AN APPEAL TO THE MADDING WORLD.

Yesterday, 15^th February was World Pediatric Cancer Day. I just finished eating my breakfast and was getting ready to leave for my office when I saw a special programme dedicated to small children suffering from cancer by Asianet- Idea Star Singer team. Kalabhavan Mani, the renowned Malayalam actor was performing with a lot of variety. An artist with a genuine ‘Village touch’ and has got a unique god gifted talent of singing to the heart, was there singing, dancing, mono-acting, and all he could do to make those few tiny touts sitting in front of him, smile. I stood there watching the programme till the end. A frail cover of dull and melancholic haze engulfed me and for a moment, Iam weak and my heart is heavy with many an emotion. There I could see many of them, too small to even spell the word Cancer, dancing and singing and moving around the stage with sheer exuberance. There were infants. Parents of those tiny birds, many of them looked like from poor back ground, were securely holding them in their chest as if to give a feeble motherly protection. Their weary face shows it all. Fiscally and mentally drained and shattered, they all had one thing common hoarded on their face- the unrelenting determination to move ahead and save their new born dream from the fangs of death. Many of them were amused, not by what Kalabhavan Mani performing there on the dais, but by the joyness of their children and their laughter. Children with face mask to cover a tumor scar or a gentian violet surgical marking on their soft cheeks were laughing with their eyes. Watching those scenes, my mind leapt over a couple of decades back when I was regularly taking my father to the Regional Cancer Center Trivandrum, for a post surgical radio therapy treatment once a highly malignant brain tumor was surgically removed from him. I was doing my graduation then. Those brutal days we lived in numb disbelief will not be forgotten easily. That dark corridor leading to the therapy centre, always stinking of vomit, cancer wounds and medicine, made my father dreaded the sessions. My father had problems of personality disorders and was at times behaving like a child after the brain surgery. He often ran across the corridor to avoid therapy, a treatment, which took a heavy toll on his pride. It's heartbreaking for me to see him like this. His hair completely falls out. Watching the agony of him, vomiting the whole day after every session of radio therapy, was enough to make me weep.  He looked tired and dejected. I took all efforts to keep it between me and my father as desired by him, which according to him was a plight he would like to bear all alone. While bringing him back from the far end of the corridor, I used to pacify him by showing the small children sitting patiently in their mother’s lap waiting for their turn to have those Gamma Rays piercing the evil cells. Those were the days I gave, the 'parental' care which he gave me when I was a tout, back to him as a son with tears in eyes. I was his father and he was my son.  Despite of all those awful treatment, sufferings and distress he was gone in a place where he was free from pain at the age of forty nine. It took several months for me to return from the agony and desperation I suffered during those days.

And today their faces had the same appearance as those I had seen at the dark end of the corridor, gently wiping the tears from their mother’s cheek and murmur with their swollen cancerous mouth….”Don’t cry..Amma…Iam here” as if they are normal as any other child.  Many of these parents do not want to put their sweet little ones in such a trauma. But by giving the best treatment available, along with their love and affection, they know their tiny seraphs will flash their wings one day.
Perilous operations in dense forests or midnight ambushes against dreaded militants never moved my heart, but a child in agony has always done.

“Regional Cancer Center” is a temple. The doctors there are next to Gods. At least we should say like that. But in a new world where the cost of treatment is not even remotely affordable to even middle class citizens, I always wonder why the government can’t take measures to make the treatment of cancer free of cost. A percentage of money spends on stage decorations and other party paraphernalia is enough to treat several such patients. Do we need our elected representatives to move in Luxury cars and stay in palatial bungalows which owes several crores of rupees from the government exchequer for its annual renovation when a poor boy or a girl die in the hospital due to lack of money? My poor numerical ability desist me from calculating how many poor patients would have been benefited by the 1.76 lakh crore that was spend haphazardly in 2G spectrum.

And to those industrialists who are sitting in their serene farm houses in Switzerland and breathing fresh air, it is a humble request to them. Please don’t leave chemicals in our rivers. Don’t give off toxic smoke to our skies. Don’t mix artificial ingredients in our food. We cannot afford to live in farm houses and produce bio foods to eat. We cannot go to New York’s Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Centre to treat our kith and kin. So please show mercy on us.

To my dear doctors.. One day I'am sure you will find a medicine which will act as permanent cure for cancer. Go ahead. Our best wishes are always with you.