foggyfroggie

2006-08-01T22:17:00.000-07:00

Mapping Delhi

Map of Dakshinpuri

Nizammudin and surroundings (sorry about the digitized effect!)

The Stretch from Gurudwara Sisganj to Purani Dilli Railway station

Jama Masjid to Kodia Pul

Lal Qila -chandni chowk

Purani Dilli -platforms and trains

Hanuman Mandir CP

House in Dakshin puri

Dakshinpuri

Dilli gate and some inportant bus routes

The cutest sketch of Jama Masjid i've ever seen :)!

Connecting ISBT to Hanuman Mandir Kashmiri Gate

CP ka circle

Understanding India and the geographical location of cities and home towns

Jama Masjid- incomplete

Gol Dak Khana area

Hanuman Mandir to CP

Hanuman Mandir

2006-06-20T22:34:00.000-07:00

Cricket fever

such a cute fan we have here....

..but whose side is she on....

Unequally matched?...its all about playing, iguess..Bikaaji Cama place(BCP)

I gonna blast this one off.... BCP

...and while the poor fielder gets the ball from the wide expances of Bikaji Cama place...

..some extertainment for the benefit of the camera didi..

..budding tendulkar here..

...and gere we go again...

..ready to roll.. Hanuman Mandir CP(HM,CP)

...against all odds..

..chauka..

..just right for the part.. the tee shirt ..the look..

...and chakka.....................!!

the ball!! the ball!!

..tempers are soaring in the heat...

..the teams clash over the decision..

...cricket is forgotten...

..thankfully the umpire intervenes.....

2006-06-19T23:23:00.000-07:00

Scenes off the street..

On a high- Hanuman Mandir (HM), CP

Trippin'

Gimme a drag !

Bathing at the washing line- New Delhi Railway Satation (NDRS)

Sleeping space under the foot bridge- NDRS

Prayas contact point for children- HM, CP

Salaam Balak Trust (SBT) contact point- HM, CP

Nach Baliye- HM, CP

Picnicing and my friends -park behind HM,CP

Inside Hanuman's belly- HM,CP

Dancing on a high- HM,CP

Just chiiiil,chill..... just chilll!!- HM,CP

Collecting bottles on the rooftop of the station- NDRS

Quiet thoughts- Prayas contact point, HM,CP

Source of quick medical relief on patform No.4- NDRS

Bucketting it- HM,CP

2006-06-16T04:39:00.000-07:00

Around Delhi with the kids

You dont wanna mess with me!- jama masjid

Carrying the wind -nizammudin dargah

'Allah ke bande has de'- inside the dargah

Lets go fly a kite- nizammudin

Lets go fly a kite- nizammudin

' My kite's the best'-nizammudin

Me and my pet kitty

Cooling it out- jama masjid

I believe i can fly- roller skating at jama masjid

Whoopsie!!- balancing an 'almost' fall

My opinion- the Butterflies bal sabha at Nizammudin

Mapping Nizammudin- Butterflies night shelter

Garbage playground- Nizammudin railway station

Collector's collective

Gaffar's detailed attempt at a map of the Dargah

2006-05-03T14:43:00.000-07:00

Chap 3:Tour de station

A warm charming smile, a confident friendly bearing, very organized, very professional- that’s how the guides of Sallam Balak come across at the New Delhi Railway station. Yes its been all over the papers, gaining a lot of popularity, you have to ‘book’’ yourself in advance for this unique idea of a tour by street children of the station where they used to live. The likes of Rakesh Mehra are taking the tour in the hope of inspiring themselves into making a film..
I was fortunate to land on a day when all the foreigners who were supposed to come didn’t turn up and there was just me, Javed-the main guide, two younger ‘guides- in- training’ and a very disappointed photographer whose sole purpose of taking the tour was to take pictures of the kids with the ‘firangs’ and the street kids but ahem!, he had to just make do with me. So I had three (could I call them ex-street kids) from the SB trust to answer my plethora of questions- Javed, very much the guide was sincere, charming and helpful, communicating well in English, but mindful of the time and the routine to be carried out. The other two Danish and Chandraprem were a little shy, but more eager to share their stories once you showed interest in them, trying hard to throw in as many smatterings of English as they could…jumping from English to Hindi in order to convey their story easily and correctly.
So along with my three guides feeling very much the queen of the tour with a photographer in tow, I was zipped to the first place- a Salaam Balak contact point for children of the families living at or around the station. These are not children living completely on their own but children nwith familes living below the poverty line. There is a’dari’ and a blackboard- alphabets, and numbers are taught to the ever distracted kids and they hang around there from 9-4 after which they go to their respective families and are whisked off to work- selling gajras, begging etc at CP.

