Story 9 : Old Age and Kids Abroad.

This article is contributed by one of the reader. This makes everyone to rethink what we do. 

If you are a regular reader of "The Hindu" newspaper, you would not have missed an interesting article titled "HOME ALONE" on the Open Page Section, on the 14th March 2010,and the series of "Letters to the Editor" published ,on the article, in the newspaper, from the 15th March 2010,till date.

The article narrates in graphic detail, how over-ambitious (avaricious?) parents (particularly parents not enjoying good health) left alone in India, with their son(s) /daughter(s) abroad are going through inexpressible agony and misery, with no one to look after them in their twilight years, when they need all the affection, attention and physical care.

The way some of the parents have expressed self-pity, for not having brought up their children, with proper values, makes a sad reading. In most cases, the blame lies with the parents, who want their children to play the :"sedulous ape" (as Jonathan Swift calls it),imitating their neighbours, friends and relatives, regardless of the real interests of the children. After having pushed them into the concrete, urban jungle and rat race  of the western world, for the lure of money, today, the aged parents are spending agonising days in India, with no one to really care for them.

Skype and Google talk no doubt keeps them in touch with their children abroad, but neither Skype can arrange an ambulance and rush them to an hospital when there is a medical emergency, nor Google talk can physically help them and take them to places of worship, music concert, religious discourse etc. Skype can neither prepare and serve the dishes the old parents want to taste nor read out to them daily newspapers, magazines and novels which they cannot read, due to poor eyesight.

The number of well-to-do senior citizens, who are getting into Old Age Homes in Chennai, has shown an alarming increase  in the last two years and the stories I heard from some of  them, when I interacted with them, as part of the " Reaching Out" service of some of the NGOs in Chennai, were tear-inviting. Some of them wept uncontrollably, narrating how ungrateful their children have become and how mercenary their entire attitude has changed, after they went abroad.

It is pathetic to see senior citizens, well-educated and who have retired from senior positions in Govt., or private company service, longing for someone to come and talk to them. Loneliness in old age is very painful and when I go and spend some time with them, just listening to their past life, my heart weeps for them. Many of these senior citizens are unable or unwilling to go and live with their children abroad due to cultural shock, climate changes, boredom of being locked up in the house all day, lack of company, discernible neglect by the children, their spouses and grand children, their way of life and other reasons. They have, therefore, no other alternative, but to spend their last few years, in solitude and soliloquy.

What a tragedy for the parents, who have given their best to their children!  One of the senior citizens (an old lady of 72 years) narrated to me, with tears in his eyes, how their only son on USA could not even come to India to perform the last rites of his father (the husband of the lady who narrated the incident),because his employers refused to grant him leave and told him that if he goes to India, he need not come back to his job. The lady said that she told his son not to come and the last rites were performed by the younger brother of her husband. That painful memory  is still haunting her. Her moist eyes keep haunting me.