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Corona paves way for old age parents become destitute!

Probably there is no section of the society which hasn't been adversely affected by the killer Coronavirus like never before in their lifetime. If the migrant labourers were forced to flee from their workplaces back home so were millions of daily wage earners whose life was thrown out of gear suddenly due to the deadly pandemic.

The after-effects of the Wuhan originated virus is in fact, literally engulfing the very existence of the society crumbling its age-old system of good societal norms and practices which the Indian society boasted of to the entire world until recently.Initially, most of the parents wanted their kith and kins working in different towns and cities of the country and abroad back home to ensure their safe well being rather than be at the mercy of the chaotic situation now prevailing all over.

But such parental yearning was only for a short period of time and as conditions appeared to change for better, they transformed themselves to become more practical rather than get engrossed in unnecessary worrisome factors all along. They realized, by their children being wherever they are could come to their rescue in the advanced stage of life.

But now in contrast to such a paradoxical development, these days children well settled elsewhere in the country and foreign countries look to be determined of having given up the idea of returning to their native places!

The circumstances have gone so worse, recalls Venkataramana Hegde, a Nonagenarian Arecanut planter of Salekoppa near Sirsi in the lush green picturesque Uttar Kannada district spread in the evergreen Western Ghats region.

He regrets: Many children settled in the United States and elsewhere do not turn up even when the parents die. They ask to go ahead with the funeral rites and the following rituals without minding their absence!

Dr DS Poornananda, Professor of Journalism and Mass Communication at the Kuvempu University, Shankarghatta in Shivamogga district painfully recollects: A senior friend of mine sold his independent house only to ensure that his daughter had a hassle-free trip to the US to pursue higher studies while he moved to an apartment...

...But when he died after a couple of years, the daughter never turned up leaving her mother completely in a state of perplexion and jeopardy. A year later or so, she happened to visit New Delhi on an assignment. Even during that short trip, she was wondering whether her mother could fly to Delhi to meet her rather than the other way round!

So strange are the things in life. The father gave up all his lifetime earnings in the form of a very good house in a posh area and moved to a small apartment only to see that his daughter accomplished her dreams. But the same daughter didn't find any time to come back to pay her last respects nor console her mother shattered at the demise.

Deenanath Jena is a retired officer. He is 83 years old living with his aged wife in Pune. Their two sons and two daughters are all married and American citizens. Now no one wants to come down to India to look after their parents as the sword of unemployment hangs on their heads.The senior citizens had booked their tickets to go to the US. But they were postponed due to the Corona related lockdown periods and now stand cancelled! So all their plans to visit the children have turned futile nor do they have anyone here to take care of them.The predicament of Ramarao is no better. If one of his sons is in the States another one is in Switzerland. But he is finding it difficult to proceed to either of the countries.

Swaminathan, currently in Mumbai is in no better position either. Like Roy, his first son is in Kuwait and another in Dubai. Unlike the US, in their cases, there is no thought of going to the Gulf countries.

It is learnt that the Kuwait government has already finalised a list of 7.5 lakh migrant Indian employees to pack them back home!

Ms Rajeev Kulkarni lost her husband a few months back. However, her two daughters married and settled in California virtually bundled her out as if a commodity from the United States. Ms Kulkarni's tears kept on rolling on her cheeks. But the poor mother's cry didn't bring in any change of heart in both the well educated and settled daughters. As there were no takers, she was left with no choice other than returning to the motherland once for all!

Probably for all such agonising stories, as of now, there are no signs of any viable solutions or answers to be seen. However, ironically it is altogether the reverse conditions in Dharwad. In one residential layout, barring three or four families, almost all the residents have their wards in foreign countries. But these 3-4 families seem to be very lucky.

According to Narayan Avadhani, for not doing well in studies their kids stayed back with meagre earnings and petty jobs. But in reality, the whole colony feels them be blessed one's as they don't have to undergo the trauma of real-life agony.To sum up, Krishna V. Itnal concludes: Each parent went in search of wealth while the search never stopped at all. But on the other hand, craving for the same wealth became a never-ending tool to isolate themselves from their own children!

-Manohar Yadavatti

Comments

  1. True, cultural shifts and families undergoing reconstruction is going to be the norm...or maybe even like some cities sporting eternal signboards of "under construction". Covid is probably the most devastating of all setbacks that the human race has seen so far.

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  2. Such a sad reflection of our times. The parents toil hard to give their best to the children. Their duty? Yes. Then by extension, shouldn't it be the duty of the same children to take care of the parents? Somewhere, I feel, we as parents did nit inculcate this during their bringing up, focused as we were on their comforts over ours. This attitude of "I am more important than my parents" has permiated into their psyche and they perhaps don't feel it .

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