Coburg Chronicles 7

It was a bright day. For once the sun was shining on our faces. There was no rain and the wind was not too cold. A good day for an outing. As planned we started to set out for our day's venture to visit some refugees who were staying in Coburg. The moment the word refugee is pronounced my ears go up almost automatically like an Alsatian. Obviously I was in that team.

The first stop was at the residence for refugees as they called it. It was a building that had individual rooms and some apartments. In the individual rooms the single men were housed and in the apartments there were families. There was also a dormitory where young people stayed while they were in transit or waiting for a decision on their status.

Interacting with them two sets of stories emerged. One, the migrants and the other on the refugees. It was really important to understand the difference. In the case of Europe they only consider political refugees. Another point to note is that, if a person is claiming asylum in Europe, he/she must claim it in the first country of entry into Europe. They cant claim it in a place like Germany as it is surrounded by other european countries. One has to get though one of the European countries to get to Germany. So the claim for asylum in Germany is almost out of question. This doesnt stop people from claiming asylum.

The case of afghans was particularly interesting. They traveled from Kabul to Germany via all the countries in between and were either enroute to the scandinavian countries or wanted to settle in any country where they had their families and friends. This journey is undertaken by young men and women who are ably assisted by agents. They pay huge sums of money to make their way out of their countries. When they reach countries like Germany the hard reality hits them. They are termed as illegal migrants who are not supposed to be here without documents. Seen with suspicion and anger they are usually met with contempt. They are most likely to be deported to their own country or a country that they entered in the very first place. The agents cant help them any more and they cant tell anyone how they got to Germany.

But, while in germany they are housed and taken care of. Thanks to the efforts of community volunteers like Ms Dood who tirelessly campaigns for a the rights of these people. She has played an extraordinary role in trying to secure rights of those who live in the margins. A campaign she organized drew the attention of the Bavarian Parliament to address the issue of the housing. Though they started with the painting of the exterior and then the interiors, it is work in progress.

The Afghans told their moving stories. It made me think, is so much risk really worth it at a huge cost? I am really not sure about that.

The visit also exposed us to the situation of the others like the Ethiopians, Chechenyans and those from Azerbaijan.

There was a family consisting of three members from Azerbaijan, they were housed in two bedroom apartment. Summarily they were suddenly joined by two ethiopian young women. They had to give away a room to them. They share the hall kitchen and toilet. This does not sound okay even to a South Asian. Where we have large joint families sharing rooms and toilets.

Despite these living conditions, they get their rations and about 120 euros a month for living expenses. In the first year they are not allowed to join for language classes but are however taught bu community volunteers. This makes integration very hard for them. For children, it is better because they can have access to schools and other facilities.

While they live here, they have all filed for asylum and have to wait for the entire process to be completed. It starts with getting an interview date. This may take even two years. After the interview the decision is not made immediately, it may take another year or so to hear about the status. In most cases till now it has been negative. But people wait in hope.

In one case that we encountered, there seems to be a positive outcome. Going by the genuineness of the case, despite all the laws of fortress europe there seems to be a possibility to stay and get asylum.

Coburg Chronicles 6

Who likes to work on a Sunday! The poori breakfast, a load of news papers, catching up what was missed during the week on various issues and definitely a quick nap in the afternoon. All this was just in the imagination and sounds too regular. But today was a day for faculty meetings. It was at the spectacular home of Dr Claudia, located on the third floor a beautiful apartment with views on three sides. Huge windows and a neat balcony.

Before that we took a quick trip to the church of the 14 saints. Not too far away, was an old catholic church built in honor of 14 saints. Each saint was responsible to take care of an ailment. The only person I could recognize was St Jude the hope of the hopeless. No doubt that the

Imagine a dozen social work faculty members from diverse cultural, ethnic, linguistic backgrounds from Chile to Chennai gathered around a table to reflect the process of the summer school and to come up with ideas of collaboration in future. Believe me 5 hours is just not enough.

