ENGLISH

POWERPOINT
PRESENTATION
PRESENTED BY:
TANEESHA
AND
DIYA SHARMA
 LOST SPRING
STORIES OF STOLEN CHILDHOOD
BY – ANEES JUNG
 ABOUT THE AUTHOR

1.Anees Jung is
an Indian woman author, journalist and a columnist for
major newspapers in India and
abroad, whose most noted work, Unveiling India(1987) was
a detailed chronicle of the lives of
She belongs to an
aristocratic family in
Hyderabad. Her father
was a renowned scholar
and poet, worked as the
adviser to the last prince
of Hyderabad State and
her mother and brother
are also well-known
Urdu poets.
 INTRODUCTION
Anees Jung's Lost Spring: Stories of stolen
childhood express her concern over the
exploitation of children in hazardous
jobs like bangle making and rag -
picking. Grinding poverty and
thoughtless traditions result in the loss
of childhood innocence, education and
play. The result is back breaking hard
work, dismal working conditions and
acceptance of poverty and exploitation
as destiny. There is an absolute need to
provide the poverty - stricken people,
particularly children, a life of dignity
and opportunities to dream.
 CHARACTERS OF THE
LOST SPRING
✔ Saheb-e-Alam-A rag picker
✔ Mukesh-Son of a bangle maker
STORIES AT A GLANCE
❖ THIS STORY NARRATES
ABOUT THOSE CHILDREN
WHO LIVES UNDER
POVERTY.
❖ THIS STORY GOES
THROUGH THE LIVES OF
TWO CHILDREN – SAHEB-E-
ALAM AND MUKESH AND
CONCLUDE THAT THEIR
CHILDHOOD IS LOST IN
MISERY AND POVERTY.
 Y O F
TO R A M
S - A L
E B -E
SA H R U PE E I N
I ND A F
M E S I . ”
M E TI B A G E
“ SO E G A R
TH
▣ The writer Anees Jung sees a young rag picker boy
who visits the garbage dump near her house and
searches for ‘gold’ in it.
▣ One day the writer questions Saheb that “why do
you do this?”
▣ Saheb replies that he has nothing else to do other
than rag picking.
▣ His home in Dhaka was in the middle of lush green fields.

