Updates: Housekeeping Staff - Provident Funds and State Insurance

Over the last few weeks, YATN members have been involved in surveying the housekeeping staff of the Academic blocks. The purpose of this exercise was to collect raw data about their wages, EPF and ESI status. We were also trying to ascertain how many of the staff had children who required academic support.

This data has now been collected and some basic concerns have been identified:

1. Many of the staff have never read their contract details.

2. Most do not have access to any document that can act as proof for their PF and SI (Provident fund, State Insurance)

3. There is a significant discrepancy in wages between the staff of AB2 and AB1.

We will update this post with the data shortly. There are other issues as well, however these are not evident from the data (hearsay only). The one condition that seems most serious out of these is:

1. There appears to be a culture of firing and re-hiring workers, in order to make them ineligible for bonuses.

In order to work towards fixing said issues, we are holding a meeting this Saturday (29/10/16) to discuss the roadmap forward. 

Meeting details:

Venue: LHC Cafeteria

Time: 11 am

All are welcome.

We are very glad to say that the SRC will be in attendance at this meeting. It is good to know that our elected representatives are here for the community beyond the students as well.

Alumni fundraising

Great news! The IISER alumni community continues to contribute to YATN. Attached below is a mail from Mayank Chugh - about a fundraising event conducted in his institute to support YATN.

Dear Y.A.T.N. and associated members,

Greetings from old, pretty, crooked, and charming university town of Tübingen, Germany!

Some of you know that I tried supporting the activities of Y.A.T.N. here in Tübingen recently and those who are not aware of any such thing, here’s the deal: I organised a fund raising event for Y.A.T.N. along with two friends of mine, Christine Kiefer and Avin Ramaiya last month (May 14, 2016.  Firstly, I would like to thank you for coordinating with me over the web to provide me all the information that I needed for the event. Secondly, I am delighted to tell you that the fund raising event had been a massive success! We managed to raise an amount of 800 Euro/60,000 INR.

Many congratulations!

Now let me tell you the underlying motivation and summarize the whole fund raising event.

Motivation:
Last year I was sitting with Christine Kiefer (one of the organisers; she is German by nationality) and we were discussing the way we have been raised in our respective countries. What stood striking out of our conversation was, the kind of education system that are present in two countries. In short, I described her how many under privileged children just do not get to see schools in their lifetime. I briefed her about our Y.A.T.N. group which was started by our seniors and my on-off involvement in it. We instantly came up with an idea of organising a fund raising event for Y.A.T.N.

Sometime during the beginning of this year, we sat down and tried to figure out a place and scale of the event. I went three rounds of presentation about Y.A.T.N. and discussions and convincing people who could provide us potential place for the event for free (Of course, I cannot rent a place here just like that and my institute does not work that flexibly as IISER M). Finally, we found a prospective place and we turned this event into a big open Indian charity party to the whole city.

Fund Raising Even/Indian Party:

The Indian party had various attractions. They are as follows:
1. Talk and discussion about the Y.A.T.N.
2. Cultural Program (Bharatanatyam dance performance, Rabindra Sangeet, and Gazals)
3. Bollywood-Electro Fusion DJ.
4. Indian Henna Tattoo counter.
5. Indian food and drinks.
6. Donation box.
As I mentioned, the party was open to the whole city without any entry ticket and more than 200 people showed up. It was crazy! Believe me, when I say this because it is not India here. We got a lot of appreciation from everyone because it was a great international crowd under one roof.

We primarily raised the funds via selling food and drinks that we prepared ourselves. We prepared a variety of food such as mix pakora, papadam, samosa, chutni, rice, channa masala. We prepared and sold mango-flavoured lassi as the prime drink.

It is unbelievable that 15 unknown people approached up after the party notice and volunteered for help in any possible chores.

A big thanks goes to the DJ, a friend of friend, who volunteered to DJ the whole night for us and he came all the way down to Tübingen from Dresden.

Once again, a big thanks to you guys for helping me out here.

Once again, congratulations!

Y.A.T.N. volunteers have been doing a commendable job. It is great that you guys have started new missions and have broken the dormancy of Y.A.T.N. blog. I would still request you to document everything and keep sharing information such as photos of the students who are attending school this year and other activities.