Positive ideas flowed about the Summer School. So creative suggestions were also tabled to improve the next one when it is attempted. The theme was quite impressive and invited a new dimension of thought departing from the clinical approach to Social Work. Inclusion and Human Rights need to be part of our social lingo. And, it was actually happening. Many years ago when we were planning the Specialization of Human Rights in Social Work, we had people laughing at us. Now minding that and working on it has helped us a long way in the process. In India, we have a long way to go.

Coming back to the ideas of collaboration, the plan was to bring out a publication, carry out joint research and also advocate for Human Rights based approaches to Social Work and concentrate on advocacy on systemic issues. More than 15 ideas popped up. Each one was interesting and relevant. As usual not all were practical. But there was no need to worry about the practicality of it right now.

It would all be compiled and circulated shortly. For me this was a confluence of ideas and a good chance to initiate a dream project; tell the story of social work around the world. The emergence of it and how it has diversified and contextualized itself to situations. The ideas was well received and I really hope to be working on it very soon.

It was now dinner time hence we tried to wrap up the business. But as we all very well know the business session surrounded the dinner as well. We could not stop with our ideating minds till we actually departed.

Coburg Chronicles 5

Reflection and sharing

It was hard to believe that the weekend was already here! But in the summer school there was no real difference. It was a working weekend. The day was to be spent with a lot of reflection. Students had to present their reflection of Flossenberg and the Nuremberg. By now I was totaled out, could no linger sit in long sessions and concentrate. I loved to hear the students speak. I was part of the earlier discussions in small groups. Holding myself to attend the day long presentations was out of question.

I sat through the first round of interesting reflections where they spoke about the impressions that the concentration camp created. The ideas were predictably different from culture to culture. The Namibians related to the genocide that took place in their own land, while the Chileans referred it to the Pinochet episodes.

In my mind the atrocities that I have read about all came back flashing, I could call it an action replay and on the top was the killing of the innocent Tamils who were caught in the conflict.

While all this was going on I was just waiting for a break. But it never came. So I decided to look for some green tea and retired for some time. It always surprises me what a 20 minute rest can do to you. I was up and running and feeling much better with my cold, leaky nose, head ache, a slight fever with severe body pain. Could have been a flu, a paracetamol really helped along with a jelly like capsule- courtesy Gaby!

Coburg Chronicles 4

Nuremberg

The word Nuremberg is very familiar to most human rights activists. It marked a new era of international human rights. For those who are not so familiar with this here is the reason. After the second world war ended, the victors, USA, UK, Russia and France set up a tribunal to try those who were accused of cooperating with Hitler for the genocide of the innocent people. This trial was held in Nuremberg. It marked a new beginning in the field of human rights where the guilty would be tried and punished no matter how strong they once were.

Now we were in this historic city. It was destroyed in the both the World wars and was rebuild to its glory. There is much more to the history of Nuremberg than just the wars and destruction. Our place of visit was the documentation centre of the Nazi Germany. It was in a magnificent red building with some spectacular modifications that gave ultra modern features.

The place was a visual narrative of the history of the evolution of Hitler as a force to be reckoned with. It was to represent the chosen trauma of the Germans in a very high tech manner. High definition photos, audio visual presentations with accompanied audio guides that were easy to use were just some features. The narratives created strong impressions of what had transpired in about 30 years from 1925 – 45. It stood as a testimony to the national frenzy that he created to feel proud of a nation that painted a completely new image to the world as the most dominant super power that could not be stopped.

The grandiose plans to build stadia to accommodate over 4,00,000 people, the parade grounds, war game arenas, parliament buildings and so on were all beautifully planned and were in the process of being executed. All this banked on the labour of those in the concentration camps. The quarries of Flossenberg etc that would supply all the building materials. This was called nation building! A process that systematically excluded a minority for the welfare of the majority.

The entire exhibition produced two reactions. Firstly, horror, secondly an inspiration to see the possibility of how a nation can be influenced by some simple emotional prodding. I guess the BJP/RSS combine try it repeatedly in India as it is the case of all the nationalist mobilizations around the world.

