Dear Parents, On behelf of Kota City, [take this opportunity to weleome your elald to ow city of wonders which processes the young minds of this country and fuels their passion ta become the architects of Modern India My humble request at the beginning of this letter is to read this wath some patience and time and it vould be idealifboth the parents cen. read this toge ther Itas the dream of every parent to se hus child touch the pmnacles of success ancl reach plac which only few can afford Every parent plantsa seed in the mind of the child which over a period of time bearediuitebut after careful nourishment and tendering since the seed ie 2 tender that any mishandling may fail us fiom realizing ow cream, Itasa very difficult satuation for parents to leave their child in a place where theydo not live and thingebecome still difficult when the purpose for which the child is left behind is for dedicated and committed efforts in scalingexeellence im edncation When parents look at the huge billboard signage! hoarding new spaper clipe depicting pictwes of young beautiful children who have achieved what they dieam for their child, the resplntion fo mspae and motivate their children becomes still stronger Good career im the field of Engineering & Medicine af the case maybe is more or Less Like certain mngnrance in termas of decent earning and ving standards J sincerely think that m most of the casee this ut the very reason that mekes urdreain such careers for our childten. There ienothing wrong in thinking on a certain kind on Auured Career Insmanes for one's child since limited resomees and high degree of competition demands one to think head of times. Howeverl think we all agree that the World too hes changed drastically in the last 15-21 yearsso much 99, that most of the facilities and services that were available for a lamated few are now available to manydus to the lmge progres in teclmology which was witnessed in this peiod Aut, Entertainment, Professional Sports, Literature, Health & Fitness, Entze prenewrship, Journalism, Photography, Event management, Music, Arkventmre, Destination towriam ete to name a few too witnessed immense gio wth m comparison fo the bygone era Many of these even created a new tuche which not mst nuctwed creative potential of human. mind and capabilities but also were very successfil career aptions Well, the pomt is not about asking you to ste them asbetter options but certainly to see them also as options Itisa matter offact that today, young children ate facing immense amount of presse relating to their acatlemic performance and due to the same many of them go through ‘various levels of stress Even if we consider that certam element of stress would exist in competition yet, parental apport, care and the right kind of family situations would help the child to cope mpwith any difficult situations. However, curentzeelity:s that due to Jack of nghit kind of conditions and support systems many childven are gomg through streseuncared and unattended for andan a few cases much aitnations disabled the children to sich an extreme extent that they committed suicide yu child... Your child xs Don't get fiightened suddenly as to what isbemg sud abou perfectly safe and sound and you have no reasons to worry. concen of our child which [believe you will understand as we read wy letter farther ut you have reasons to have Tconsider myself asa very-unfortmate person because I got a chanee to read around 2 Suicide Notesof Young, Brilliant, Beautaful aud Wonderful Children Aan giving oo many ade ctrves to such children becamse they conuruitted Suicide??? Iamsony... Answeris No... They were in thet a¢ I suid earlier Young, Brilliant, Beautiful and Wonderful Children, A Gil with amazing command in English language iu her suicide note (Grammatically perfect 5 page Suicide Note with beautiful muning handwriting) thanks her mother for giving up her career for raising the childven ...Subtle hint that she war pricked on this matter again encagam...Another gul-wants her grencinother to become her mother an her nest birth. Another reqnesteher parents to allow her younger sister to do what she likes and not what they like....One tells candidly that he wasmanimlated to study science which was not histaste...Many simply write in fewer lines that they cowld not fulfill the expectations of thew parents...Ratherfe w sry they were not really capable of dong what 1s ‘bemg asked for by them... Allof them thought that Death wasa mnch peaceful and. effortless action then gomg through this dilemina of avtificially domg whet parents want them to do. As they 2a) Suicide Cas ‘Tip of the Iceberg" reveals little and hides mountains within, similaly apparent sveflect few numbers but reality or the hidden mountain is ell those children who did not opt to take this extreme step but certainly are going through, strensiworryfansiety due to presmure on performance Many Paente camot believe after the disaster that it was their own child whe took such. dhastic measure end dont mean to hint their sentiments any finther but the zeality1s that the child was mentally loolang forsome blade of grass which a drowning inan searches for. That blade of grasscould have been your simple appreciation of hus efforts... your solacing words of comfort of asking him to do his best and forget the results. your absolute mmconditioned appreciation of us extacrdinarmess. In etun what the child got was threats of perfonnang still better. peychological menipnlation by repeat and 1e-telecasting