and Mumbai for years and now we will be looking at operations pan India. We have a tie up with Italy, Turkey, USA, Canada, UK, Switzerland, Spain, Portugal, Czech Republic and France for the programme.

How are foreign students able to adjust to life in India?

We only take a group of children from India to International festivals across the globe. We do not invite their children over to our country. The reason why this programme is called Exchange Programme is that the children live with the host families and interact with many children from other countries.

Please describe an interesting incident from the CEPs, which has remained with you till date.

Ferriswheel Youth Ensemble was awarded the best performing group trophy at a prestigious International Youth Festival in Canada through public voting. Our Executive Producer, CEP, Sabeena Kapur fondly remembers her CEP trip to Taiwan. During that trip, the children were sharing their memorable moments with us and one of them went up to her with a handmade card that said, “I don’t miss home because of you and whenever I will celebrate Mother’s Day, I shall think of you.” We were truly touched.

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Campaign

India will need several more Alzheimer’s caregivers: Report

The just-released World Alzheimer Report 2013 reveals that the global Alzheimer’s epidemic has created shortage of caregivers around the world.
by Alzheimer’s Disease International (ADI) and Bupa

The World Alzheimer Report 2013 Journey of Caring: An analysis of long-term care for dementia,  released yesterday, calls for Governments around the world to make dementia a priority by implementing national plans, and by initiating urgent national debates on future arrangements for long-term care.

Alzheimer’s Disease International (ADI) and Bupa commissioned a team of researchers, led by Professor Martin Prince from King’s College London, to produce the report.

dementiaThe report reveals that, as the world population ages, the traditional system of “informal” care by family, friends, and community will require much greater support. Globally, 13 per cent of people aged 60 or over require long-term care. Between 2010 and 2050, the total number of older people with care needs will nearly treble from 101 to 277 million. Long-term care is mainly about care for people with dementia; around half of all older people who need personal care have dementia, and 80 per cent of older people in nursing homes are living with dementia. The worldwide cost of dementia care is currently over US$600 billion (£395 billion), or around 1 per cent of global GDP.

The report states that more attention needs to be paid to maintaining and enhancing quality of life; helping those affected, and their families to ‘live well with dementia’.

Ten-fold increases in research funding are needed to re-energise the work on dementia prevention, treatment and care. This investment is essential to mitigate the impact of the global dementia epidemic on future long-term care needs, and improve quality of care. A key finding is that the number of dependent older adults will increase to 277 million by 2050, and half of all older people who need personal care have dementia.

India is likely to have a 100 per cent increase in dependent older adults.

The Report recommends that:

– Systems should to be in place to monitor the quality of dementia care in all settings – whether in care homes or in the community. Autonomy and choice should be promoted at all caring for alzheimer's patientsstages of the dementia journey, prioritising the voices of people with dementia and their caregivers.

– Health and social care systems should be better integrated and coordinated to meet people’s needs.

– Front-line caregivers must be adequately trained and systems will need to be in place to ensure paid and unpaid carers receive appropriate financial reward in order to sustain the informal care system and improve recruitment and retention of paid carers.

– Care in care homes is a preferred option for a significant minority – quality of life at home can be as good, and costs are comparable if the unpaid work of family caregivers is properly valued

– The quality of care in care homes should be monitored through the quality of life and satisfaction of their residents, in addition to routine inspections, as care homes will remain an important component of long-term care.

Professor Martin Prince, from King’s College London’s Institute of Psychiatry and author of the report, said: “People with dementia have special needs. Compared with other long-term care users they need more personal care, more hours of care, and more supervision, all of which is associated with greater strain on caregivers, and higher costs. Their needs for care start early in the disease course, and evolve constantly over time, requiring advanced planning, monitoring, and coordination.

“We need to value the unpaid contribution of family caregivers more, and reward paid caregivers better. We can build quality into our care systems, but to do so while containing costs and achieving equity of access for all will be a challenge.”

Marc Wortmann, Executive Director, Alzheimer’s Disease International said: “We need to value those that provide frontline care for people with dementia. This includes paid, as well as unpaid family caregivers, who share much in common. Governments need to acknowledge the role of caregivers and ensure that there are policies in place to support them.”

Dr Paul Zollinger-Read, Chief Medical Officer, Bupa, said: “An ageing population around the world means that improving dementia care and support is one of our generation’s greatest healthcare challenges – a challenge we must tackle. We’re calling on Governments around the world to make dementia a national health priority by developing national dementia plans.”

Read the full text of the report here: www.alz.co.uk/worldreport2013

The Metrognome is committed to the cause of dementia and Alzheimer’s awareness. This month, we’re covering the stories and statistics on dementia and Alzheimer’s that really matter. Do write to us at editor@themetrognome.in if you have information and anecdotes to share. 