The exhibits end with the Nuremberg Trials. This also marked the beginning of a new phase of development of Human Rights.

Our next stop was the Human Rights Road located just opposite the Nuremberg Museum. The story goes that the place was acquired by the Municipal Council of Nuremberg, proposals were invited to decide to utilize the space. A novel idea of a human rights way was assigned to famous Israeli artist. He put up thirty pillars with 30 Article from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The articles were written in german accompanied by another language. Many languages found their place in on the pillar and obviously many did not. So after the 20^th pillar he planted an oak tree to represent all the other languages of the world. It was surprising to find Tibetan and Singalese among the thirty but Hindi and Telugu or Tamil were obviously missing. I guess that is was part of the tree.

In the free time that followed, a visit to the Church of St Lawrence, a magnificent piece of work that took 200 years to complete stood right in the heart of the Market place. Located closely was another church of Our Lady, that was built during the reformation and then was given to the catholics two hundred years ago. It was interesting to find that the images on both the churches were so similar in form but only different in size.

Nuremberg thus left a lasting impression to learn about what had happened in the history of Human Rights not so long ago.  

Coburg Chronicles 3

Day 3

Flossenburg

It was an early start. I was back in Gaby's house for breakfast. It was 7:00 am, She had alerady left for work. We had to cut into the really hard bread. Solidad was my only company for breakfast when we started. Soon Lucy joined us. Our conversations were around education in Chile and India. We soon left the house packing some sandwiches for John and Cecilia. The bus awaited us at the Mensa. It was fully loaded and off to Flossenburg.

Flossenburg was the location of a former concentration camp. It was a work camp and not an extermination camp. Work camps were places where people were brought in for hard labour. They were given colour codes to be differentiated. A green triangle signified a career criminal, a black triangle signified an anti social, a red triangle was political objector, blue was an immigrant, and pink was for the homosexual and purple was for the Jehova's witness. If the person was a jew an inverted yellow triangle was added to the existing triangle. So by seeing them one could be identified.

The camp existed from 1942 to 1945 till the americans liberated them. In 1945 there were about 100,000 prisoners in the camp and were liberated of which it is said that 30000 were killed.

The camp hosted citizens from 22 countries which included almost all of europe. To our surprise there seemed to be one chinese and seven from the USA.

The camp site was not eerie to see at first. The stories they said were not compelling in the beginning. But as we progressed, it became harder to hear. There is a place where it reads, “Work will set you Free”. It is really nice to hear this but it actually meant that, if you work very hard every day you will die fast and then you will be burnt in that oven and your smoke will be free. What an interpretation!

This was the place where bodies people were burnt in threes and fours as there were about 80-90 people dying every day and all of them had to be disposed. So the bodies would be kept on a table and their jugular vein cut off so that they bleed out all their blood. The golden teeth/filling was pulled out, their hair was shaved and then they were filled in the oven. The gold was melted to make jewelry and the hair was sent to make beds. The clothes were probably recycled.

The valley of death was a place where people were lined up and shot. Now there is a memorial of nations that underlines the suffering. Close to it is a church that has beautiful glass work with significant allegorical reference to the suffering. This church was built by the survivors.

A compelling fact about this camp was that Dietrich Bonhoffer a protestant theologian was killed here. I have read a lot about him and used his works extensively in retreats. In a book called Contact with god, Tony De Mello Quotes, Bonhoffer, “When Jesus says follow me, he is asking you if you are willing to die for me”. He joined the resistance against hitler and also planned to assassinate him. But in the process was imprisoned and hanged in Flossenburg along with eight of his companions. It was quite a place to be in.

A video of the survivors was very informative. It gave more intricate details of life in the camps. The survivors were filmed on the spot when they had gathered for a reunion.

The experience was very different from the Holocaust museum in Washington DC and the New York. Those museums gave an eerie feeling about the whole thing but this was less traumatic but had a whole lot of information that made you go through life as it was in real time. Associating it with what happened in Sri Lanka or Cambodia was easier.

