Unwanted

Life in Bangalore for techies and their families means mainly one thing – everything takes a back seat to careers. The hours that the software guys and gals keep are almost insanely ridiculous. No one has time to eat healthy, exercise, have a meaningful relationship, have kids or if they do have kids, even do more than make sure they are fed and paid for. The kind of incentives offered, the determination to elevate one’s standard of existence to match the gloss that is advertised, the chance to travel abroad and see new sights and make the family back home even more proud of one’s achievements are all factors that make a high-level software job irresistible. All fine and dandy – my only objection is the sad fate of the children of some of the more imbalanced of these marriages.

I have known families that make everything work together beautifully and I appreciate them for it takes a lot of effort to keep things sailing smoothly when careers and home life have to be balanced. I also know of a few where the children are so neglected that it makes me want to shake their parents and ask them why they chose to have these poor creatures at all. There is this little girl who lives nearby. She is a year older than my six-year old daughter and they are friends. She gets no attention from her busy father and her housewife mother is too preoccupied with jewellery and beautification to even walk with her to the gate and put her in the school bus. The child is so starved for affection that she is whiny and lies terribly – all in a vain attempt to get noticed. Sometimes she tells me “Mahi is so lucky Aunty – her dad is always home early!” Her mother never reads stories to her. She never walks out with her. She is left to her own devices and frequently left alone to sit with the guards at the gate in the security cubicle. What sort of mother would leave a pretty child like that alone at eight in the night with a bunch of men? Sometimes I feel that God is terribly unjust to inflict a child with a parent who does not deserve her.

I have attempted to speak to the mother only to be abused myself. Her thin sheen of politeness gives way to a market-stall manner when provoked. And I leave well enough alone knowing that I shall always feel guilty for not pushing more. I try to get my daughter to play with others too so that she doesn’t pay for my interference. And yet the image of the girl’s face full of yearning does not leave me.

Perhaps the neglect of some affluent children by indifferent parents has nothing to do with careers and everything to do with the single-mindedness with which they pursue increasing wealth or maybe just a good time. The only ones who really suffer are the children who are ignored and left unwanted.