(Pictures courtesy nightingaleseldercare.com, www.indianexpress.com. Pictures have been used for representational purpose only)

Categories
Overdose

You are a terrorist

Terrorism doesn’t start with the picking up of a gun. It begins with mentally slotting people on various small fronts.
by Jatin Sharma

It might shock you to hear this, but it’s true. You are a terrorist. You have been contributing to terrorism in one or more ways knowingly or unknowingly.

It seems to me I am meeting a lot of terrorists these days.

What really is terrorism? It is an act of creating terror and feeding people’s mind with fear.

And you are contributing to it in many ways. The first step of supporting terrorism is when we, as individuals, try deciphering a person’s origin the moment we get to know his last name. It is the favourite pastime of an average Indian.

“Oh, your name is Mark Wesley. You are a Catholic?” you might say.

“No, I am a Protestant,” he may answer.

The moment we hear a person’s name, we get all excited. Like a person is a puzzle presented to us, and that must be solved. And as if we are not foolish enough to divide people in terms of Muslims, Sindhis, Sikhs and Parsis, we go a step further and say East Indian, Goan, Dalit and what not.

Let alone this sport of naming and categorising everyone in sight, we even throw out silly taunts when we celebrate festivals or watch matches. Have you ever gone up to a Muslim friend and asked him if he is supporting Pakistan when the cricket match is on?

Aren’t we helping terrorists – the bomb-weilding kind – become more powerful, for these kinds of statements make it easier to brainwash people later?

We are basically supporting terrorism as long as we keep dividing our people. We get amazed and make it a big story when a Muslim hosts a Ganesh at his place during the Ganpati festival. If you are a mediaperson who prints such stories to show that India is a land of ‘Unity in diversity’, you are a terrorist. Why does it shock you if someone wants to believe in a God without calling that God Allah or Ganpati?

The irony of the matter is that God has become a divisive name in today’s world. Even if you think you are the most reluctant fundamentalist, think again. If you have ever gone out to show the world that your celebration of a particular festival is better than any other religion’s celebration, then you have reiterated the divisive mindset.

If you still disagree, listen to this. The moment you go, “Patil is Marathi, Shah is Gujarati, Kapoor is Punjabi, Motwani is Sindhi, Batliwala is Parsi, Sheikh is Muslim, D’Souza is Catholic,” you are supporting terrorism, for you are segregating people in your mind. You are giving them an association that might not actually be true. Your mind is that of a terrorist, that automatically relates one person to be a part of a larger group, and you believe that group to be representative of a certain kind of behaviour.

More examples of daily terrorism? Sitting at a table and acccusing someone of being a miser as he is a Marwari, or calling a loud mouth at work a Bengali, or a show-off neighbour, a Punjabi.

When was the last time a person’s name was just a name to you? Or the last time you came across an unusual last name and didn’t waste your and his time asking which part of the country that person belonged to?

Jatin Sharma is a media professional who doesn’t want to grow up, because if he grows up, he will be like everybody else.

(Pictures courtesy o.canada.com, indiadeific.blogspot.com)

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Enough said

No nation for poor mothers

A recent report indicates that despite the best healthcare services, mothers from marginalised sections of society receive very little attention.
by Humra Quraishi

Earlier this month, the Population Foundation of India, an NGO working in the field of  heath and population, organised a consultation on Maternal Health on April 3 and 4, 2013  with support from the United Nations Population Fund, the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, and the Maternal Health Taskforce of the Harvard School of Public Health.

I quote Poonam Mutterja, the executive director of the Population Foundation of India  on the current scenario:  “We all know that maternal mortality has declined significantly over the last decade. InIndia, the figures dropped from 301 per 100,000 births in 2003 to 212 in 2009. Yet, these reductions have not reached the most marginalised and disadvantaged communities and groups in society; tribal communities, schedule castes, and those belonging to the poorest quintile.”

According to the National Family Health Survey 2005-2006, scheduled tribe mothers are least likely to have received any antenatal care or care from a doctor. Moreover, only 23 per cent of mothers in the lowest wealth quintile received antenatal care from a doctor as against 86 per cent of mothers in the highest wealth quintile.

Mutterja continues, “I refer to the case of the 26 maternal deaths that took place at Barwani district hospital in Madhya Pradesh over a period of eight months in 2010. 21 of these 26 women belonged to scheduled tribes. The Population Foundation of India, which is the secretariat for community monitoring conducted an enquiry at the government’s request, and found that each of the 26 maternal deaths was avoidable.”

The Foundation has also released some more findings on maternal health:

– India’s current MMR (Maternal Mortality Rate) levels still remain unacceptably high and by many estimates account for nearly one-quarter of all such deaths worldwide.  Expressed in sheer numbers between 78,000-100,000 women die annually in India as a result of childbirth and pregnancy.

