Kitnay Aadmi Thay

 

Following an interesting NEWS on the Indian media, ''How can 18,000 judges tackle 3 crore cases, CJI TS Thakur asks PM Modi", a small dialogue from a classical movie came across my mind:

The Sholay of our times..
Gabbar : Hmmmm.... Kitane aadmi thay Thakur?
Thakur: sardar.. Three Crore aadmi the.

Gabbar: hmmm.. three crore aadmi ? .... SOOWAR KE BACHCHO.. woh three crore the aur tum 18000?! .. phir bhi waapas aagayeye . khaali haath.. kya samaz kar aaye the?.. sardar bahot khus hoga sabasi dega kyoon? DHIKKAR HAI ... Arre O Saambha...

Gabbar: Soona.. poore 18000.. aur itna isliye hai ke yaha se pachas pachas kos door gaanw me jab bachcha raat ko rota hai to maa kahti hai beta soja ..soja nahi to Sureme Court aa jaayega. Aur yeh teen haraam jaade..ye Supreme Court kaa naam poora mitti me milaay diye..iski sajaa milegi.. baraabar milegi...

(ek aadmi se revolver leta hai aur usse poochhta hai)
Gabbar: KITNI GOLI HAI?
DAMAAR! Damaar! damaar! (18000 times) Isko bhi case may dalo! ek our file open caro Sarkar-kay Office may. kya farak padda (?!) eko ou'ur kol'kay...

And its a never ending story...

First Message To IFSW

'Professionalism'-a buzz word that moves the moment one even dares to think of "Social Work". The moment this word (somehow) kicks in, the market gets filled with ideas, ideologies, principles, values, ethics, theoretical frameworks, practice models, competencies, networking, memberships, associations and so on... 

Talking from the point of view of an Indian Social Worker, its been 80 years since we brought in Social Work as a discipline into our universities-that is 11 years older than our country's independence that we received in 1947-yet, we have only done our bit, as individuals and more collectively as associations that have mushroomed all over India that hawkers memberships at different rates, to cripple the growth of Social Work as a profession rather than boost it in any form.

Think we are all confused. The higher we try to reach to the ones perched on top of these institutions and associations for clarity, the sooner we realize that the older and more confused they are who have learnt mute and pointless babbling as new languages. Often in the academia, we are asked to refer NASW for our code of ethics and every other detail connected therewith; after a point of time, we realize, NASW is so national by its limitation with no space to accommodate others that they leave us with space only to wonder, 'Why patronize them at all?!" Different schools of thought occupy the Indian scenario-perhaps like every other healthy democracy-we have the liberals to the conservative with the moderates in between wondering where to draw the line-like in politics, more so in Social Work. It took many of us a while to understand that Social Work is not (yet) a "professional" course in India (too) as it does not fit into the "professional" requirements other actually professional courses such as medicine, law or its allied courses mandates. Any Deepak, Rani or Chandru can be a Social Worker here unlike the Tom, Dick and Harry there. The associations are as confused as its members; there is neither a council nor a culturally-relevant locally and commonly agreed code of conduct or restrictive/promotive unit to monitor its practice. This as mentioned earlier, after 80 years of its existence. 

International organizations talking to a member of some God-forsaken association in India and feel a right to claim that they have associated with Indian Social Workers are so absolutely wrong. One organization or for that matter a bunch of their pseudo-collectives, DO NOT represent the collective Social Worker community from India. 

Where are we? 

Are other countries with us in this regard? 

What should we do that perhaps our seniors in the field have not done?

Kindly advice...   

Federation Gives In

After paying the membership amount, after waiting for more than the required time for some action to confirm the membership, after requesting, reminding and even begging, and ending up with still no response-not even for courtesy's sake, finally International Federation of Social Workers responds and gives the membership. (After making me use the only language the world seem to understand these days... 'legal action'). 

Extremely glad that I was able to get an insight into the functioning of the lousiest, clumsiest and most disorganized organization I have ever seen. So now, I am officially a member of an organization that I don't personally care a damn about. Word of advice to my fellow Social Workers: 'Don't make the mistake I did. Stay out of this organization and save some money.'