It was our pleasure and honour to organise this event for Y.A.T.N. and we are happy to support Y.A.T.N. 

Best Regards,
Mayank, Christine and Avin

Pics from the event:

Humans of IISER Mohali

As this is written, we are still fighting a long-drawn skirmish with the administration to reinstate the housekeeping staff we believe were unjustly fired. (Read about it here)

In our most recent meeting, as our able generals discussed our plans for the near future - a tangent sprang up. The idea was, or is a simple one. It is to show our appreciation for the housekeeping staff, in our effort to add depth to our efforts to integrate them with the IISER community. To do this, we are going to start by trying and saying thank you. At the convocation ceremony - on 24th of May, we will have a large collage made of photos of all the non-academic staff of IISER (or as many as possible) along with a joint chart for students to write thank-you notes.

We are also making a page - Humans of IISER Mohali (cliched, eh? :p) where we will upload all of these. Go over, give the page some love.

As we create this, we don't really know where it is going to go. It could become multiple things. A news outlet for all things IISER? A page to poke fun (harmless) and mock random people? The list of possible dreams is a long one. But for now, we want this to integrate the people of this campus. 
Eventually, we hope to hand this page over to IISER's photography and videography club and/or the literary club, with the hope that they can take this somewhere. Until then - Don't let's go gentle into that good night.

Rough sketch of plans for Summer Camp - 2016.

Update:

This event is no longer to be conducted, as the schools we were targeting have been approached by a commercial company that wants to conduct a similar event. We hope we find a different outlet for the energy and plans for this work.

(original post)
Dates: 27th June (Monday) - 2nd August (Saturday)

Timings: 10.00 am - 2.00 pm everyday (Lunch 12.00 pm - 1.00 pm)

Activities to be conducted:

Arts and Craft
 - Make-what-you-can
 - Painting challenges

Music and Dance
 - Group singing
 - Dance-off competition
 - Beat-fix

Sports
 - Teamwork challenges - keep-uppy
 - Capture the flag
 - Dog and the bone/Sack races

Science Demos

- Non Newtonian fluid- Object Floatation

- Soap bubble formation, soap solution games - Dry ice sets

- Fun facts with mirrors and lenses; Total Internal Reflection

Movie Screening
 - A kid's film with a take home lesson

Dream-squatch 
 - A life-lesson and inspirational session

Housekeeping Staff of Hostels

UPDATE 2:
The talks with the Director regarding the remaining ladies have ended with a blunt and negative response. The meeting was a short one, on the account of the Director being busy. In all, his response to our requests that the remaining ladies be re-instated can be summarised in a few lines -

1. As students, you shouldn't be involved in this business. Nothing can be done for the ladies.
2. There are certain government regulations that estimate the number of ladies required per square foot of area, and following these regulations has resulted in the removal of these women.
3. We have been as kind and generous to these ladies in the past - but it is simply not possible for me as Director to keep track of every face now.

From our point of view, the response to each of these arguments is relatively simple:

1. We are involved in this business as humans. Students is simply a secondary tag we bear.
2. a. What are these regulations? b. Were we then in violation of these previously?
3. How is this relevant?

With this in mind, we are now writing a formal letter to the Dean (students) - asking the following questions:

1. What is the IWD estimate of the square-foot area of each Hostel?
2. What are the regulations that determine how many housekeeping staff are required ?
3. How many ladies are estimated as required and why is this different from the previous estimate?

We will also be requesting the following:

1.  A copy of the contract that is currently in use for the housekeeping staff.
2. IWD approved plans of the hostels.

Having assumed this more confrontational status, we need all the support we can get from you. Please show that you care, share this or say a few words of your own.


UPDATE 1:
(original post below)

The director's reconsideration has yielded some benefit. Half of the ladies have been reinstated. For this, kudos to the director and the Dean (students). The problem is slowly marching towards resolution.It is to be noted that these ladies have been asked to work in the academic blocks, leaving the hostel still understaffed*. However, more importantly, in the eyes of the ladies who have not yet been reinstated, the situation has no doubt taken a very ugly turn. Whether they have misunderstood or this has actually happened, we can't tell -  but they have come to believe that the five taken back where chosen on a system of merit. Which leaves them feeling hard-done by, as they haven't really put a foot wrong.

