It's come. We all saw it coming. We tried to avoid it. All of us did. But we just could not. It was bound to appear and it did. Like Haley’s comet, but far more frequently. I'm talking about November 14th. Some would call it Chacha Nehru’s b’day but I have been told by very reliable sources, that under the present regime, Chacha’s b’day is not to be celebrated beyond the Mountbatten household. So let’s look at its other name, which is….er, Thursday. Okay, okay, let’s look at its older incarnation – Children’s Day.
The genesis of Children’s Day is all over the place. One theory is Chacha Nehru liked children. Although not in the way that Michael Jackson may have liked children. Jackson apparently was a proponent of Children’s Day on an everyday basis. Another theory is that India had too many children and too few days. So the idea was to give children one day before we ran out of days completely, because God knows we could never ever run out of children.
However, the most likely answer is the then Congress Government wanted a day off after three consecutive days of work, and so came up with a few suggestions. The Committee formed to look into holidays was on vacation at the time, so a new committee was quickly formed on an ad hoc and temporary basis. This new committee tossed out quite a few options. Children’s day prevailed over Somersault day, and Engine Driver Day. Although for the life of me I can’t see why?
On the occasion of Children’s Day, writer Vasant P Valson and his wife Sajeeth have written an exhaustive thesis on the characteristics and salient features of Indian children. Although initially written in Malayalam, by page 39 they switched to English, and luckily for us stayed with English till page 83, paragraph 2. Vasant & Sajeeth have 3 children. Two are their biological ones, and third is their neighbours’. Apparently the neighbour’s kid (38 years old at the time) came to taste their fish curry, and then just never left.
- Main feature: Indian kids don’t have just the one feature that sets them up. As a collective they don’t all have long noses or curly hair or an extra front tooth. However, they do have one very distinct feature– snotty noses. Pan India, kids have perpetual colds and runny noses. Why the running noses? Vasant & Sajeeth answered this question, but as they slipped back into Malayalam at that point, I can’t enlighten you further.
- Needy kids: On the world’s Needy Kids Index, our children rank very high. Only American kids rank higher. India’s excuse is that because it is a very populated country, kids have to shout really loudly to get themselves heard. Thus they become both more pushy and more needy. Case in point are kids in Bollywood films. These kids are always extremely loud. They’re always shouting or making loud gestures. One kid was so needy that Salman Khan walked her all the way to Pakistan.
- Crowds: Indian kids are never single. Not in a romantic sort of way, but in an actual manner. They are never lone figures hanging out on their own. They are always heaps of kids glued together like pieces of popcorn in a popcorn machine. This is why I have been pressing the government for a special Aadhaar Card for kids. Basically it's the same Aadhaar Card but with a much bigger photograph to accommodate for the animated expression of the kid. Bear in mind, kids don’t sit still in photographs but are always bouncing around like balloons unless they’ve been suitably medicated just before the taking of the photograph. (Which also tells us that any Aadhaar Card for balloons must also provide for a larger than life photograph in the card).
- Curtail for finger poking: It has been noticed in children, especially younger ones, that these kids have a propensity for poking you with their finger. These repetitive jobs can be quite painful, and highly irritating. Especially when done in a public forum. The reason for the finger stabbing is you not paying attention to the kid. Of course you cannot be blamed for this. I mean who can pay attention to a two and a half foot tall living organism who is saying just the one word over and over again?
- Food stains: You can always tell when an Indian kid has had a meal. And I don’t just mean by the smell. It is the food stains actually. His shirt will be lined with food stains and you can make a near perfect guess of what he’s eaten. In fact so much food pops out of the mouth, that on an average a second kid can enjoy a full meal if he was fed with just the food stains from the first one.
- Acquisitive nature of the Beast: And by the beast I mean children, of course. There is no more clinical and ruthless consumer of all things payable than children. They want to buy everything. For instance, a skinny kid buying an abdominal relaxation gadget just because he liked the colour. All the world’s most useless and unnecessary gifts sell like hot cakes because of children. At home I have a machine that collects coasters, a bell that makes no sound, a lantern cover (minus any lantern obviously), and a ahampoo made from mud which one is far too terrified to actually try.
Vasant and Sajeeth have gone on and outlined their case. Their case being a case for not having children in the first place. Obviously not all kids are bad, only about 95% from all accounts. It’s fairly clear that instead of celebrating a day for children, we look at a day earlier, November 13th, and celebrate it as “Please think very openly about whether it's worth having Children’s Day”. Wishing everyone a “Please think very openly whether it's worth having Children’s Day” then.
The writer is a comedian, TV anchor, theatre personality, satirist, podcaster and an author.