What Colour Is The Soil In Munnar

A walk across the rusty hanging bridge

to sway from the new to the old.

A magical transformation

from fake to real.

More to revel,

as stories of tea and Munnar wait to be unveiled...

Margaret Bridge, Munnar

What colour is the soil in Munnar?

"What colour is the soil on which tea grows?" my Mother asked as we drove through Munnar, a mountain range converted to a tea estate by the British colonists in India. The rich beauty of the carefully arranged tea trees-row after row and plantation after plantation-overwhelms even the hardest of senses. The crisp, thin air and the clear water below must infact make your heart skip a beat or two. My Mother happens to be more of a British adorer-a rung higher than a sympathizer; perhaps comes with her being a person with a bias-having taken English literature as her academic pursuit.

My Mother had a reason to ask me that question this time; for she was a witness during the times the great whites packed up their stuff to leave the country after 335 glorious years of their ravishing tenure in India. She has always insisted that the Brits have to be thanked for signs like the rail tracks and road ways-laid by them that have fueled economic growth-which if had been done by Indians, thanks to our bureaucracy, redtapism and corruption connected there-with, we never would have managed such a feat. 

This is where we begin to argue; for I see the railway tracks and every other monumental feat left behind by the Brits-the tracks and the cracks-a joint symbolic display of British (ill)governance and East India Company's dirty game on unsuspecting, innocent and a careless crowd-the natives of the land. Every rail track that was laid can be traced from the spot where the Brits found a fancy for something and anything they considered wealth that could be exploited and looted to the nearest port from where it could be boxed and shipped to her majesty's service straight to the white man's shore. All 33 and a half decades of wealth, human lives and innocence-spotted, looted and packed to be shipped-for which we as natives on whose back the dirty empire rode, even considered it our obligation to pay for their stray stay and upkeep while they were here to loot us; we even learnt to wave and say, "Thank you! please..." like a commission-earning Tourist Guide. 

All of a sudden, to hear this question of what colour is the soil in Munnar to come from my mother, made me wonder if she was (finally) beginning to see the substratum buried beneath these beautiful fields that held stories of horror and barbarism waiting to be unearthed to let the ghosts of the air howl their stories to fill the misty mountains... once in a while. Stories the poor Indian labourer might tell of how the Cha’ips on horsebacks would whip the bare Indian backs to force them to work, stories of how families would be stolen, lives would be lost, children would be separated and human dignity suspended to build what the empire wanted, the company demanded and the white man commanded-with an order to prepare the ground to grow tea. Tea-even if it meant tunneling out a whole mountain to plant, pluck, process and pack it to the white man’s wish and supply it along the established spice route to his friends, family and customers back home. What colour could the ground be where lives were caught by the throat, suffocated, frozen and killed-where shouts of violence and cries for help were ignored, unrecorded and unaddressed? What colour could the colour of the soil of Munnar be anything but red? A deep red perhaps… like blood that flows-that boils right now at the very thought of the greatest injustice done to humanity to spread a green carpet of tea over a red carpet of slavery, bondage and blood.  

Today, when one walks past the little town of Munnar amidst its tea estates in plenty, buses with boards in the vernacular (Malayalam) that ply tourists who land for guided tours and to sip their chilled beer in the comforts of a chillier cold, walk past government buildings with name boards in the vernacular (in Malayalam and Tamil too) with hoisted red flags that sway with passive aggression. The aggravates of the tension in the air is smothered by the presence of local commercial establishments like the wayside eateries, taxi and auto-wallas, lodges and hotels that depends solely on the influx of the crowd of tourist. Early in the morning, armouring the heavy chill, a bunch of tourists drip in everyday. They are feast to the eye for the handicraft shop owners and the masseur and masseuse in massage parlors who have mastered the art of squeezing someone (literally) to earn their living. Today every brown man in Munnar owning a commercial establishment waits for a 'Cha'ip' (a white man) or a 'Madaam'may' (a white lady)-as he was taught to call-to earn back every penny they looted. Miles and years to go before that can be done to tally the account. Yet, it moves...