There are two ways to describe this situation. We've chosen to be as objective as possible, to the point of sounding cold and distant to all the emotion involved. The picture isn't quite complete though. There is a very human side to this.

These ladies, or aunties, as we commonly refer to them - are still lining up outside the IISER gates on a daily basis. Deluding themselves to believe that they can win their jobs back by merely willing it to happen, because the alternative is probably beyond contemplation. A single mother of 3 children, a lady with an alcoholic for a husband (this woman also recently sustained substantial injuries in an accident) - these are stories that you cannot walk away from without a sour taste scarring your psyche for the rest of the day. And that doesn't do them justice, not even remotely. They aren't just stories, they are people - like the rest of us.

"I turned down another job to work here. And now I've lost both jobs. I did my work well, (I can vouch for that, this aunty works on my floor and it is invariably clean by 9.00 am) but one day I'm working and the next day I'm gone. What do I do?" The tears dry in the blazing heat, leaving a salt mine.

What can we do? For one, every voice counts. If you can share this, or post a few words of your own about this, it will be very helpful. For another, YATN plans to hold a meeting with the director. If you are on campus and feel as strongly about this as we do, please do try to make it. We will post details here as soon as we have them.

*Understated as this point is, it also a matter of critical importance. Will post developments as they happen.
_______________________________________

(Original post starts here)
This post is with regard to point 3 of the previous post.

IISER Mohali's hostels are kept clean by a body of housekeeping staff. They are primarily middle-aged to elderly ladies, earning close to minimum wages. On a daily basis, nearly 50 of them used to be responsible to keep 2 wings on 8 floors of 4 hostels clean. This included around 250 toilets stalls.

Recently, owing to a change in the structure of the tender for the housekeeping contract, 10 ladies were removed from their posts. (Please find the tender here.) This change in tender warrants some discussion, but prior to that, some crucial points must be noted. The remaining 40 ladies are now distributed as 10 ladies per hostel - meaning that they all have to handle almost an entire floor on their own. This considerable increase in duties of an already over-worked work force promises to be disastrous. Even ignoring concerns about the ten ladies who have been removed abruptly after 6-7 years of service, this move seems to be ill-conceived. A slightly more careful review of the tender shows causes for concern.

For one, the tender has been issued been issued by the Administration Office. This is an oddity, considering that other hostel services, such as the mess tender were issued by the Office of the Dean (Students). Of course, it could well be the case that this is how the duty is divided, however, the clear lack of understanding of the hostel's requirements on the part of the Admin Office is evident from the tender.

Under Annexure 1 - B. Broad details of Scope of Work

Pt 2 - Continuous moping to be done at reception floor and other floors during office hours. 9.00am - 5.30pm.

Pt 4 - Cleaning and dusting of entire furniture, partitions, wooden cabin walls, railings, doors, windows venetian blinds, racks, sofas, typewriters, computers, telephones, curtains, wall mounted fans etc. with dry/wet cloth, feather brush and duster.

The hostels do not have a "reception". Nor do they have a majority of the items listed in  pt 4 - sofas, typewriters, telephones, or wall mounted fans for instance. Similar errors are seen in sections C and D. Multiple other points refer to the hostel as the "office" - as if this was tender was simply adapted from one of the tenders used for the Administrative or Academic buildings. If that is the case - has sufficient thought been put into the number of staff required to handle the task?

These categorical arguments aside, there is the issue of the ten ladies who were removed. What can be done to solve the issue?

Before we discuss this, a few positions have to be clarified. The Dean (students) has put on record his opposition to this change in tender and has requested the Director to reconsider the situation. As YATN we are currently waiting for the response to this request before we formally state our position on the same.

Simultaneously, over a few meetings with the entire housekeeping staff of the hostels, we are trying to rectify a few other issues that they face. For one, we are trying to ensure that all the ladies read and develop at least a rudimentary understanding of their contracts. Also, to augment their minimum wage income, we are trying to help them organise themselves into a cooperative society. The goal of this is to help them produce and sell certain products in their free time, like in a cottage scale industry. Over time, if sufficiently successful, this organisation may be able to bid for the housekeeping contract directly.

Watch this space for updates. Any comments or suggestions are welcome.

