my kudos to tn women's collective- one of the few non donor funded mass based orgns in tn. ranjani
__________________________________________________ http://www.publishaletter.com/readletter.jsp?plid=28131 Dear Editor: As news came to me of a girl committing suicide because she failed (www.inewsone.com/2011/05/27/girl-commits-suicide-after...in.../53380) I wonder where the education system, parents, community, education market, state and media have failed. Not only that other countries want to emulate the Indian education model to get more people for software. Earlier this week I attended a workshop organised by women's collective (no donor funds) where marginalised children from 16 districts of Tamil Nadu had come and had set by their own panchayat at local to district to state level. Girls and boys were equally found in decision making. Significant proportion were dalits. Their list of achievements included taking a oath not to drink pepsi and coca cola, eating nutritious food, focusing on not only education but sports and cultural activities, prevention of such suicides, not smoking or chewing pan, not to discriminate on the basis of caste, sex or religion. Further, in one district they had successfully written to the Collector to remove the liquour shop from their village. In another village they had petitioned to repair water tank. They had prevented a child marriage. In another village they had (unsuccessfully) asked the government to prevent nuclear power plant from coming. They danced both traditional art forms and western music to entertain me Why media does not cover such events, and only how many percentage passed and how many 100% scored? Why in today's age teachers and media tell children become engineers, doctors, MBAs, MCAs- why not a woman/male farmer? Why just values are not taught in schools? Why the government provides little counseling before exam results? Why the private (and government) education market places values only on marks? Why other countries want to emulate the Indian model and violate child rights The Women's Collective makes money by selling organic agriculture products, LIC policies, collecting contributions etc., and its leader has decided not to travel abroad and addresses people from Tamil Nadu. The coordinators daughters took part in the program with equal enthusiasm * Acknowledging children, women's collective members and its coordinator Errata in public domain: When the children were asked whether Bhariatiyar's statement that India was independent and equality was achieved was a reality, they ALL said no. Reasons given were that votes could be purchased, discrimination against dalits were prevalent, girls were not given the same freedom as boys, sex selection of male/sex selective abortion of females was prevalent, teachers did not come regularly in government schools, and so on. I must say these children are wiser than mine- my failure. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "humanrights movement" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/humanrights-movement?hl=en.