– Moreover, for each woman who dies, another estimated 20 more suffer from infection, injury and disability connected to pregnancy and childbirth.

– Only 50 per cent of women in India receive three or more antenatal check-ups, leaving the other half deprived of adequate care (DLHS-3, 2007-08).  The situation is worse when we look at data by caste/tribe.

– The likelihood of having received any antenatal care and care from a doctor is lowest for scheduled tribe mothers (25 per cent) and highest for mothers who do not belong to a scheduled caste, scheduled tribe, or other backward class.

– Among mothers in households with the lowest wealth quintile, 59 per cent received antenatal care and only 23 per cent received antenatal care from a doctor. By contrast, among mothers in households in the highest wealth quintile, 97 per cent received antenatal care and 86 per cent received antenatal care from doctors.

– In India, the unmet need for contraceptives remains high, it is over 30 per cent in Bihar, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh, and over 20 per cent in Orissa and Uttarakhand. This unmet need reflects the gap between a woman’s desired fertility and her access to family planning services.

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journalist based in Gurgaon. She is the author of Kashmir: The Untold Story and co-author of Simply Khushwant.

(Picture courtesy abcnews.go.com)

Categories
Enough said

Rich past, uncertain present

Delhi hosted cultural events capturing the essence of bygone times, which only served to remind us of sharp, present-day realities.
by Humra Quraishi

Delhi recently played host to a series of exhibitions on the life and works of Amir Khusrau. Then there was a three-day seminar on Dara Shukoh, the eldest son and heir apparent of Shah Jahan. There was also an exhibition on the art of Calligraphy. Sadly, I could make it to only one of these three events.

I attended the Amir Khusrau exhibition at the National Archives. Let me just say it was splendid. It captured the genius of Amir Khusrau, his poetry, his thoughts, and his philosophy. Credit ought to be given to the Aga Khan Trust for Culture and also to the curator, Shakeel Hossein, who, I’m told, came all the way from Boston to set up the exhibition.

I couldn’t attend the three-day meet on Dara Shukoh, organised by Anjuman Taraqqi Urdu (Hind), but going by the list of speakers – Gopal Krishna Gandhi, Professor Irfan Habib and several well-known historians and critics – it must have been a wonderful, full-fledged seminar. Dara Shukoh has always fascinated me a lot; so much so that I find  my visits to the Kashmir Valley incomplete if I don’t go and visit the unique school of Sufism, Kas-I-Mah, which he had set up. Its ruins lie close to the Chashm-e-Shahi Springs in Srinagar. It is the first-of-its-kind in the whole of Asia and Central Asia, and the school, now in a dilapidated state, was built near the Chashm-e-Shahi springs at the suggestion of his spiritual teacher, Akhund Mullah Mohammad Shah, who came from Badakhshan, in Afghanistan.

The more I read on him, the more I begin to feel that if only he’d lived, he could have changed the entire complexion of this land. In fact, one of the rather fascinating books on Dara Shukoh is penned by Gopal Krishna Gandhi, Mahatma Gandhi’s grandson and former bureaucrat-turned-Governor and now full-time writer. Soon after his book, Dara Shukoh: A Play was released, I‘d asked him why he’d written a book on this bygone Mughal prince. He’d said, “It was his story which was, in fact, history. Where do you find failure trouncing success, defeat making victory counterfeit, as in the life of Shahjahan’s eldest-born?”

Meanwhile, the exhibition on the Art of Calligraphy by the Siasat Group (and set up at the Jamia Millia Islamia’s MF Hussain Art Gallery) drew large crowds. I feel that calligraphy ought to be revived in a  big way, as it is one of those art forms that hasn’t received its due recognition in the country.

But all these events that helped me delve into our rich past has only forced me to ponder over our present and the future – what can we take away from the present?

Nothing. For today, we are busy chasing even those militants who are begging forgiveness and want to give up a life of violence for a second chance. Today, we are calling every bearded person a terrorist.

This week, on World Water Day, UNICEF released these grim findings: ‘Globally, an estimated 2,000 children under the age of five die every day from diarrhoeal diseases and of these, some 1,800 deaths are linked to water, sanitation and hygiene. Almost 90 per cent of child deaths from diarrhoeal diseases are directly linked to contaminated water, lack of sanitation, or inadequate hygiene. Despite a burgeoning global population, these deaths have come down significantly over the last decade, from 1.2 million per year in 2000 to about 760,000 a year in 2011.

UNICEF child mortality data show that about half of under-five deaths occur in only five countries: India, Nigeria, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Pakistan and China. Two countries – India (24 per cent) and Nigeria (11 per cent) – together account for more than a third of all under-five deaths. These same countries also have significant populations without improved water and sanitation.’

