Parenting...

One of my cousins is studying right now in the ninth standard. His school has started with the tenth standard lessons already. This poor fellow is finding the whole stuff too much to take. The syllabus is vast. The volume of homework is large. Worst of all, the pressure is high. He studies everyday for close to six hours, yet has difficulty in understanding the subjects. Of late, he has lost considerable weight. His food intake has drastically dropped. Anyone can actually count all the bones in his body. Right now, his life is lived inside pressure cookers. One at school, where nothing short of madness prevails as teachers are no longer teachers; another at home, where the parents could either choose to be parents or devils.

In India, where the entire worth of a student is judged by two silly board exams, students are put to a great deal of trouble. The schools are relentless and compassionless in overburdening the students. The competition is cut throat, so much that at times, I imagine, a real cut from a blade would be far less painful. Friends are few. Every fool (relatives, friends of parents, neighbours) who meets a student in tenth or twelfth class makes it a point to first talk only about the studies. Poor fellow, the only place where he can hope to find some relief is home. Every student in those trying years would hope to get back to a home that does not remind him of all these troubles. They would not like their parents to add to their woes by making them feel the pressure even when they are at home. In short, they would like the home to be a home.

Sadly, as in the case of my cousin, many - or perhaps I would not be wrong in saying most - students do not have that luxury of having understanding parents. A certain boy in my brother's class had to suffer from burns caused by an iron rod because he stood eigth in his coaching class, in a class of 100 students. Another boy suffered terrible mental depression because he was constantly being compared to his more brilliant elder brother. Coming to my cousin's case, I am told that he is often scolded at home for his so-called underperformance, and that his parents tell him that he is 'good for nothing'.

These are just examples of the suffering children face at home. I suppose that it is a widespread phenomenon. There are homes where the father comes home drunk to beat the mother and the children. The examples I gave are not that bad. Nevertheless the suffering is by no means lesser. In some cases, the kids prefer to take the extreme step. A few days back, I read in a newspaper that the number of suicides by students was on the rise over the last few years, and that the number of deaths peaked during the exam season.

All these take me back to those days when I was a student in those classes. I too went through the tenth and twelfth classes. I wrote the JEE. My younger brother too went through all that. My parents, however have never troubled us. Not once have they scolded us. Not once have they underestimated us. Never did they discourage us. In fact, they hardly used to worry about our studies. Of course, they always kept a watchful eye on our activities, and would often insist that we spent lesser hours watching T.V, or playing. But such advices were short. My mother, being a working woman, often felt sad that she couldn't help us more. But I would say that she not saying anything negative to discourage us was in itself a great help. She in fact, only talked in positive terms to us.

When I look back at my entire life now, I can only feel gratitude to God for having given me a set of parents who knew how to raise their children. I also learn a great lesson from both my parents and those parents who are more like devils to their children, that the only way you can be great parents is by unconditionally loving your children. I only wish that all parents knew this.