New Beginnings

Quite like this page, YATN has seen a period of dormancy now. Our migrant labourer community have long since shifted out, and although we still support a few of the financially, there is little else we contribute on those lines. Over a few recent meetings, YATN has decided to take up a new mission, a new direction - in order to revive it's activities. 

Like one of our founders once wrote: There are many skeptic enthusiasts unaware of many things happening around them. This blog is also to invite them by telling what we do. No doubt, the blog may seem boastful, but let me assure you that it is written in good faith, keeping the larger community in mind.

Our plans for the near future:

1. We plan to increase the number of students who we support financially in Sohana and Chilla to around 15 students - for which we will need to raise funds aggressively.

2. We're currently organising a summer camp - a fun-filled vacation experience for the kids - in the last week of June.

3. We're working to organise the ladies of the Housekeeping staff into a cooperative society. This one is a long story and warrants an individual post dedicated to it. Will post details shortly.

A Diary Entry

It is a better day today, honestly. But amma still seems worked up. Like yesterday, she did not have her breakfast. And Bittu is also very cranky today. I hope papa comes back from that building soon. It has been nearly a week since I saw papa, he seems to be working quite hard.

Today my drawing teacher told me to draw the mountains and the sun rising from behind. But these buildings are much more beautiful, aren't they? Have you ever gone all the way up to the top of that building where papa works? It's the best place on earth. My papa is a painter. He used to take me along with him when amma went laying bricks on the other side of the building. You can see the whole city from where my papa works. Everything seems so small from up there, even a bus is the size of my little finger! The wind there is free. Free from any obstruction, free from any sense of responsibility. I like being there. It makes me forget even hunger. I love being up there.

Besides, it's the place where papa works. And he has the best job in the world, atop the highest place. Chhotu teases me because we don't have a television set and they have one. He says that his father earns much more. But only I know how jealous he feels when he sees me on top of that building with papa. He looks so small from there, not more than the nail of my little finger. The world seems so small from there.

I wish papa finishes his work and comes back so that I can go up there with him. Chhotu was saying that he will never come back. But I don't believe him. He is just jealous. I asked amma though, she said nothing. But it doesn't matter. Everything will be alright when I go back again on top of that building.

It's not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or when the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions and spends himself in a worth cause; who at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement; and who at the worst if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory or defeat. Theodore Roosevelt

Why worry

It’s been quite long that I have been associated with YATN, and the frequent questions I face are- “Why do you do whatever you do? And how do you know you are benefiting them?” I have some answers for the second question, but here, I’d really like to talk about the first one! That’s because I found new answers while discussing with friends.

When people asked me earlier, I used to tell them that I don’t know why ‘they’ should get involved with such issues, but the reason I get involved is subjective and personal. I don’t feel I am doing any kind of service for the society. I do it because the people living there are my friends. I know them personally and quite well. I know their problems and can relate to it. I meet them more frequently than I meet my parents! And so, whatever I do, I do for my friends. Won’t you do just anything if you find your friends in need? I agree our relationship might not really be balanced. But so what? We can still be friends. And no doubt, I have learnt a lot from them over the years.

It so happened that we were pondering upon this very point – Is this kind of work anyone’s responsibility. And here are some new viewpoints. Let me start with a story.

Once in a village, there was a severe drought. There were no crops and the even the cattle had started dying of hunger. So the villagers contacted the old wise man and asked him for a solution. He pondered and said, “This very night, everyone shall leave their houses with a glass of milk and pour it in the well. Indra Dev will be happy to accept your offerings and mighty rains shall follow.” Young and clever Ramu thought, “So what if I pour a glass of water instead? Who will know among thousands of men?” And so he offered a simple glass of water. The next morning while everyone waited for the grace of Indra Dev, the old wise man reappeared. Everyone was baffled how he could be wrong. After some discussions, they decided to go to the well, just to find that it was full of water. No one had offered milk.

This story that amma (I call my mom ‘amma’) told me is one of the cornerstones of my life. And what amma wanted to teach me is simple. Whenever there is a problem around you, know that it is not someone’s responsibility- it is everyone’s responsibility.

