Andhra Pradesh

Bringing a smile on their faces

— Photo: C. V. Subrahmanyam.

Cheerful mood: Streetchildren at a programme organised in the city.

VISAKHAPATNAM: The glee on the faces of the streetchildren was too evident to be missed. They waited with bated breath for the speeches of the guests to end so they could start playing with fireworks.

When the ‘momentous occasion’ came, it hardly took a few seconds for them to ‘fall in line’ to receive their share of fireworks from the organisers.

Once they were given the green signal, their joy knew no bounds and they played in gay abandon.

The glow on their faces seemed more than that emitted by the flowerpots and ground ‘chakkars’.

Playing with fireworks seemed to make them forget their sorrow at least for a while. The neglected and uncared for street children who had made the Railway stations and trains their home, have been lodged at shelter homes by Childline.

A close look at their faces is enough to fathom the hurt in their eyes and the fact that they had undergone a troubled childhood.

They come from different States and diverse backgrounds but most of them seem to have one thing in common: ill-treatment and neglect by parents or domestic violence that made them run away from their homes. There are, however, a few delinquents who prefer to take to the streets than ‘slogging’ at their school.

Earlier, some of the streetchildren proved that they are second to none when it came to displaying their creative abilities.

They caught the gathering by surprise by presenting both modern and classical dances like professionals.

A girl danced in perfect sync to the Tamil song “Vaaraai...” from ‘Chandramukhi’.

“I was moved by children sweeping the coaches in trains and seeking money from passengers during my visits to different places between 1995 and 1998.

I used to wonder where they were coming from. Subsequently, I found that shelter homes for street children were being run in Mumbai and Delhi,” recalled B. Devi Prasad of the Social Work Department of Andhra University, while addressing the gathering earlier.

Childline Nodal Director B. Vijaya Lakshmi said that the organisation had been conducting Deepavali celebrations for street children in Visakhapatnam for the past six years. “Though we are doing our best to make you happy, we can never substitute your mother’s love,” Director of Childline Collab Project G. Sumana said. She advised the street children not to indulge in vices like smoking and chewing khaini.

Faculty members of the Department of Social Work Vijaya Bhavani, Harnath, Murali Mohan Reddy and Indira Rani (Action Aid), City Coordinator of Childline Pavani, former Coordinator Krishnaveni and former centre coordinator Basaveswara Rao were among those who attended.

© Copyright 2000 - 2009 The Hindu