The ride back was very relaxing as all of us slept in the bus except the Driver of course!  

Coburg Chronicles 2

Day two.

As usual I woke up at 5:00 am the only difference was that it was 5:00 am in India and only 1:00 am here. Rolling and wriggling in the bed went back to sleep, but was visibly tired for the day. Was ready on time for the walk to breakfast to Gaby's place. Bread, cheese, meat, milk, musli, yoghurt, jelly, honey, tea, grape fruit and apple juice greeted us on the table.

Had a quick bite and was ready to head for the sessions. The first half of the day had four presentations from Chile, Namibia, India and Germany. They presented by the students who had worked on the issues. It was really interesting to see their level of involvement in the issue. The real learning was from the presentation from Namibia. Where the apartheid was at its peak. Was similar to the South African case study but was very different in terms of the way in which it was dealt with. The Indians presented on on the situation of the Irulas in Guduvancherry. It was a typical class room presentation. All this while I was thinking of our students who could have been presenting here. Wondered how well Arulmani and Jerry would have pulled it off the whole perspective would have been different for the international community.

In the afternoon there was an interesting lecture by Dr Louis De Campo an expert on child rights working in Columbia. His case study was the rehabilitation of child soldiers. Bencosta was the name of is project. He gave several insights, on how things operated in that part of the world. A video demonstrated his work and the difference they had made in the lives of thousands of children amidst the ongoing conflict.

It was now about 5:00 pm and we were free till 7:00 pm for dinner which was at the Highlander Restaurant. I was totaled out, I just came to my room and hit my bed for nap. I had slept for about 40 minutes to renew my energy for the rainy day. Then walked down the mountain to the city centre for the dinner. It was an old restaurant, with a lot of character. On the way I picked up the russians and the chileans who were shopping. Though I was not the last to reach there. I was served food at the very end. Just like what happened yesterday. But I was in no hurry but very tired. The place was supposed to be the best for Burgers in this part of germany. Hence Burger it was for dinner. The burger lived up to the wait. The fries was really good.

After chattering, I was ready for my uphill walk.  

Coburg Chronicles 1

Day 1

21^st May 2013

Introduction and tour of the city

the participants of the summer school met at about 9:30 at the hall and started the interactions. There were people from Namibia, Chile, India, Russia and Ethiopia. In all there were about 60 people including the Students of Coburg University.

As we entered the hall, Lisa, a student who was with us in Chennai greeted me with a Vanakkam without even seeing me. She was once considered as a trouble maker by the CIP, though I do not subscribe to that opinion. Then I looked at her and said, “I know you!”. She was a bit startled and got up and said, Yes Yes Yes of course! She gave me a name tag and we were ready to get started. In the mean time I was curious to see the Indians from MSSW. As we waited they walked in. Was happy to greet them. All the while I was thinking of Jerry, Christin, Saswathan, Karunya and Arulmani who could not make it. What a missed opportunity.

The introduction got underway with a lot of games, Claudia was in-charge and make it look so simple. She used some of the theatrical warm ups to lighten the mood. It was funny and useful. Now it was time to sit and listen to the inaugural address. Susanne the dean of the School was there to welcome. There was simultaneous translation in Spanish for the Chileans. So it went on back and forth.

Gaby rolled out the entire program and it sounded pretty tight packed for two weeks. It has been a while since I stayed in a place for almost two weeks. The last time I remember doing this was in Oxford for three weeks. I hope to take back a lot from this program as the contacts were good and the topics were also interesting. It all goes well at the end I will have a lot to share with my students and friends.

Lunch was organized at the mezzanine level, it was bread, cream of broccoli soup, chicken wings, and some fruit with cheese. I had to motivate the students from MSSW to eat as they really found it weird to eat bread and soup. One of them was already ill from the journey but was coping well with the pressure of being in a foreign land. They showed good initiative in their participation. Their faculty was also a good sport.