I agree we all have priorities and there are so many issues like corruption (which is the hot topic nowadays) that are there. A single man cannot get involved with everything. That way, he would end up doing nothing. I totally take it. All I ask you is to contribute in your own small way. And that small way shall come only when you don’t slate yourself off from these responsibilities. If we want a better society, we need to be sensitive and vigilant. And it starts with your neighbourhood. There are as many laboureres in IISER Mohali as many there are students. And after all, these workers are the ones who put together our buildings and give us various services.

I feel that we unconsciously tend to alienate ‘these’ people. For instance, have you ever asked the name of the sweeper you see every day? Leave that, do you ever even smile to acknowledge their presence?

People also ask me “I want to join YATN. How can I join YATN?” and I invariably answer “There’s no way!” I’m sure my response baffles them, but I am glad to do so. I am confidently able to go ahead with these activities, radical at times; because I know my friends are there to save my back. And if they see what I see and if they feel as I feel, they will take a step forward and walk beside us.

Mail to the Director can be drafted now

As told to Irfana and Danish on 31 May'2011
We went to the colonies on employer basis and asked 3-4 workers including ladies. There are 3 construction companies related with building construction operating in our campus.
Asked about	Kalsi Brothers	Kohli Brothers	Gautam
Number of people(roughly)	100-120	150	100-150
Identity cards provided by the company	No
First Aid	on time
Drinking Water	satisfactory, good
Urinals	About to make urinals	No proper urinals
Working Hours	8
Workig Days	As per workers' will
Over time wages	rate = normal working rate
Safety Measures	Taken care on time by authorized people, taken to hospital if required
Children's care/creches	Children are prevented from the sites by authorized people, no creche	Children are not prevented from getting into the sites, no creche
Any people working with visual or hearing imapairment	Probably one man has hearing problem	No
Worker below 18 years of age	No
Areas	Guest House	Academic Block and Lecture Hall complex	Faculty House
Awareness about Punjab Building and Construction Workers Welfare Board or any other related office	No, but they get their wages on time and are satisfied with the company		Aware about some labour office but they get their wages on time and are satisfied with the company

Highlighted points can be compared with the following laws:

13. IDENTITY CARDS. -

(1) The Board shall give to every beneficiary an identity card with his photograph duly affixed thereon and with enough space for entering the details of the building or other construction work done by him.

(2) Every employer shall enter in the identity card the details of the building or other construction work done by the beneficiary and authenticate the same and return it to the beneficiary.

(3) A beneficiary who has been issued an identity card under this Act shall produce the same whenever demanded by any officer of Government or the Board, any inspector or any other authority for inspection.

16. CONTRIBUTION OF BUILDING WORKERS. -

(1) A building worker who has been registered as a beneficiary under this Act shall, until he attains the age of sixty years, contribute to the Fund at such rate per mensem, as may be specified by the State Government, by notification in the Official Gazette and different rates of contribution may be specified for different classes of building workers :

Provided that the Board may, if specified that a beneficiary is unable to pay his contribution due to any financial hardship, waive the payment of contribution for a period not exceeding three months at a time.

(2) A beneficiary may authorise his employer to deduct his contribution from his monthly wages and to remit the same, within fifteen days from such deduction, to the Board.

"In respect of this, the workers reported that the company does not take any money from them."

29. WAGES FOR OVERTIME WORK. -

(1) Where any building worker is required to work on any day in excess of the number of hours constituting a normal working day, he shall be entitled to wages at the rate of twice his ordinary rate of wages.

(2) For the purpose of this section, "ordinary rate of wages" means the basic wages plus such allowances as the worker is for the time being entitled to but does not include any bonus.

18. CONSTITUTION OF STATE WELFARE BOARDS. -

(1) Every State Government shall, with effect from such date as it may, by notification, appoint, constitute a Board to be known as the ... (name of the State) Building and other Construction Workers' Welfare Board to exercise the powers conferred on, and perform the functions assigned to it, under this Act.

(2) The Board shall be a body corporate by the name aforesaid, having perpetual succession and a common seal and shall by the said name sue and be sued.

(3) The Board shall consist of a Chairperson, a person to be nominated by the Central Government and such number of other members, not exceeding fifteen, as may be appointed to it by the State Government :

Provided that the Board shall include an equal number of members representing the State Government, the employers and the building workers and that at least one member of the Board shall be a woman.