The report also states that, ‘The figures for sanitation are even bleaker. Those without improved sanitation in these countries are: India 814 million; China 477 million; Nigeria 109 million; Pakistan 91 million; and DRC 50 million. Improvements in water and sanitation would greatly contribute to a reduction in child mortality in these counties.’

This is the present we are grappling with.

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journalist based in Gurgaon. She is author of Kashmir: The Untold Story and co-author of Simply Khushwant.

(Picture courtesy bbc.co.uk)

Categories
Overdose

Pedestrian pains

Jatin Sharma recently bought a new car, and he has lost respect for pedestrians already. Read on to know why.

When you buy a new car, you want to respect pedestrians. Mostly because you were one of them before you got your mean machine.

I recently got a new car. In my new-found love for pedestrians hoofing it while I drove by in style, I stopped at every signal, and when I would see them waiting to cross, I would drive to the side of the road and apply the brakes – only to realise that they were not always equally considerate towards me. They would keep crossing one after the other, and others would just jump out after seeing me stop for others. It was almost like it was a race to see who would cross in my front of my car first.

Another time, all the cars were whizzing by and no one was letting the pedestrians cross. My new good-driver soul made me stop. But instead of being thankful, everyone while passing started throwing abuses at me. They vented their frustration at having waited a long while, on me. Me, the guy who had stopped and let them cross. All of them looked at me in anger, also pulling a lot of faces.

This is a good time to insert a quote from Lawrence S Harris: ‘Are we taking drunken drivers off the road to turn them into drunken pedestrians?’ 

I  admit  that I just Googled this quote and I have no idea who Lawrence S Harris is and when he quoted this. But I am putting it out here because it is apt to what I’m about to say next.

Yes, pedestrians have every right to curse, abuse and torment the drivers in our country.  It has been observed that our country lacks basic discipline and respect for traffic rules. Whether it is lane-cutting or rash driving or the, ‘Yeh rasta mere baap ka hai‘ attitude of a driver, our traffic situation is clearly based upon the law of the jungle. Whoever is bigger and powerful rules the roost. It’s that law of nature where the smaller car is bullied by the bigger car, or the bigger bus, or the biggest truck.

But the law of the jungle falls flat when it comes to the pedestrian. Jaywalking is the pedestrian’s favourite pastime and the moment someone is going to hit them, they will not look for logic or the fault of their actions, it directly becomes the question: “Yeh carwale /H@#$zaade samajhte kya hain khud ko?”

Pedestrians labour under the delusion that averting accidents is just a driver’s responsibility. Pedestrians in our country like to jump over dividers and even land on the bonnet of a passing car suddenly. Every time it happens, I wait for at least one of these clowns to jump out with a bugle in hand and yell, “SURPRISE!”. Most pedestrians don’t even realise that the person inside the vehicle is manoevering a machine that is at least 100 times his weight, and he needs to stop it mechanically in order to avoid a disaster.

And if the driver goes wrong even by a whisker, the world and its mother rushes out to bash him up without asking whose fault it was. Our country has so many rules and regulations for drivers, but when it comes to pedestrians, there’s nothing, so we can just hope that each of us is a brilliant driver who can handle any situation. The driver can’t speak on the phone while driving and can’t be drunk behind the wheel and he/she needs to have a seat belt on, but the pedestrian can be drunk and on merrily talking on the phone and can basically get away with anything. 

And there are some pedestrians who make you talk to the hand. Literally. These are what I like to call the Ichchadhari Traffic Police; the moment they want to cross the road, they stroll across it with a hand raised. This species of pedestrian is deaf to honking cars and do not even acknowledge the driver of the car that has braked suddenly to avoid knocking him down. 

I’ve recently learnt that cars and pedestrians contribute to the traffic nuisance in our city in equal measure. Drivers are at fault several times, but pedestrians too need to be a little lenient towards drivers. They need to realise that a guy handling a vehicle must be under tremendous pressure. The pedestrian should try and avert small mistakes, too. He should not pretend to be a hero, leaping across the dividers and catching drivers off guard. 

We are a country that lacks basic infrastructure and courtesy when it comes to traffic rules. But then, the onus is on the people of the country to formulate those rules in order to make road usage beneficial for everyone. A country changes by the attitude of its people. But somehow, when people come out on the roads, either behind the wheel or on their feet, they instantly enter into a competition to see who reaches his/her destination first. 

There is no need to be in a perpetual road race. If we all become considerate about each other on the roads, the day will be come when even in India, drivers would love to stop their car and let the pedestrian cross the road. For now, if the drivers do that, they are only sitting waiting for people to stop crossing the road and let him pass, since the light turned green ages ago.

Jatin Sharma is a media professional who doesn’t want to grow up, because if he grows up, he will be like everyone else.

(Picture courtesy blogs.seattleweekly.com)

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