Acharya Tulsi
Evening time, as spent, in earlier time, is no longer today. Children may they be little or not so little, clustered around their grandmother in the evening. She used to nourish, amuse, and entertain them with pleasing fairy tales and motivating stories. These fairy tales were called ‘Lori’. Children used to go into deep sleep. When sleep was somewhat mild, they used to witness all or some happenings they had heard from their grandmother.
It was a psychological process of structuring the healthy and perfect habituation of the children. This was helpful to consolidate the commitment to their family. It used to deepen their respect towards elders. Housewives being free from any tension used to do their domestic work. Old ladies did have a useful way to pass their time and the exercise of building-up desirable personality in the subconscious mind of children used to crop up.
Whether grandmothers, a significant unit of family, are themselves so lively? Friction in the family has cracked their mind. It is beyond imagination that an imported culture is so authoritative on a country. Joint family was the glorious tradition of India. In that tradition large number of persons not only used to eat bread, being cooked in a single oven, but also it bound them up with a unified feeling. They used to share their pleasant and unpleasant moments. Floor of the house used to echo the frolicking activities of children.
Today, the situation is quite different. Peaceful co-existence of large number of people is perhaps impossible. Persons are becoming acclimatized to loneliness. A deep-rooted silence is expanding in the surroundings of houses. In order to overcome the monotony of this loneliness, he uses radio, entertains by viewing television and searches the solution of loneliness in video cassette. Under these circumstances, the condition of children becomes more precarious than that of elders. Their open playgrounds have turned into apartments. Their open mind has been bonded with insufficient equipment’s. How painful will be that evening for the children, being totally exhausted all along the day. Alas! May men awake and provide suitable environment for the blooming of innocent children.