of the hardships you have gone tuough for the sake of fanuly.... comparison with better performers neighbors, relatives, children of colleague, ancestors. could be anyone ) sharing imaginations on the los notional gain of mociel status being dependent on child's performance We need to understand that staisticelly speaking not many children commit suicide in comparison to the total number of children coping with such academic pressnure if we analyze the numberebut life analysis tells us that their hopes and dreams are overlooked and hurt manya times So it ishigh time we pause and contemplate abit Ingedl to take a pruse here since [ hear many of you saying lids co not like many things which are good for them... So the question I fenel to hear from you is Should parents ga chuldven‘s muna ture wat °? Not necessnuily Well let ns try to see what all good things they resisted. Eating ght, sleeping nght, talking right, behaving right, seeing right, listening right, reading right ete Child actually observes parents and never follows anything blindly. Moveover there is one thing which is certain ...Child analyse and looks at the parents to se whether in case any of those things preached are followed by parents to begin wath and if, hether theix parents axe really loving, joyful, peeve ful and hagpy by doing 20... They tend to pick up only those habits of theix parents that make them happy an] peaceful In cage you have seriously messed up sitnatons your child may even not ike you. Ituay appear strange and extremely enmoying, .But there isa pordbility of your child not liking yon... This comes in meny forms and shades. Absolute dislike, not liking fe w traits of yous, not liking youby comparing you with someone better, not liking you for your aver plotective care and.concern which you may think es love but is suffocating for the child, not Hing you for your double standards (we may have ...) ete So, it it the objective of this letter to make you reelize that your child distikes you"? Aawrwer again is big No... Your child dees not cishike you. Tam just waking @ point that mmeonscioudy we may have created such situation which we need to undo Children ave parent's responsibility and we are no-one to teach a parent them responshility nor we intend to do 90, Parents really think good ‘br theirclulduen’s future but the point I need to make is that your dieams are always lmited to your experience of what is good... what issuccessful. what us the best thing... Well, the truth is your child may surpass allof your imagination and each places which younever even dreamed of... We ll come fiom different segments of the sciety:in temmsof social economic status, cultme, religion, belief systemse tc However asfar the natwel principle of upbringing a child 8 concemed they remain the game everywhere Lam not an expert in Parenting nov have manyeredentialsin “Bight Child Cae Practic: and fully understand that clifferent kind of childven need different kind of interventions yet Iwould request you to divert little attention to these fundamental aspectevelating to child management Creating the right land of atmosphere for the child to guovr and flower in home by making home « really happy, loving and peace fill place to live Understanding the needs of the childven... There are two extremesin this cas... Making the child go through ternble hardship to vealize “Your” creams i one end and the otherend Over pampered care... Bath of them definitely de not woik Take time to switch from teaching mode to learning mode fiom the child sance children, ow you the way to be really happy and peaceful at times. Instead of leaming from them, we tend to always assume the role of teacher! preacher Allow the child “to be” on his own terms and here I mean especially the child'sengogement with natme end world around and empower them with the right kind of communication skalls which is mote accommodative... Interaction with the other gender due to theix coming of age iguot an aberration but a normal proces: which you can keepa note on but not try to prevent it totall Spend tine with children without complaining of you office, life situations, problems, hardehipeall the time....t maybe really too late besbre you want to spend and there is 20 more time available with the child. Why? Because we may have medle him just like oumekres in an effort to tutor him....We cettainyare not the benchmark for the child. Many a times, we anay be regressre rudimentary types m-comparison to the abihty of the cluld Just a final thought , Ave we mterested in making the cluld realize “ cost ov Should it be bhe creating such situations that the child realizes“ His/Her” Dreams nr Dreams “atany Leould have amply attended a Parents Comseling Semon during achniston ancl spoken on these sues but usually:t so happens that an such gathenugs we are conditioned and influenced more by impression of the person sitting next to you or people who think diffrent Nothing woong in disagreeing but it iv bevt to disagree on own terme instead of getting influenced by others... Finally, | would like to tender my mmconditional apology far taking your time and telling you things ebout Child Management in which Tam uo expert and my vwor‘ls in this letter have similar cases andl certainly before you en gethered by my limited expenience in Kota dealing with there are great mien who have inspired me to put my thoughts Be the Best Parent in the World! Lam sure there is no competition there. ‘Yous Sincerely Dr Ravikumar Distnet Collector, Kota