Chetan's Musings

The recently completed Shaheed Path in Lucknow - an elevated 6-lane expressway that allows quick access from the airport to eastern UP - is a driver's delight. If you're travelling to Faizabad, for example, the road can get you speeding towards your destination, bypassing Lucknow city almost completely, in a matter of minutes. If your visit is during the waning winter season, you will be enthralled by the miles of mustard fields on the way - the enchanting yellow atop green stretching for as far as the eyes can see. You can do your business in Faizabad and be back at the Lucknow airport to catch an evening flight, carrying with you an idyllic portrait of rural India, and feeling smug about improved infrastructure in the state of UP. Venture a little within the state, and you will quickly realize how deceiving this idyllic portrait can be. Barely 40 kms from Lucknow, within the Lucknow district itself, is the Mal block. On 19 Feb 2014, I made a visit to Mal to understand th...

In a recent casual discussion, the CEO of a prominent CSR foundation shared her lament about how youngsters who join the social sector prefer to spend their time at the office, noses buried in their laptops. Going by my observations of some of these youngsters as well, this indeed appears to be a disturbing trend. The social sector is all about causing a positive change to the lives of those who've been left behind. Much of this is to do with basic human requirements such as health & nutrition, education, livelihoods, clean water, and dignity. As in any other social discipline, the traditional classroom can only at best provide a theoretical perspective - the real learning can only be found in the field. To that, no alternative exists. And this learning is seldom apparent in one or even a few visits. The field reveals itself gradually - layer upon layer - and that too, only to the discerning, non-judgmental eye. For a newcomer to the sector, it would take several vis...