All about a lost dream

(For mélange or Multi-lingual)

Vikram, a student of class VI, was tremendously energetic and enthusiastic and was
very playful in nature. He was fairly well in his studies as well. But during the
passes of time, he declined himself to the world of cheap thrill and evil amusement.
He was flocked around by some ill tempered boys and being flying in nature, he
was easily attracted to the world of destruction and deterioration in his study was
the normal outcome of this. Slowly he developed a slit from his parents and before
the parents understand something, it was too late.

This is not only a mere story of Vikram alone, but hundreds of thousand others who
are dragged away very easily to the world of destruction thus spoiling their future.
Their lives become a burden for themselves but when they realize about their
mistakes, it is already late. All the way to return to the main stream becomes closed.
Life is felt as a miserable task and they succumb to the odour of failure and
rejection. Society certifies them as an eliminated piece and one morning he is lost
behind the dark curtain on misery, melancholy and depression.

An average parent does not know what to do under such situation and
circumstances. Many times they are even found to be ignorant and unaware about
the exact situation of their ward. They can’t judge the mental status of their
children. The continuous struggle of the boy or girl with himself or herself is
beyond elucidation. Frustrated parents scold their sons or daughter, punish and
sometimes take to psychiatrists. But these remedial steps can not solve the problem.

The energy of a young youth is like a brook. He has the ability to do continuous
work, discharge continuous duties and untiring physical & mental labour. It’s the
actual human resource of the nation, the future of the present generation. Hence, it
is the pious duty of every concern to protect, preserve and to nurture this generation
which is going to take over the duties of the present age group.

The mind and body of a youngster is the warehouse of abundant energy and the
workshop of limitless thoughts & ideas. They create their dreamed palace and
world with their own imagination. If the outlet of this unbounded energy of a young
one is not ascertained to be a positive one, the expectation of good and moderate
future is not tangible.

A detailed designed structure for the re-organization of the scattered youngsters is

very urgent need of time. The educationists and the thinkers promote ideas for the
re-grouping of the damaged part of the society which is highly limited to a certain
privileged group of people but no such plan is proposed till now for the re-structure
or to protect the future of the youngsters in general, especially of the lower middle
class category. The effort executed by the social organizations, the NGOs and other
organizations related to human resource are very inadequate and can not cover up
such a broad part of the society.

Adequate attention or seriousness is not frequently seen from the part of the Human
resource departments towards the great loss of man power and wastage of many
priceless brains resulting a great numbers of youngsters are compelled to exhaust
out their imaginations to nowhere. They are tired, frustrated, upset, misled and
diverted. Unfortunately they also occupy a foremost portion of the society. Being
mentally and psychologically very weak, they become the easy target of the
antisocial groups of the society and after little counseling they make themselves
involved in such activities. Each one of the today’s hard core antisocial element and
terrorist was certainly a yesterday’s innocent boy like Vikram. And this process
continues endlessly. Being quite acquainted of the psychological status of such
youngsters, one such Vikram traps many such frustrated young people and the
volume of this cluster enlarges indescribably.

The duty of the Social organizations, Teachers, educationists and of course,

Government is to educate and train the parents to handle such boys and girls at the
very early stage of their diversion. Parents should never reject such sons or
daughters or discourage them for their unusual activities, rather should extend their
wings of love and affection to them so that they are hold close to the love of parents
and do not snare to the way of diversion. Parents once knowing the report card
about the trend of his son or daughter should become very watchful and maintain a
close touch with him. Many times the internal atmosphere of the family also
indulges or pampers an adolescent to go away from the domestic environment.
Many ingredients act simultaneously up on a child inside and outside the house.
Some of them strikes his mind in such a way that he can’t cope up from the mental
blockade and behaves abnormally. Declination of attention and concentration from
studies is the primary symptom of such problems. Parents should be very alert
about their own behavior with the ward and also with other members of the society.
The unnatural relationship of husband and wife strikes directly to the psycho of the
son or daughter which he (or she) can’t express to others and also can’t grasp
without expressing. This makes him mentally handicapped and to get rid of such
mental suffocation, he keeps himself busy with other easily available sources and
cheap friends which further take him away from the main stream.

Rejection can’t be a tool to rectify a child’s behaviour and attitude, rather it acts as
fuel to the fire of rejection. Film Tare Jamin par.. is an excellent example of
bringing a child to the mainstream . Understanding the psychology of the child, his
family background, his attitudes, natures and learning abilities are the key to take a
child to limelight. Keeping focus on his abilities and by ignoring the drawbacks a
child can be motivated and upgraded. This can only be materialized when he
develops trust on his own ability. Hence it is the utmost duty of every concern to
teach the child to keep faith on himself.

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The process of re-organizing the diverted group of the society becomes extremely
difficult when they cross the adolescent age group and enters in the groups of
adults. During this age of time they are mentally much sound and emotions get a
definite shape. The duties of the NGOs become thornier as they have to meet many
types of challenges including financial constraints. DON BOSCO SERI ( Self
Employment Research Institute) of Kolkata is such an organization to re-establish
the street boys and other orphans . The students in this organization are given
vocational educational Education on various streams on free of cost and thus they
get self employment after completion of the course.

Self employment is the greatest tool to redress the frustrations but this is not easy.
Huge amount of fund is required for giving proper training to the students keeping
in view the demand of the market. Proper policy to establish vocational institutes to
meet the demand of the market is required for the same. Adequate fee concessions,
scholarship, loan etc must be made available to the students so that the poor
students are also attracted to these institutes.

Every school should compulsorily have a counselor. The delinquency of a juvenile

can be restricted to the maximum possible extend by clinical understanding of his
behaviour and offering suitable guidance. This can be done effectively by a
professional counselor only. Many times the behaviour of the student inside home
is quite different to that of outside. This difference symbolizes the un-fulfillment of
his desires & expectations in either of the two places. These complex equations can
be very dangerous some time to the mental health of the boy or girl. A counselor
can understand these types of problems and apply appropriate therapy. Attraction
towards opposite sex, love and lost love are some key problems which many times
drive away a youngster from family and society. Parents as well as teachers must
not ignore such problems because the effect of this cyclone may lead to a very
unprecedented end.

A homely environment in the school and a healthy atmosphere at home is the desire
of all but sometime the reaction among many elements of the society unbalances
the equation and the whole chemistry becomes a riddle. A young member of the
society, who is yet to be acquainted to the complex world, can not assimilate
themselves to those puzzles and succumb to a miserable future which is much
unexpected and a collapse of all dreams of a beautiful tomorrow.

( The writer is a teacher of Kendriya Vidyalaya IIT Guwahati)

N.D.SARMAH