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Facebook post on Kailash Satyarthi that should make Indians, media and the government think

Written by : TNM

The News Minute | October 14, 2014 | 04:07 pm IST Ever since Kailash Satyarthi's name was announced as one of the recipients of this year's Nobel Peace prize last week, accolades and good wishes have been pouring in for the child rights activist across various platforms. Satyarthi, among the many roles he dons as a social activist, is the co-founder of Bachpan Bachao Andolan and is known for his work towards the elimination of child trafficking and child labour. When Satyarthi's name cropped up as the recipient for the prestigious award for Peace along side Pakistan's Malala Yousafsai, it was a proud moment for India. Many realised how little they knew about the man who's win was widely being celebrated. Some had heard about his NGO, but his name didn't really strike a familiar chord.Soon, full profiles on Satyarthi's life and work were published, his achievements highlighted. These also gave rise to some pertinent questions. If Satyarthi's work is deserving of a Nobel, why hasn't he been recognised with an award by the Indian government yet? Satyarthi's name was nominated for the Nobel by the European government and not India- what does it signify? A Facebook user Vinod Thomas recently shared a post written by his friend Prasad Kumar suggesting how we often ignore many who do real work bearing significant results and are bringing about a social change, just for the lack of popularity. Thomas' post reads, A thought provoking note from my friend Prasad:It has been about 20 hours since the "breaking news" of Nobel Peace prize to Mr. Kailash Satyarthi. In these 20 hrs I did a bit of research on him and this is what I found.He gave up his career as an electrical engineer. He began his mission of fighting for children's rights in 1980 i.e he has been at it for 34 years now. 2 of his colleagues got murdered and he himself got attacked once. Which means forget the Nobel prize, being alive itself is a huge award for him.He won his first award in 1984 and since then he won about 8 awards. And guess how many of those awards were given by his motherland for his yeoman service? ZERO!During these 34 years approximately 4000 Padma awards and about 25 Bharat Ratnas and many more awards have been "doled" out, but Mr Satyarthi is not one of them. Because you see our standards are very high!!During the same period dozens of " eminent" people have been nominated to Rajya Sabha and to many other such " prestigious" positions. But once again Mr Satyarthi did not qualify for any of them. No PM ever felt it important to call him for discussions ( even as they were meeting Film stars) and ask him what needs to be done to give children their rights!!And guess who nominated him for the Nobel prize this year? Indian Parliament? BJP? Congress? RSS? VHP? MP government ( his home state)? Rajiv gandhi Foundation? NO. He was nominated by EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT!So in nutshell he won this Nobel peace prize entirely due to his efforts and despite the Government/Media/Civil Society ( largely, because some people from the civil society did help him along). But today we all want a piece of his fame and glory. Who knows there might be a queue of Bollywood producers outside his door!!Did someone say Peepli Live-II?

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