Sagar Island: Is It The Land Of The Deserted Elderly?

By: Barnali Bose, Editor-ICN Group

KOLKATA: The usually garrulous co-passenger sitting beside me, in the local train was strangely silent yesterday. As I glanced at her, I noticed that her eyes were  brimming with unshed tears.

My eyes fell on the headline of the  article she was reading. It read, ‘Sagar Island: The Land Of The Deserted Elderly?’ What followed, left me dumbfounded.

Most of us are aware that the Gangasagar mela is the second biggest religious congregation in the country after Kumbh.

Hindu  pilgrims, from all over India gather on the occasion of Makar Sankranti at Sagar Island in Bengal, every year. They take a dip in the holy waters of the Ganga at the mouth of the Bay of Bengal, braving the cold winter.

A few people, after ‘washing off’ their sins at  Gangasagar Mela, consciously shed baggage they sadly consider unwanted – their often-ailing aged parents and relatives.

Such deserted elderly have quite often been found belonging to faraway states so that they cannot easily return.

Some of them are in such a state of shock that they are even unable to recall where they had come from.

They are then left counting their last days in the government hospitals,where they are given refuge.

In some cases, where the police are able to trace their families,they are not accepted, often citing adjustment issues or monetary problems.

Incredibly true is the fact that a few families are even found to have performed  their aged parents’ Shradh ceremony. On their return, such family members proclaim them to be dead, either  having been killed in a stampede or drowned in the river, neither of which is factual.

A heart-wrenching account was narrated by an old woman who said that she had sensed something was amiss when her son  left her alone on the pretext of bringing flowers for her puja. This was because he had dragged her grandson along with him.Obviously, neither he nor did the flowers come. When asked where she had  lived earlier, she only said,“ Sagar island is my home now.”

The sorry plight of these elderly people brought to my mind, a fable, our Moral Science teacher had narrated in my school days. This is how it goes.

A young son was carrying his father on his back to an old age home. On the way, he came across a  big rock. Tired of carrying his father,he wanted to rest for sometime. He said to his father, “ Father, please sit  on the rock for awhile.”

 

The old man who had not uttered a single word throughout the journey screamed, “No,no, son, not there.” Surprised the son said, “Why father, Why?”

As tears streamed down his bony cheeks, the old man  mumbled almost inaudibly,“ My son,my dear son,it is the same rock I had rested my father upon, when I was taking him to the old – age home decades ago.” Needless to say, the son took his father back home.

I narrated the above fable to my co-passenger. I said to her, “It is my belief that children tread upon the footsteps of their parents. As they say, What goes round,comes around.”

Said she,“ Does that mean those deserted had meted out the same treatment to their parents?” Well, I didn’t have an answer to that.

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