To be continued... 

Can Social Work Be Licensed In India

The Two Requirements to get a Social Work license in the West as I understand (with my limited perspective) are:
1. Formal Social Work Education (A promotive strategy)
2. Test for Licensing (A restrictive strategy)

Though I was worried about the latter, it seems like we have both working in India at present. UGC's NET is considered a test accepted by the Indian Government to test people for academic as well as (now) in non-academic recruitment drives too.

I am sure you would have read the headlines about 'A recent recruitment drive by Indian Oil Corporation that made NET crucial.'
NEWS: "Indian Oil Corporation is recruiting officers in marketing and human resource management. The written test for the selection process will be through University Grant Commission National Eligibility Test (UGC-NET) examination, conducted by Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) on behalf of the UGC." (Source: http://indiatoday.intoday.in/education/story/indian-oil-recruitment-through-ugc-net-december-2014/1/398201.html)

With the two strategies in place and existing already, there would be no need to reinvent the wheel; and with no need for a new system to be formed I really don't realize why there must be a delay in 'licensing' being made compulsory and with immediate effect. There should be comfortably no delay in declaring professionals with MSW and with NET as licensed Social Workers. All we would need after that is a stamping authority to declare the same; that can be worked out signing an MoU with IFSW or any such bodies by making it clear to them about this scenario present within their disposal in India.

Ofcourse there will be objections that can be expected as in any restrictive practice; perhaps people in India know better that passing the NET will not be as easy as passing MSW once this idea is enforced. As for consensus in this regards, it is a fact that those who do not get through the restrictive strategy, will find a way to oppose the existing option and will divulge in the pretext of finding alternatives.

Now since we are used to copying models and systems directly from the West (At times with little or no relevance to our country), if these criteria are the ones we need to make Social Work a licensed professional practice in India, it is only a matter of time that we need to make this a reality by working on it fast and expose IFSW to this option already available and install a stamping authority to further move this cause. Seems as simple as that.

May be after my (ongoing) trial to include Social Work as an optional subject in UPSC, licensing Social Work with the available options must be my next attempt. What say folks?!...

In the mean time, I also need to think:
1. Is a foreign degree in Social Work acceptable for a personnel to be employed in India to practice? When it is not possible the other way around quoting irrelevance and the need to adhere to passing local tests and exams.
2. Is a foreign degree in Social Work acceptable for a personnel to teach in the Indian academia? When it is not possible the other way around quoting irrelevance and doubting our capability.
3. Can a foreigner be allowed to continue to work as a Social Worker in India?! Esp. without the knowledge of the local customs or language (criteria used to test us if we plan to go to a foreign land) and/or without undergoing a security check or signing child/elderly/gender protection policies and/or without a need to adhere to any eligibility criteria put forth as policies esp. Universities?
4. Can foreign interns who come on 'volunteer tourism' be provided tourist visas for their academic pursuits in India when the same possibility is not extended for an India intern?
5. Why is Social Work syllabus offered by different Universities different? Then how can we claim that we are professionally prepared to be the same when the foundations of our syllabuses aren't?!
6. Can those who are trained in a discipline in a University by unqualified personnel (who have not met certain standards in qualifying to be employed like NET, PhD etc.) be accepted as 'trained' professionals? Shouldn't they be disqualified automatically?
7. What must be the penalty for institutions who destroy a profession and student lives by recruiting trained yet unqualified workforce be?

Social Work Petition In The NEWS

NEWS about the appeal to UPSC demanding recognition and inclusion of Social Work as a subject has started hitting the media; and I'm just too glad :)

NEWS in Daijiworld: Social Workers have sent a petition to UPSC for inclusion of social work as an optional subject in civil exams... Click here to read the NEWS

Whats In An Identity

Today's Hindustan Times reads, "An Italy senator said on Tuesday Massimiliano Latorre, one of the two Italian marines accused of killing two Kerala fishermen in 2012, will not return to India after being allowed to go home temporarily for medical treatment. Latorre’s deadline to return to India expires on Friday." ( Source: http://www.hindustantimes.com/india/italy-says-marine-charged-with-killing-fishermen-won-t-return-to-india/story-H4twrRJVp17ZadVRgBVxbL.html ) as on 13th Jan, 2016, 0915hrs. 

