With holy month of Ramazan bidding adieu, Bilal Bahadur offers some shots detailing how orphans break their fast inside orphanages
Political and military aspects of Kashmir conflict have multiplied orphanages in Kashmir over the years. With the result, most of the orphanages are packed with tender souls.
Amid present state of affairs, experts say children’s experiences and perceptions have been ignored making them the victims of violence and abuses.
Growing in the shade of disturbance and perceptible social change, many orphans are left to menial labour and have become easy recruits for all sorts of violent causes.
Caught between certain future and awful past, these children often end up in orphanages.
Most of them belong to middle or lower middle class families. It is feared that in absence of proper care, these children are likely to become vulnerable.
A study by known sociologist of valley, Prof Bashir Ahmad Dabla maintains that after becoming orphans, 48.33 per cent of these children face economic hardships, 22.00 per cent face psychological problems, 13.66 per cent face denial of love and affection and 08.66 per cent face apathy by relatives and friends.
Apart from monetary aid, these children need help to overcome pain of loss. Due to lack of socialization, they have been living an abnormal life with the perception of being normal.
Most of these children living far away from their families often develop longing for their families. Over the span of time, they have learnt to vent their feelings by sharing the burden of their hearts with inmates of orphanages.
This section of Kashmir’s new generation seems asking for a parenthood and homely environment that can put their fragmented lives together.
