As you sow, so you reap
One
evening as I entered the house my wife told me about an incident happened in
the family of my cousin named Kailash. The whole incident put my memory in the
time machine and I travelled some 15 years in the past.
The
occasion was a marriage ceremony in my Masi’s (Mother’s sister) house. I had gone there with my wife and
daughter. All the rituals of marriage
were being conducted with lots of enthusiasm and fun. On the eve of the
marriage ‘Mahila Sangeet’ was organized and a professional lady was engaged as
‘Masters of Ceremonies’. All the
relatives and guests were enjoying the evening.
MC was good at her craft and was inviting the family members to perform
in a very good sequence; in between she was announcing various spot prizes
also. We all were participating with lots
of zeal and were full of ear to hear the next spot prize. And the MC announced the next spot prize, ‘any
kid below 15 years of age brings me the marriage invitation card first will get
a prize’. Listening this all the kids
started running here and there, some went to their rooms; some started digging
their mother’s hand bag, a few collected the car keys from their fathers and
ran to the car park area to collect the card.
My
cousin (Masi’s son) who was beside me during the evening had two sons below the
age of 15, was cheering them to arrange the invitation card fast. Suddenly I saw a girl of around 8 years
running towards the MC with an invitation card in her hand. Just then my cousin’s elder son caught the
girl, snatched the card and within seconds presented it to the MC. In the milieu of so many people the MC could
not see the reality and gave the prize to my cousin’s son. Now my cousin’s joy knew no bounds. In his view his son had shown supreme smartness
by snatching the card from the little girl and presenting it to the MC. He was all high about his son. He called his
son, patted his back and asked him to sit on his lap pampering him. I kept
quiet trying to enjoy the next performance, but the cousin who was looking for
endorsement for his son’s smartness rose the topic again that how sharply his
son had acted. I paused for a second,
framed the sentence in my mind and said, ‘Don’t be so happy, today he is
snatching from others, tomorrow he may snatch from family members. Condemn him
now’. This sentence put a brake on my
cousin’s display of joy but his face expressed that he did not appreciate this
piece of advice. Then I showed him the 8 year old girl, who was weeping silently
in a corner.
The
incident my wife told me that evening was related to the same cousin i.e.
Masi’s Son named Kailash. Wife told me
that Kailash’s son Mahesh is threatening his father to transfer all the
property in his name. And his
threatening was not only verbal but physical also. His tactics included removing the quilt from
his father’s body in the midnight of December/January winters of North India,
disconnecting phone calls made by Kailash to his other children, deliberately
putting excess salt in Kailash’s food etc.
The
information made me sad and I decided to call Kailash. Phone was picked up by Mahesh, he spoke very
politely but made excuses about the presence of his father. I could not stop visualizing Kailash weeping
silently in a corner somewhere just as that little girl was weeping some 15
years ago.
Passive
acceptance of children’s rude, selfish or insensitive behavior by parents is a
real cause of them turning in to brats. Whenever
I hear about counseling session for children, I wonder, who is in more need of
this session, Children or their parents?
Sanjay
Bordia, 1044-A, High Point-1, Palace Road, Bangalore-560001. Ph. 09743322555
No comments:
Post a Comment