CHILDREN

"How was the week-end?" I was faced with the routine start-of-the-week question. "Pretty good! My wife and I went to MG road on Sunday", I replied. "Cool, I hope you had fun shopping", the colleague responded. Surprisingly, it was true; but few would have guessed that we shopped at Namma Jathre - an exhibition cum fair organised by groups (mostly) working on community development, held in Cubbon Park's Bal Bhavan on 30 December. For those unfamiliar with the local language (like me), Namma Jathre translates to English as "Our Festival". Namma Jathre was started under the theme of 'Festival of…

Every morning, Mahadev rises and soars with the soggy monsoon sun as orders surge. It’s boom time in IT city, after all. “I haven’t seen such a busy season for three years,” he smiles, as he wends his way over the half-manicured streets of HSR Layout. Mahadev is 12. He doesn’t know, therefore, that his princely wages of Rs.70 per day earned for moulding iron gates and grids is a shameful secret. That his earnings are a breaking story of sorts, though not for the same reason as those of IIM-B graduates. His salary is invisible as his employment violates…