Then I was escorted to platform No. 1-the luxury platform where all the fancy trains-the Rajdhanis and Shatabdis come- which all the station kids vie for the food and free bees which people leave behind. To hide from the police they scuttle around on the gaps between the tracks where the policeman cant reach them.
Then off we went to platform no.4 where there is a fruitwala stall on the roof of which there is an arrangement for children to sleep, because they have good relations with the fruitwalla-he’s been around for sometime- they get him any fruits which they may find on the trains and he lets them sleep or hide over his stall. Few steps ahead is a chemist- the only one on the entire station- which the children use in cases of emergency- when they may want basic medication and are not aware of any hospital to go to nearby.
Below the footbridge spanning all the platforms a space is formed between the footbridge and the roof of each platform where children huddle and sleep in the night.
The watering line-where the kids wash themselves at least once a week along with the trains getting washed was shown from a distance. Again I was whished off to be shown a ‘pani ki tanki’ from a distance under which I was told that various gangs operate. One has to belong to some sort of a gang or fraternity in order to survive at the station- it offers you security and support-the dark side being that it also forces you into things which you might not have otherwise gotten into- drugs, abuse etc. Fights between gangs over ego clashes among the leaders or small petty grudges are common and cause many an injury.

Then we head towards the GPS-the police station at the station on the first floor of which is a Salaam Balak center- they have a health department with a doctor visiting regularly every day from 10:30-2:30. The most common disease among street children I was told was STD, and skin diseases of various sorts. Some also suffer from TB for which they need to be put on a special diet apart from the medication. Some of the children of the station (you don’t bump into too many of them, they’re busy with collecting bottles and such like) stop and interact with my guide- but I feel like an utter outsider, alienated from them by the fact that I’m intruding on their ‘bacha- kucha’ sense of privacy in what is anyways perhaps, the most public place on the planet.
To protect their privacy photography is not really allowed (except for media coverage, which I found kind of contradictory in itself). Also you’re not really shown much of the station- nor do you interact with children from the station- few safe places- few stories and experiences of the guides themselves at the station(where they have spent 5-8 years), some anecdotes –mostly being taken to areas were salaam Balak has a contact point and is in no way conflicting with any gang or other NGO. This is also because there have been a few conflicts with the children still staying at the station and our guides from the SB trust, with those children asking for money from the guides for intruding into their life and displaying it to people for money, with the ones still living at the station having nothing to gain out of it.
After the GPS, we rickshaw it through Paharganj to ‘Apna Ghar’- salaam balak home for boys-they come and go as they please-get to stay, sleep ,eat food,watch TV , attend classes, learn vocational skills –develop whatever skills they may have or be interested in. A quick tour of the building ending with a table displaying items for sale made by the children-the proceeds of which would go for their welfare… If I had been a tourist from a foreign land-I guess all this would have been very interesting and unique-an experience to remember- BUT for me- I didn’t get much in terms of the spaces I was looking for, from the tour. I got the most out of my guides when we had actually finished the tour and they sat down with me for some time just to chat- we had gotten to know each other –they were more open, less guarded.

Experientially, I saw more of a street child’s life at the station when I went on my own. I saw where a particular gang staying near a water tank, saw them sleeping huddled together, saw them openly taking solution in front of me, running to get food from an incoming train, messily eating dal out of an aluminium foil container, sometimes they team up in pairs and sift through trains by turn- so if one train comes along, Saif will search through it while Krishna will take a break and when the next train comes it will be Krishna’s turn to sift and Saif’s to chill. I been accosted by a 27 year old menacing looking leader or goon, Rohit who scared me out of my wits; how he openly boasted of taking smack and cocaine – claimed that he does not do a single ‘good’ thing to earn a living, and that to live the life he leads one cannot survive by doing good work-so he does all sorts of ‘bad’ things- picking pockets, lifting luggage, etc. etc.
I saw kids betting their coins in games of various kinds-with kanchas and cards, a older boy openly kissing a small child (why do I write about it? Coz I guess it shocked me a bit-you may know about something but when you see it happening you still get shocked.)
I saw a temple off platform 5 where the children hide from the police and also find great solace with the sandhus languishing around, who happen to be their most easy suppliers of drugs. I walked through empty trains along the length of the docking tracks where the trains are washed and where the children play hide and seek and still rummage the trains for any useful rubbish. I was humbled by a boy who took my questionarrie sheet- (questionnaire sheets didn’t really work for me ,by the way), and read it in the most fluent English with such ease- translated it then for the other boys, got bored 4 questions down the list and went off for another sniff on solution. I’ve had children tell me such tall stories that sometimes its difficult to sift the truth ,or any semblance of it, from the ‘gup’.

My tour guides have added tit bits of information for me as we talked- they told about the Shiela cinema hall, where most kids go on a Saturday and when in the mood, watch 4 show- marathons. Saturdays seem to be special days for them-they have a bath, go to Sadar Bazaar and buy new clothes for very reasonable prices- Rs 10 for a pant etc.and then go watch films. Many children sometimes wear a clothing for an entire week day in day out till it gets completely tattered and then go buy themselves an new piece of clothing. They told me how children are very influenced and fascinated with films- some run away from home because of what they see in films- they feel they’ll go to Mumbai and become actors or go to the ‘bada shahar’ and find work and earn pots of money.