(4) The terms and conditions of appointment and the salaries and other allowances payable to the chairperson and the other members of the Board, and the manner of filling of casual vacancies of the members if the Board, shall be such as may be prescribed.

22. FUNCTIONS OF THE BOARDS. - -

(1) The Board may-

(a) provide immediate assistance to a beneficiary in case of accident;

(b) make payment of pension to the beneficiaries who have completed the age of sixty years;

(c) sanction loans and advances to a beneficiary for construction of a house not exceeding such amount and on such terms and conditions as may be prescribed;

(d) pay such amount in connection with premia for Group Insurance Scheme of the beneficiaries as it may be deem fit;

(e) give such financial assistance for the education of children of the beneficiaries as may be prescribed;

(f) meet such medical expenses for treatment of major ailments of a beneficiary or, such dependent, as may be prescribed;

(g) make payment of maternity benefit to the female beneficiaries; and

(h) make provision and improvement of such other welfare measures and facilities as may be prescribed.

(2) The Board may grant loan or subsidy to a local authority or an employer in aid of any scheme approved by the State Government for the purpose connected with the welfare of building workers in any establishment.

(3) The Board may pay annually grants-in-aid to a local authority or to an employer who provides to the satisfaction of the Board welfare measures and facilities of the standard specified by the Board for the benefit of the building workers and the members of the family, so, however, that the amount payable as grants-in-aid to any local authority or employer shall not exceed-

(a) the amount spent in providing welfare measures and facilities as determined by the State Government or any person specified by it in this behalf, or

(b) such amount as may be prescribed, whichever is less :

Provided that no grants-in-aid shall be payable in respect of any such welfare measures and facilities where the amount spent thereon determined as aforesaid is less than the amount prescribed in this behalf.

Laws for labourers

Hi everyone......

following is the link to the

Building and Other Construction Workers' (Regulation of Employment and Conditions of Service) Act, 1996

http://www.vakilno1.com/bareacts/building&otherCon.act/buildingotherConact.htm

......let's go through it and discuss what we can do about it in our campus.

And if anyone have contacts with law students or can find out similar NGOs which can give pace to our tasks then it would be very helpful.

The next episode: Evening School

My last post was dated April 13th. I'm writing after so many days because of two reasons- first, the semester end was approaching and I had a lot of lag to cover up, and second- because someone told me that this had started looking like "my blog" rather than "YATN blog". So I thought it would be nice to give writing a break. Though I had been requesting my colleagues to write something, but probably they are not particularly fond of writing- so here I am again!

The next big thing that we were to do was to start a large scale active involvement of the IISER community. For this, we started an "Evening School". Though the ideas had started to crystallize in the winter break itself, the final execution of the activity could not be until February. All the new members together with the old ones sat down and drafted a scheme for the school- we had finished that in 3 days, by 15th February.

The main idea behind the school was to prepare the older kids for Sikhya and to interact with and teach the littler ones. We had documented nearly 80 kids in the last few days and now, the task was to divide them into classes. The school timings were decided to be from 6pm to 7:30pm. But before that, we had to decide how the activity was to be organized. We divided ourselves into four groups- 1) Organizing, 2) Teaching, 3)RAW and 4)Fun Activities. RAW is Research and Analysis Wing (and it is obviously not inspired by the RAW that operates in India. We call it so because the name is fancy!). We initially made ten teaching groups (two more were added subsequently) and divided the labour kids according to their age and knowledge. Each group was assigned to two students in the Teaching group. The classes for each group were to be held on alternate days. The RAW was responsible for framing the course structure in collaboration with the teachers. The organizers were supposed to make resources available for the evening school. Besides, there were "Shuttlers" who would go to different areas to fetch the kids, keep a record of who was coming, and then assure that the kids went back home safely. The Shuttlers were mainly the organizers, along with some teachers. The fun activity people were given the job to hold some hands-on and fun activities for the kids on the weekends. And thus, we started the first evening school in IISER Mohali.

postcards

There are still millions who only dream of school.YATN is helping some of
them.You all are familiar with YATN and its objectives. Join your hand
with us ,with the innocent children so that their dreams remain no longer
dreams.
We are trying to raise funds by selling postcards which uses iiser mohali
...labor kids drawings & paintings.Today was the 1st day of cards selling but
we saw not much response.Come forward and help us!

last date of selling cards:23 apr.,saturday
venue :canteen area

note: you can buy cards and pay as per your pleasure(minimum price per
cars-20 INR)try to buy as much as you can.

