Just before I was about to leave the gas station, I had to put my foot on the brakes of my car. Next to my car was standing a little boy, age would be 12 years maximum. He was holding a drum which is usually used to keep edibles hot or cold. Before I would have had said anything to him, he came to me, knocked my window, I moved it down.
Do you want to buy a warm boiled egg? I kept staring at him, he was trying to convince me it`s very cheap and weather is cold, maybe you need it. The way he said this, had unexplainable effect on me. I felt like I was breaking from deep inside, a voice of breaking glass from thousand miles away. I had in my eyes the picture of my younger brother, who is his age. In a nano- second, I had an unintentional comparison between this child and my brother.
I still remember, that it was night time, around 10`o clock. I asked him how many eggs do you have to sell? He proudly told me that he has sold 20 and now has 5 left. I bought some of them and advised him not to beg for anything in his life, just hard work and you will get everything you want. I encouraged him and his eyes were sparkling. I will never forget those eyes.
Some days ago, a similar thing happened to me again on a signal, where a little boy of 10 or 12 years of age came and requested to clean my windshield. I allowed him, he cleaned it but I didn`t have change, I promised him that I would pay for his services and took my car to service lane, but he said, don`t bother, its fine and smiled.
The reason I am telling you this is not my personal projection; rather, there are some strong messages in these incidents. Let me put these in front of my readers.
How would you compare the behavior of these children with whom ruling our country? These little children work hard, sell stuff which costs us like next to nothing. They face hard weathers, unknown fears, fight with society and earn little just to feed their family and themselves. On the other hand, our ruling class travels in the convoy of 98 official cars, all fueled with our tax money. Unlike these hardworking children, they earn much with bribe, commissions and kickbacks. These children feed their families but our rulers make families die from taxes, inflation and worse law and order situation. BUT these little angels have a self respect, which our rulers don`t have, they earn while our rulers beg. They live legitimate but rulers make marry on our taxes. I don`t know how much respect we have for self respect but little children have self respect which our rulers lack.
Next thing, who is responsible for such a situation? If you ask me, I would always say, it`s us, who are responsible for the situation, we always elect incapable persons as leaders, we elect them so that we can use them in our personal affairs, like getting jobs, transfer postings etc. we never thought that by doing this, how are we contributing in slaughtering our own future with our own hands. Yes, such elected representatives do help us but in individual way, they never thought about a nation, which comprises of all parts of our society, including these small children. Our destruction consists of a simple cycle, we elect incapable people and they destroy us, we cry and cry and become victims, but at the end of the day, prioritize our personal interest over national interest and re-elect the same. I`ll not talk about remedies, we know each and everything, I am just elaborating our general behavior.
Last but not least, how should we take care of this delicate but neglected part of society. These children have lost their childhood, when our children play with toys, they walk on roads to find customers, when our children think of some outing and picnic, they think of the big problems which they try to solve with their innocent little minds and weak body and small hands. When our children don`t have any medical or security issues, we mobilize all public and private resources, but when these angels face these, they have no state assurance standing by them. We are together by our social status while they are alone. Our children go to schools and they stand out of schools selling pens and pencils. But still we don`t know whom we should call double faced.
We spend much money on useless things, but why don`t we have a generous heart to buy a pen or an egg from these angels. Please don`t make them watch dreams of living like our standards, because there is no one to fulfill their dreams, neither our state nor us. They cannot be us, because we would never allow them to be. Just help them to live and eat. Please buy their stuff, but do not give them money in shape of charity, otherwise it will take away from them a last worthy and precious thing, self respect.
Photo Credit: WikiMedia Commons
Syed Talal Hassan Bukhari
talal.hassan5@gmail.com
talal.hassan5@gmail.com
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