▣ They left it many years ago and he does not remember it

anymore.
▣ His mother had told him that there were many storms
which destroyed their homes and fields. So, they left
home and shifted to the cities.
▣ Things like shoes, money, bags, etc. for the children and
food, clothing, shelter for their parents are gold and are
means of living for them.
▣ The writer suggests that he should go to school. She
herself knows that her advice is meaningless for the
poor boy.
▣ The writer asks him jokingly that if she opened a one
would he attend it.
▣ He replies that there are no schools in the area where he
lives. He also assures her that he will go to school when
one is built near his house.
▣ Saheb says that he would join the writer’s school.
▣ Actually she had said this as a joke and had never
intended to open a school, so she felt ashamed of herself.
▣ Saheb was not hurt because he was used to such false
promises as they existed in large numbers in his empty
world.
 ARMY OF BAREFOOTED
CHILDREN
▣ The writer asked one of them that why was he not
wearing any footwear. The boy simply replied that his
mother did not get them down from the market. As they
were beyond his reach, he did not wear them.
▣ Another boy who was wearing a different shoe in each
foot said that even if his mother would have given him
the footwear, he would have thrown it away.
▣ The writer asked the second boy the reason for wearing a
different shoe in each foot. He did not reply and shuffled
his feet as he tried to hide the shoes.
▣ A third boy spoke that he was eager to get a pair of shoes
as he had never owned one all his life.
▣ This story of shoes shows us that the underprivileged
value anything that they get because they have been
longing for it.
 AREA WHERE SAHEB LIVES
▣ Seemapuri, where saheb lives, was located on the
outskirts of Delhi was very different from the
capital of the country. In 1971 when these rag
pickers had migrated from Bangladesh, the area had
been a wasteland.
▣ Seemapuri was a wasteland but now it was not
empty as almost ten thousand rag pickers lived
there in structures made of mud, with roofs made of
thin sheets of tin or plastic material called tarpaulin.
CONDITION OF SEEMAPURI
▣ There was no sewage, drainage or running water
facility in Seemapuri. They lived in unhygienic
conditions.
▣ It was a piece of wasteland where the garbage of the
city was collected.
▣ These people had started living there illegally.
▣ The ragpickers had been living illegally in
Seemapuri for the last thirty years. They have
occupied the area without government permission
or ownership.
▣ The politicians of the area have provided them ration
cards and voter identity cards. They got grocery for
their family through these ration cards and in return,
they cast their votes in favour of the politicians who
helped them.
▣ The writer asked a group of women who were wearing
torn saris that why did they leave their homes in
Dhaka.
▣ “If at the end of the day we can feed our families and
go to bed without an aching stomach, we would
rather live here than in the fields that gave us no
grain,” say the group of women.
 SAHEB’S INTERESTS
▣ Saheb liked the game of tennis. Someone
gave him a pair of tennis shoes.
▣ But he would never get a chance to play the
game himself.
▣ At last, Saheb got employed in a tea stall.
▣ He would earn eight hundred rupees a month and
get meals too.
▣ Saheb was working for someone else and was
carrying his master’s container, he was burdened
with responsibility.
▣ Earlier, as a rag picker, Saheb would carry his own
bag and was his own master. Now, he was no
longer his own master.
 OR Y
S ST
SH’
U KE
M r.” ca
i ve a
o dr
nt t
I wa
“
FIROZABAD-TOWN OF BANGLE
INDUSTRY
▣ Mukesh lived in Firozabad which was famous for
glass bangles. The writer felt that the boy’s dreams
would not materialize and gradually get influenced
by the dusty streets of Firozabad.
▣ Firozabad was the main town of India for the glass
– blowing industry. The families had been involved
in working at furnaces, welding glass, and making
bangles for generations.
▣ They made so many bangles that it seemed that
they made bangles for all the women of the world.
 DREAM OF MUKESH
▣ Mukesh who aspired to become a motor mechanic.
▣ He does’nt know how to drive a car but he was
confident and said that he would learn to drive a car.
▣ His dream was far away from reality and although the
boy was confident, he would succumb to the societal
pressures.
▣ The author asked him if he dreamt of flying planes. The
boy became silent and refused. He did not know about
them as he did not know about planes. Not many planes
flew over Firozabad. As he had only seen cars moving
around in Firozabad, his dreams were restricted up to
them.
 CONDITION OF HIS HOUSE
▣ Mukesh was happy as he took the writer to his
home. He felt proud as he informed her that it was
being renovated.
▣ They walk down stinking lanes choked with
garbage, past homes that remain hovels with
crumbling walls, wobbly doors, no windows,
crowded with families of humans and animals
coexisting in a primeval state.
 HIS FAMILY MEMBERS
❖ Mukesh’s elder brother.
❖ Wife of his elder brother.
❖ His father.
❖ His grandmother.
▣ His father was a poor bangle maker. He had
worked hard all his life – first as a tailor, then
as a bangle maker.
▣ He was still not able to either renovate the
house or send his sons to school.
▣ He had just managed to teach him the skill of
making bangles.
 HAZARDS OF WORKING IN
BANGLE INDUSTRY
▣ Thousands of children are engaged in bangle
making and many of them lose their eyesight
before becoming adults. They did not know
that it is illegal for children to work in that
hazardous condition in the glass factories.
▣ The story is the same in every family. Mukesh
took the writer to his house where the writer
came to know that his grandfather had
become blind working in the factory.
 FEAR OF LAWMAKER

▣ Hundreds of years of slavery had killed the

initiative of people to think of a better life.
They carried on their miserable life as they did
not have the courage to rebel against tradition.
▣ If someone dared to start a new line, there
were police, middle-men, sahukars and
politicians to persecute them.
▣ Justice after all is the right of the rich and the
powerful, not of the helpless like Mukesh.
 CONCLUSION FROM THESE
STORIES
The condition of the life of Saheb or Mukesh
was far from desirable. It should not be
allowed to continue. But some people must
bell the cat. The writer was happy when he
came to know that some young men like
Mukesh was ready to take the plunge, rebel
against tradition and start a new life.
THA NK
Y OU