...Abhishek
YATN member

A Tasty Morsel

I have adopted this title from somewhere. I call it a "Morsel" because this experience is something we need to chew upon. And why it is tasty follows:

First of all, our plan did not go as per our ideology. The kids were never made to realize that they should not accept anything they had not put any effort for. And ingraining this attitude in them is very important. This way, they will start respecting the efforts of the people around them, and more importantly, realize the true worth of their own efforts.

Second, the parents have started taking our efforts for granted. This is not an issue of our ego, but such an attitude affects our activities adversely. It is impractical for us to hang around with the kids a lot of time, and at the end of the day, it is the parents who decide for the kids. This attitude begets inactivity on their part, which once again, defeats the purpose, as then, the education of the children may not be sustained once they leave IISER Mohali.

And finally, the best part, the part due to which the morsel is tasty, is the reaction of the parents and children when we gave them clothes. Some of them were happy, but many of them retorted and complained that they would not have bought such filthy clothes for their kids. This is what happened- it is a fact. So next time when you go around their slums, remember- how ever their living conditions maybe, they have self-respect. They may come to you asking for donations, but then they expect something "worth them". So before closing, let me tell you where we went wrong, and for that, let me tell you my favourite joke (as my father told me):

There was a bus driver who went around his usual path. One day, a big fat man boarded the bus from a stop. The driver asked him for money of ticket, but he simply replied,"Big John doesn't pay!" The bus driver, a small man could not gather courage to argue, and so remained silent. This went on for a few more days, with the big man replying,"Big John doesn't pay!" The driver was very distressed due to the situation. So he joined a gym, built some muscles, and one day, decided to confront the big man. And once again, when he asked for ticket and got the same reply, he rudely retorted,"Why doesn't Big John pay?". The big man replied,"Because Big John has a Bus Pass..."

All I mean to tell you is that before going out to solve a problem, first make sure if there really is a problem. This was applicable in our case.

A Failed Attempt

It was either the 5h or 6th of February, for which we had planned the competition. The previous day, Karishma and Pradeep had talked to the authorities of the nearby Chilla Public School and got the keys for the next day. Harshita, Sharmi and their friends had labeled and gift wrapped one clothe, along with a woolen cap in every gift. There were nearly 75 gifts we had prepared to give away.

We had decided that it will be a post lunch activity. The ones living in the chandigarh campus reached Mohali by 12:30 pm, had lunch and started preparing for the drawing competition. The people active at that time were Abhilasha, Anshu, Anuj, Dilraj, Harshita, Sharmi, Pradeep, Karishma, Mehreen, Kapil, Hitesh, Manish and me. Some others were attracted by the hustle-bustle of the kids, but they just hung by to see what was happening.

The duly wrapped gifts were stuffed into a store room. We went to call the kids from their homes. The cold was biting, no one wanted to come out of their homes. We persuaded them by telling that if they won the competition, they would get prizes. On the first go, not many came- there must have been about 30 kids, which included some really small ones who could barely walk. So we started with them. We gave them the stuff they would need for drawing- we sat down with them and helped the really small ones draw something. Everyone was busy, either sharpening a pencil, searching for some colour, or simply tending to a kid. It was a good environment and we were really enjoying ourselves.

After some fifteen minutes, when some four year old got restless, we decided that we should let him go. So Harshita wrote down his name and gave away a shiny, blue gift. He had come with his father and two other siblings. And so, the man went back with his three children, all with gifts.

The next fifteen minutes saw order. And then, chaos broke loose. The reason was palpable. Those gifts had attracted attention of other workers. They got the idea that something was being given away. And so, they came with their kids to collect their "share". The YATN people had to spring to their heels to manage the kids, and more so, their parents. This was something that would obviously happen- but we were unprepared. Some wrapped more gifts while others tried to contain the chaos. In another one hour, all the kids had drawn as they wanted and got their "prizes". By the end, we had give away some 110 gifts. Even when the goal was achieved, the purpose was defeated.