What they told me about girls who arrive at the station was also interesting- most girls get picked up by pimps- they are easily trusting and don’t know better. If not by the pimps, the gang leaders catch them and bring them to the gang. They kind of become the gang leader’s property, and if by chance he is thrown in jail or killed, they become the property of whoever becomes the next leader. Mirroring story lines reflected in underworld gang stories or even stories from the Mughal, pre mughal era- this pattern is not uncommon in history. Many a time, and again according to the pattern, these women get emotionally attached to the very men who had abused them and when taken in for counseling and given an alternate choice of life –they object saying-‘ nahi! Main to yahin pe theek hoon, mujhe yahin pe acha lagta hai!’ Such is the unfathomable human psyche and many organizations have faced a deep helplessness in the face of this refusal of an individual to help himself or herself.
Many women, of course, get used like tissues by anyone and everyone who feels the urge to sneeze and as many times they choose to sneeze (pardon the metaphor-it just came along !). Danish recounts an incident where 22 men ‘had sex’ with a woman at the platform in a single day. Javed recounts of how once when he was part of a gang- his leader brought two women from Bengal back one night, being small Javed couldn’t do much to help them, but after being abused ‘who pagal si ho gayi thi’, is what he remembers.
Now, working with Salaam Balak, Javed has developed a strategy- he tries to keep good relations with some gang leaders –and since they are his friends-he jokingly tells them- that if a new boy or girl comes- what will you do-you’ll just ruin his or her life- why don’t you bring them to me –I’ll take them to a better place-at least they’ll be cared for. Till now Javed has managed to get 15 children through gang leaders including two girls.
Also, currently pursuing a Bachelor’s degree in Arts and wanting to prepare for MSW (Master of Social Work), he acts as a mentor for many children. He proudly claims that around 50 children have decided to change themselves after seeing what he has been able to do with his life. Danish is another wonder –he has refined the art of macabre- he makes anything and everything out of it- conducts workshops all over the country, has his own authorized card which allows him to display at exhibitions and places like Dilli Haat.

What has surprised, saddened as well as amused me the most as I speak and interact with people over the past few months has been the subtle competitiveness (rivalry would be too strong a word) among the NGos working with street children. They all work at the same station but hardly interact,like one kid put it’sab apna apna kaam karke chale jaate hain’. Though that ‘apna apna kaam’ is actually a common goal or target seems to have been forgotten. They vie for awards- national and international, for titles like –‘the largest’ or ‘the oldest’ etc.
The children of course love the attention and the freebies and whatever the NGO each NGO might try in order to get them to sit and study, or stay at the centre.

Lets whisk off to Nizammudin Railway station and see how it goes there:
Right now there are mainly two NGOs with centres or night shelters at Nizamuudin- PCI and Butterflies. Other NGOs also wrok here but do not have shelters of any sort. PCI has a shelter just off the exit of platform 7 while Butterflies has one more towards Okhla but the children have a shortcut along the tracks to reach it. The Butterflies one is a night shelter- it has the added attraction of having a T.V. which draws many of the younger children like moths to a bulb.
But interestingly, though the Nizamuddin station is small –only 7 platforms and not too many children stay there as compared to the other railway stations, they all don’t sleep in the shelters. Most of them pick bottles from trains and there is are two very organized ‘Kabadi walas’ at two ends of platform 7. Loyalties are distributed among the children to each ‘Kabadi wala’ and as a result two main gangs have surfaced. So one gang picks bottles for one Kabadi wala and the other for the other. The bring in their bottles and other stuff like glass, metal etc. This is dumped in a huge pile on the outskirts of platform 7 on the backs of an effluent nala. Then its is diligently sorted out by the kids into respective piles.
Apart from getting around 50 paisa per plastic bottle the loving ‘Kabadi wala’s wife ‘ gives them some semblance of a bedding for the night and they sleep all huddled together on top of the big bags of ‘kabad’- doped out under the starry sky.
Education classes are organized by both the NGOs. There are a string of small restaurants in the lanes behind the station where the children eat.
A makeshift cinema hall in some tents which shows films for 5 min- not the whole things- ( I have yet to see this place, I have only heard of it through a child, and hope these are not blue films) is also a much frequented place.
My unofficial guide though the station Mangal, a tall, sincere brown eyed boy who was learning how to drive a taxi at a nearby taxi stand, and claimed to have stopped taking solution for quite some time has been sent to Sharan detox center because he had started taking too much solution. ‘Froggy in well ‘syndrome all over again…

Purani Dilli Railway station does not have so many kids even though the maximum children land up in Delhi at that station because the fancy and luxury trains don’t come there. Nizammudin and New Delhi Stations get all the Rajdhanis and the Sampark Krantis and Shatabdis – more bottles to pick, flowers too sometimes, good and easily available food- (since they stuff you so much that a lot gets wasted); more tourists and rich people, and if luck’s on your side- a bag left behind in all the hustle bustle……..

Next time:
Chap4: CP ka circle