Time For a Reality Check!

By Hammad Anwar

Sometimes you need a reality check to actually know the world that exists around you. Most of us are just going with the wind where we are able in doing our daily routine functions but that’s where it comes to a halt. We are stuck in a vicious circle which just includes ourselves and hardly are we able to look up around us and feel the other people.

Currently we (generation) are in a transit stage of our careers. Most of us have passed out of universities and many will follow us soon. But as one of my teachers says that we are being brought up in a materialistic society which is dangerously running low on values and morals. So soon we will be lost in our journey towards the so-called dream i.e. dream of having a great individual career. So, before we are lost in that, just wait for a second and look around yourself.

Precisely this is what happened to me couple of days back when I had to take my car to workshop due to some wiring problem. The initial inconvenience taking my car to those areas eventually turned out a blessing for me, so as once again I was able to stand on road watching the surroundings around me there.

The scene wasn’t different from what you see in an average lower middle class shopping area of the city. You had couple of general grocery stores along with property dealer offices. There were the couple of automobile workshops and some tea stalls. Standing there and observing for good amount of an hour was indeed an interesting experience. The workshop where my car was being was fixed was just another normal workshop with half a dozen young children from ages 8-18 were working under a strict guidance of the master mechanic.

It wouldn’t be any surprise to my countrymen to see a child working in a workshop. This has been cited, written & spoken about like thousand times in all kinds of media. To highlight the reasons of this and stressing the need of them going to school rather than workshop isn’t my topic today. We all know in what depth of poverty they are stuck in. My question is that why there has been no improvement in their conditions while just not restricting it just only to Pakistani children. There is enough child labor and lack of basic necessities only in subcontinent to make this issue a real deal let aside the ever present problems in Africa.

We have been listening to the opinions from all around; to start with there is the opinion about the lack of some real global effort to actually solve these problems, others will blame the incompetence, corruption and lack of will on the part of the local national governments, and some will tell you their conflicts theory about suffering of proletariats through the hands of bourgeoisie. But the question of the basic human rights of a person remains there intact in front of us. These rights existed before the formal adoption of so called Human Rights Charter by United Nations and even if that piece of paper doesn’t exists, the fact remains that there is no natural law which divides people into groups where one prospers at the cost of others.

Everyone in this world has right to put in his efforts and earn as much as they want. But isn’t there some moral responsibility to pay back too? The age’s old concept (and mind you it’s still not completely outdated) have been that once you get rich, you are part of the arrogant wealthy class and now it’s your right to enjoy and see other struggle and suffer.

Without going into any support for socialism, my simple point is that the class differences have been there and are here to stay. But what if the concept of paying back is introduced? Recently we have seen people like Bill Gates and Warren Buffet coming ahead and paying back to the world. They have been and still are among the very top wealthiest people in the world. So technically applying the old theory, they were supposed to sit back, enjoy and make more money. But they have come up with propositions donation major chunk of their assets. Not many of us would be ready to do that, we eventually live in a materialistic world and that’s the reality, so why not a little part as pay back?

I know many of you are wondering that we live in a country where people take out money out of banks before the annual cutting of Zakat, so how one can expect to take part willingly. But I am sure many of you have seen people like these who are spending their wealth in the small but significant projects of welfare for these children. Not every one of us is able to generate donations on basis of fame like Imran Khan did but still small efforts can lead to a better future.

People like us would never even think of spending one month in outskirts of the city or even in the middle of city as a teacher in some school but we have people like Mr. Yaqub who has been providing stationary and teaching children from the slum areas of Islamabad in a park for last 24 years. And I believe it’s high time that we should stop making new NGOs and try to strengthen the existing ones. We need collective efforts now and slogans of revolution aren’t going to bring anything. It’s up to us now to come forward and pay back a little bit to society in whatever capacity we can. It’s not just moral responsibly but an obligation now. And remember the problem is much more than for any one individual to handle even if he is the great Abdul Sittar Edhi!

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