Arundhati Roy=Indian Writer, 
Vidya Balan=Indian Actress, 
KR Narayanan=Indian President, 
KJ Yesudhas=Indian Singer, 
PT Usha=Indian Athlete, 
KG Balakrishnan=Indian Chief Justice, 
M Fathima Beevi=First Woman Indian Chief Justice, 
Aryabhatta=Indian Astronomer, 
Adi Sankara= Indian Social Reformer, 
Kamala Das=Indian Poet/Novelist, 
Shobana= Indian Dancer/Actress, 
John Abraham= Indian Actor, 
Raja Ravi Varma= Indian King/Painter, 
Shiny Wilson=Indian Runner, 
VP Sathyan=Indian Football Team Captain... 


Interestingly did you realize that all these great ones are also "Keralites"?! When it comes to violence against fishermen along the 'Indian' coastal line, in the South'Indian' states, how come we refer to them as "Kerala", "Tamil Nadu" fishermen and so on and try to make it a state-specific issue and move it away from being a national-level concern? 

Why is it that one gets garlanded with a national identity when successful while at the same time manages to get a state-segregated identity when one is a poor farmer or a fisherman subjected to systematic violence, oppression and injustice? Just ASKing... 

Like A Boss

As far as I am concerned, foul words do come way too easily for me; yet, the Bard, beats me square with these lines like a Boss:

“A knave; a rascal; an eater of broken meats; a
base, proud, shallow, beggarly, three-suited,
hundred-pound, filthy, worsted-stocking knave; a
lily-livered, action-taking knave, a whoreson,
glass-gazing, super-serviceable finical rogue;
one-trunk-inheriting slave; one that wouldst be a
bawd, in way of good service, and art nothing but
the composition of a knave, beggar, coward, pandar,
and the son and heir of a mongrel bitch: one whom I
will beat into clamorous whining, if thou deniest
the least syllable of thy addition.” 

Said William Shakespeare in King Lear; Not I. No wonder this bugger is a literary genius. 

Hurt Yet Not Retired

Its interesting to see that very often we end up expecting others, maybe another individual or another institution or another organization or another association-to do what we can do ourselves. There is always the some 'other' who thinks the same way too. And at the end of the day noone does anything.

As soon as this petition was started, the 'Indian Frog' theory once again surfaced; there have been discussions about why this move was not initiated through some of the associations or through some of the so called 'established' bodies and I found blockades and subtle threats coming my way quoting some unknown reason to pull a leg rather than offer support or a gentle lift forward. For some reason, it was felt that rather than being a flimsy sleeping dog or a clumsy barking dog, a bite is required at times to establish one's presence and ascertain an identity. Perhaps just tired sleeping and barking like many, something that takes just two minutes to sign and show a presence that could deliberate action could be done through this collective initiative and hence this 'untitled' 'unnamed' 'common' petition which I think is the best way forward in this issue.

Yet, I wish there could be a better representation. Could we just make an attempt to promote this link? Not just in words or discussions or any other thing that diverts us from this cause yet to move others closer into signing this petition and reaching a dignified number (God knows how much!) and move this endeavour closer to success...

Kindly reach this link to others to get the support we require to get UPSC to include Social Work as an optional subject in the civil exams.

Click here to sign the petition demanding UPSC to include Social Work as an optional subject in the civil exams

Thank You. 

Attention To All Social Workers

Friends, Indians, Social Workers :)
Kindly support this initiative: An ask to recognize and include Social Work as an optional subject in UPSC (Civil Exams).  
All that you have to do is:
1. Follow the link given below, sign the petition
2. Bring in more people from within your reach and network and do the same
3. Make the difference!

Click Here To Sign The Petition

Thanks.