Post lunch was the walking tour of the city. We had to climb down the hillock, under the railwaystation, to the market, through the old streets and heritage buildings that were well preserved over 600 years. Student guides were well prepared to give us an orientation to the history of coburg along with its monumental structures.

An interesting fact was the manhole cover. It had a symbol of a black man's head. It was the head of Moor, a black warrior of the Roman who valiantly protected the city in the 3^rd century AD. The students paused for a moment to reflect on it and asked for impressions on the manhole. The chileans had some interesting ones.

We later strolled through the town hall area were a music festival was on. It was a square where plenty of bavarian beer was served. It was funny to seen the people in traditional attire, some looking like they were from the fraternity and the Nazi outfit proving their identity. The music was great.

A decision was made to go up to the castle, where Martin Luther of the reformation had lived for about six months to protect himself from the tyranny of the church. This compelled me to walk up the hill despite my disabilities.

On our return we were taken to a good restaurant for dinner, and the surprise was in store. Meat, potatoes and so on....

came back and just crashed as I was so tired of the walk and jet lag.

The Significance Of The Students’ Protest

                                                                                              20^th March 2013

Learning Lessons!

Many spectators especially from Tamil Nadu term the students’ protest as the reawakening of the 1960’s anti Hindi spirit, while some others compare it to the JP movement of the 70’s. What it really is a spontaneous reaction of a bunch of students who were motivated by some political thinking. Let us not mistake this to be a political party but it is political thinking. That means any one who wants change a system that is perceived to be unjust is thinking politically. The process of politicization happens when the eyes and ears along with other senses are open and a sense of dissatisfaction is sustained over a period of time. The simmering of this feeling has led to the precipitation of events. It was almost like the student community was waiting for a chance to protest.

In the past twenty years or so there have not been too many protests at this scale in Tamil Nadu and especially by the students.  In the urban areas they were considered to be mall going, entertainment loving, time wasting types or on the other hand belonging to some nerdy group that was interested in techy stuff, or others still belonging to the don’t care attitude groups. There are also others who belong to the “I cant afford that”. This is an interesting group that is deprived and disadvantaged and does not hesitate to lay its life for a cause.

There is reason to believe that the protests sparked off a sense of purpose in the minds of the youth. With or without understanding, knowingly or unknowingly but most willingly the students have stepped out of their classes and forced the state to declare an academic holiday.

There are several things that we can learn from this.

1.     Even if the world has forgotten the Tamil cause in Sri Lanka, the students have reminded them that it is very much alive in the hearts, minds and in body.

2.     It is a reminder that the students can’t be taken for granted. This means that they re ready to come out in the open and take a stand for issues of social justice even if it is not happening in India

3.     For students there is no need for any inspirational leader to organize them. They are capable of organizing themselves.

4.     Though many political parties motivate the students and draw inspiration the students have still not pledged any allegiance to any party.

5.     Despite the presence or absence of distractions of IPL, Movies and TV the students have found ways to sustain themselves for a cause

6.      They have not had coordinated protests but independent flash strikes, fasts and so on.

7.     We should never forget that this is a twitter generation and they have made use of the social network sites to its best. Along with this they have also known ways and means to attract the news hungry media.

8.     Let us not feel that they are on the street just because the government is letting them to be there. Even if there is a lot of pressure on the students from the government they will find ways to continue their protest.

 The causes and consequences of such students’ actions can be subjected to a postmortem at a later stage. What is most important is that they have made the world look at them in a different light. It looks like they have shaken off their Teflon coating of indifference to prove a point that they are still awake and will keep us awake when it is necessary. 

Being aware of what we ask!

The protests of the students have taken a different turn from what was imagined by the students. However, for those who have lived through the protests in Tamil Nadu it was pretty much predictive. Some students are yet to give up the protests while many have given up due to the closure of the colleges and hostels. After waiting and watching, the Government of Tamil Nadu has acted. It is an attempt to calm the students who are agitated and think that such terrible things are happening in Sri Lanka right now as they happened in till May 2009.

