Well, The latest controversy to've hit the nation is that of young kid Budhia on his remarkable 7-hour non-stop marathon-run effort! Before I begin to put down my views here, let me admit that this is definitely an incredible feat and one only hopes that this was not drawn out of him by forceful exploitation. Having said that, I'm not really going to get deep into the case-history of Budhia himself, but am going to talk about so many others like him who are exploited for the money they can earn at such young ages in various other fields (Especially the cinema/media industry), right in front of our (public) eyes, and which we unfortunately do not think are real exploitations!
The first and might be the one such victim I'm going to talk about here and now, and probably the most intriguing thing in my mind, is Ayesha Kapoor. For starters, she was the child artist in the mega-success movie of last year, the winner-of-all-ABC...Z awards, "Black". While we admired and appreciated and were awe-struck by this young girl's performance on screen, hardly any of us would have thought of the hardships she would've been put through in freezing each of her frames to get the output that we all watched in great admiration on screen...think of the innumerable takes and re-takes, the pressure on her to get each and every movement of hers to a "T" and the long, arduous make-up sessions she would've had to go through on all shooting days. Think of all the sacrifices she would've been forced to make, in terms of taking days and months off her school, the number of days she would've missed being with her favourite friends and loving family (I understand she is in a boarding school, but I'm still sure she would've got some time out of her school to spend with her family/close ones). while on the one hand, I can't stop admiring her exemplary performance, on the other, I'm very much disturbed to think of all the hardships and pressures she would've been put through in getting that level of a performance from such a young kid, and I'm sure she was not born on a silver screen so as to say that she's a born-actress.
Don't we really think the Ayeshas of the world are as bad as the Budhias? If not, then why not? I'm sure kids of the age of Budhia and Ayesha would not really be matured enough to take it on them. Even if they are, celebrity status might take its toll on them as they grow up and may make them take the wrong course in life (classic case being that McCaulay Culcin, the celebrity-turned-drug addict who gave several of the "Home Alone" hits)
If so many Human Rights activists and groups are complaining in one voice against Budhia's "exploitation", then they should do the same against the exploitations of the Ayeshas... Whatever awards the Ayeshas might be getting for their performances cannot take away the fact that they are as badly exploited as the Budhias..the glitter of the tinsel world cannot undo or mask these atrocities being meted out to the young ones...
I'm not trying to judge whether Budhia's case was really anti-human or otherwise, but what I'm trying to say is there are definitely hundreds, or maybe thousands, of such cases that easily escape our eyes...and hold on, I'm not still talking about the millions of young child-labourers that we get to see day in and day out on our streets and factories (classic example being that of the under-privileged kids at the Sivakasi match factories :-(. I'm only talking about cases that have become celebrities by such instances...All the young, child models who are being made (read, forced) to perform on screen.
I don't have a solution or an answer to this problem yet, but I only wish that those who utilise such talents realise what they are doing and act responsibly. One of the ways the Government/Ministry of Child Welfare(or an equivalent ministry/department) can do is to regulate and strictly monitor the working hours, work environment, stress levels on such young ones. They could probably have a rule saying that any filming involving a kid (say, less than 12 yrs old) should be monitored by a Human Rights group member/activist and make sure the kid does not get over-worked, and is given sufficient breaks and gets to spend quality time with his/her friends and family. For kids who might be reaching a peak level of celebrity-dom or even making too many on-screen appearances, they might also have a monitoring programme to make sure they do not take to wrong paths early in their life!
Well, I guess I've lectured enough for now...until I return with something more...
~ PenaPunaivan
