Kokrajhar calling!

“Whatever you do may be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it.” Mahatma Gandhi

Gandhiji did his bit in giving us freedom. He was a one-man army with a passion that drove him to move mountains. And move he did. Not only mountains but the whole world. People were mesmerized by his passion. The passion to take on the gargantuan task to free the billions of people of today from the shackles of pain, frustration and dominion.  

But then, the staidly question as to whether we are free at all; free in the mind to think passionately about something that will drive us to wake up in the middle of the night and say, “Hey, wait a minute. I need to bring about a change to this world.”

But sadly, there are very few givers to this world; very few people who will uninhibitedly, passionately, deliberately and yet quietly bring about a change even if they knew that the world was soon to end.

But fortunately, I know of some people who have brought about a change in the lives of the marginalised and the people who deserve more than care.

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...and then there were angels abound! My trip to Kokrajhar on the 2^nd of October,2012 made me doubly sure that angels actually do exist and they work ever so quietly.

Every child has the right to a beautiful life. However, when terror strikes, a child is forced to retreat into a shell and it becomes a very difficult task to again train the child to withdraw from the intense fear psychosis it went through.

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The ethnic clashes between the Santhals and the Boros in 1996 and again in 1998 left more than 300 people homeless and several children orphaned. The children felt cornered and scarred for the rest of their lives, knowing not whom to trust and what to do. They had no one to turn to and were at the mercy of people who donated what they could to keep them alive. Some of them had their relatives who took care of them in spite of living a hand-to-mouth existence themselves. But the panic psychosis was evident and writ large on their faces.

However, angels work in close tandem with mortals and I saw this on my visit to Kokrajhar with the CARE team from DBYES, Don Bosco Institute on the 2^nd of October, 2012, led by Fr. V.M. Thomas. We started early at 6am and all through the journey Fr. Thomas spoke of how much he wants to do for the people and the children of strife-torn Kokrajhar. He is one visionary who dreams what others think impossible and presents the best to the world; something so beautiful that it touches a chord somewhere and makes me feel distressed on my inadequate effort to bring a change to the lives of the lesser privileged.

There are 46 CARE centres across Kokrajhar, Chirang and Udalguri, caring for 4000 children; the children who have been inadvertently affected by the heinous ethnic clashes, clamping down their ability to think beyond a small rat-hole, where they stayed all the time gripped with the fear of never being able to see the next morning. Some run down shambles were made into make-shift refugee camps where they huddled around each other to let the comfort percolate into each other.

We were privileged to be joined for breakfast at the Kokrajhar Circuit House by Dr. Martin Casper, MD, Child Aid Network, Germany and around eight volunteers from across different continents, who were actually travelling in separate cars along with us. After this, we drove to the Kokrajhar Don Bosco. Fr. Damien is an excellent communicator and I was endeared to him immediately as he showed us around his huge school. Quite a facility they have created for the children as they are still in the process of expanding.

Soon after, we went to the Amguri Training cum Production Centre, where we were warmly welcomed from the entrance by beautiful dancers, dressed in their colourful ensemble. After the ritualistic washing of hands with soap and water, we were taken on a round of the facility. The weaving unit was a riot of activity, with young girls at the looms, weaving out colourful clothes. The young volunteers with Dr. Casper soon became more than involved with the weavers, trying their hands at the shuttle, which can only be handled with expertise. Ofcourse, it was an absolute pleasure to see the young Santhali girls work at the loom, with not an iota of fear or unhappiness on their faces. I bought a traditional Santhali ensemble that caught my fancy and which I knew would be a cynosure of all eyes when I actually wore it!

Yes, fear was the word when they were brutalised by their own brothers more than a decade back. Tormented and broken, they had no one to turn to till DBYES, Don Bosco led by Fr. V.M. Thomas came to their rescue. Fr. Thomas, with his team of selfless Samaritans, worked throughout the year and round the clock to feed, care and love these people and their distraught children. It took them several years to get the Santhalis to think fearlessly before they could actually step out of their homes, without panic in their hearts. And today, they are a happy community, working at their looms, stitching clothes, learning how to drive and rearing pigs and poultry.

“Today, there are vocational training centres at Amguri, Bhutiachang and Gosaigaon, training around 200 young people,” Fr. V.M. Thomas told us as we sped to our next destination.

As we turned a corner of the road, I was pleasantly surprised when we were greeted with colourful flags, music and lots of smiling faces. Some children, wearing different coloured dresses lined up the entire area leading upto the entrance of the school building, while waving several coloured flags. An ambience of happiness and festivity, while some of them waved at us from the windows of the building, as we waved back at them. We were at Don Bosco, Amguri for the Care Children Meet cum Parents’ Day.

We all went and sat in the seats designated for us and soon, the children, in all their colourful attires started dancing and singing. The principal of the school kept on talking in between the program, lending the much needed anchorage. It was amazing to see that the entire group of children, all Santhalis and rehabilitated by CARE, DBI, now had a reason to smile. The atrocities of the past are still writ large on their faces. Some of them hardly smiled and some would just be in awe as I shook hands with them and hugged them!

Some of us spoke in turns trying to tell the children how lucky they were to be blessed by the care of Fr. V. M. Thomas. In fact, most of us were willing to give quality time in a year for these distressed children; telling them stories, teaching them painting, drama, poetry and also counselling them to get over their worst fear; deprivation of living. I was more than willing to give a lot of time to these children because I could see that they had potential to be focussed at the national level. And this is what I have been wanting to do all my life. Give quality time to the deprived children and also the misled-misguided youth!

After lunch at Don Bosco, Amguri, our next stop was the Training cum Production Centre at Gosaigaon. Once again, we were given the warmest welcome. After the initial round of felicitations with their traditional cotton scarves (gamusas), the young trainees of the centre entertained us with their songs and dances. And then we were taken on a round of the facility. They had a computer centre to empower the youth on the latest technology in computers, all of which has been sponsored by the Childaid Network of Germany. This centre also has a weaving and a tailoring centre and we were pretty much impressed by the creative things they had designed with the limited exposure that they had been entailed to.

It was 8pm when we finally started from Gosaigaon. The road back was bumpy but I was pleasantly tired and fell into a deep slumber, while Fr. V.M. Thomas and Dr. Martin Casper planned what next they could do for these people of the BTAD area who so need one thing desperately, constantly and without fail.....LOVE!