The emotional outbursts of the students should be respected and handled with care both by the state and the educational institutions. For the students it is a way to say, “we care about the Tamils in Sri Lanka”. They want to be part of the pressure group that can get the government of India and the UNHRC to act on Sri Lanka. The only confusion is what to ask them. Some say oppose the US sponsored resolution not minding to know what it contains, India should have its own resolution, a separate Tamil Eelam should established based on a referendum, an international independent judicial inquiry into the war crimes/crimes against humanity/genocide, announce an economic embargo on Sri Lanka, all this is motivated to punish those who have and are committing the atrocities against the innocent Tamils.

The demands sound very legitimate at the first look but the practicality is very questionable. Firstly, opposing the US resolution and throwing it out of the window without giving it a fair chance would mean that the only option in front of us have to be left out. The time factor and India’s current positioning does not permit it to draft and come up with its own resolution. Such a process should have been thought out well ahead of time. Also, this is a time when the previous US sponsored resolution is coming up for review. So, it is only right to say that what was stated last year should be reviewed and not have something entirely new as a knee jerk reaction just because we think India needs to do more immediately.

A referendum on Tamil Eelam is a popular demand. It appeals as the only solution for the population that has been suffering injustices for the past 60 years. Thanthai Chelva placed the proposal in the 1977 Vaddukottai declaration in 1977. This came after years of struggle where the Federal party in one voice said that there is not other option but a separate nation. Though not much has changed till date in Sri Lanka in terms of political solution to the Tamil Question, the demographics have changed considerably. This is because of the new delimitation of the constituencies, migration of people from the Tamil People to the developed world in fear or in search of greener pastures. With an estimated 20,00,000 tamils living abroad the 7 districts that are primarily Tamil areas in the North and East have been depopulated. A large number of Tamils now also live in Colombo. These people are either unwilling to return to their homelands or are not able to return for political reasons. In this context a referendum will be self defeating on one hand and also become a cause for further Sinhalization of the areas. A Tamil Eelam will be defenseless without people to live in it, although, those patriotic Tamils who live in the developed world will promise to come back and live in it, their children and their grand children who have been raised in the developed world will find it impossible to acclimatize themselves to the Eelam situation.

The option of an economic embargo, is bright and looks good. The wrong doer should be punished, the country as such has failed to protect its citizens and hence it is only legitimate that stringent economic action should be taken against them. This is meant to be like the one that was in South Africa, or that was imposed on India just after the Pokhran Nuclear tests. Well the context in Sri Lanka is definitely different. Though it is claimed to be a middle income country, the majority of the people who are just trying to rebuild their lives after the war live in the Tamil areas. An economic embargo would mean a repeat of what happened inside the Vanni during the times of the LTTE when the government did not permit transport of even essential items to the Tamil areas controlled by the LTTE. Though the innovation of the LTTE kept people alive to survive the terrible times. Such an embargo from the international community would bring undue sufferings to the already ailing community in terms of price rise and demand for essential commodities. The few jobs that are available to the Tamils will also be lost. Further leading to a depletion of the population owing to its penury.

Does this mean that the Tamils just need to accept the situation and live at the mercy of the current regime? Definitely not! There are many more options that will preserve the Tamil identity, territory of the Tamils and preserve the heritage. The two-pronged approach of working with political and developmental goals in mind is essential. Both these should be worked on simultaneously. The Tamils who were displaced by war are just limping back to normal life; there is a need to concentrate on the rebuilding their lives though proper development programs. This will encourage Tamils to get back to their home soil, occupy their land and not allow it to be empty without protection. For this, the diaspora can step in a big way. Hypothetically there were about 300,000 people who were displaced because of war that means about 75,000 families. The diaspora, which is much stronger than that in numbers, could hand hold at least one family to restart their lives. On the other hand encouraging investments in the north and east that would provide jobs and help the youth to see some scope for their continued existence in their home lands, provision of amenities such as schools, colleges, hospitals and an array of things will surely pep up their self concept.  All this may still sound a bit too lame and not valorous as fighting a war but things do not stop here.

The second prong is to take the political debates forward. With the absence of any consensus among the political parties about a political solution the bargaining capacity of the Tamils for self-determination and is reduced to fighting elections and holding on to posts. The real need is to come up with a package of demands and to stand united on one side at least when it comes to the principles. Moving the agenda on the rights dimension is dependent on clearly starting with a common minimum approach. As stated earlier it could be the 13^th/13+ Amendment or any other starter that was agreed by all earlier. Once a critical mass is built the issues of identity, protection and governance will ensue.

Right now the whole insistence on exuberant demands such as separate nation, especially with the noise of the international community is used and will be used by the radical Sinhala forces to further ferment the opinion of the poor and ignorant Sinhala South to hold on to their position of the whole world is against us and we have only Sri Lanka to live and hence let us keep it to ourselves. 

Struggling to Say NO!

Struggling to say No!

Being polite to me actually meant to say yes for even what was not possible for me to do. Just to satisfy the people who you like, love or you work for. I have refused people who beg, who try to exploit or who try to compel to act against my will. But in most cases I have always said yes. This is beginning to change. Before that i wanted to look into why is it difficult to say no and easy to say yes. Being raised religiously with all the catholic piety, that was mostly self propelled to become a missionary, or to become a role model  with a romantic idea of being a great proselytizer who could change the world through work and through preaching brought in the thought of a good person always says yes. He is willing to go through the struggles to fulfill that yes. 

When it comes to work in a professional administration it is a different ball game. I believe that I am in a helping profession and therefore I need to say yes to people who come to me. YOu need to teach them to fish but that needs a lot of time and effort, or at times it demands giving things or giving time. Knowing fully well that it is not possible to do this always is a pain. Not being able to help others in pain is a terrible feeling. Especially if you want to and you cant because you either dont have the means or the position doesnt permit can cause a lot of stress. 

It is here that the professional boundaries become dominant to help me. In my office I meet several students who come to see me for many reasons, mostly academic. In November 2012 our office announced the registration for internal arrears. This was meant for the even semester. a dead line was set to 5th December and extended up to 7th December with a small penalty. The deadline passed and we still had students coming in to register. Given the track record of the previous years we had to permit the late comers with a larger penalty. We decided on a final, final closing date. The long line of students continued. Now it was time to decide, we said we will give time till the beginning of the christmas vacation, that is the 20th of December. 

The college re-opened on the 3rd of January 2013. We still had students coming. We were also permitting them. In my mind, I was disturbed as we were acting well past our deadlines. I was not willing to tow the previous years' models. So the decision was made to draw the iron curtain. This is the time when saying no begins. Now parents started to come along with their wards. Pleading that they did not know the dead line. Their ward was sick/met with an accident and was in the hospital. The results that came after the deadline indicated that the ward failed. They had only one internal paper to complete the course. One parent even said, "you have decided to ruin my son's career". One student said,"I beg at your feet please permit me this time" another candidate said, "My life is dependent on this I want to continue my higher studies". Apart from this some non teaching staff also started fielding their candidates' plea. 

This was the time to hold on to my senses and take a good look at every case. This enabled me to look beyond the violation of the deadline. The cases where the parents came in was much more serious than what met the eye. One candidate was completely absent for an entire semester, he had failed due to lack of attendance in two full semesters. This case had no merit. The case where another student was in the hospital was a defaulter once again in the attendance. During his regular years of study his parents had never bothered about his studies or class attendance but wanted him to pass now. 

One other case where the fuming father kept arguing had to be silenced by questioning his responsibility as well. In the case of a friend who carried the papers of the hospitalized candidate, we questioned the ability to write the exam immediately without attending a single class. The final candidate who had the staff recommendation had failed despite being granted special permission earlier. 

This helped in the process of deciding. We had to Say NO. But made sure how we said it. I had to convince myself first, that, I was acting out of a clear conscience. I wanted to help. I was unable in this case. Going by the merit I had to say no. Here refusal, I thought did not bring down the career of a candidate. So I had to say no and still struggle with it.