Kids who Paint Blood

They are fearless. They are strong. They can climb trees, play football, love cricket and play indoors. They are simple as any other village child, but there is a big difference. They don’t paint soothing village scenes. Their paintings are liberally splattered with blood. Gory pictures of human carcasses, burnt out houses and looted graineries, are about all they care to put on the canvas. They have seen more blood, than one can imagine. Some of their parents were slaughtered before their eyes. Brothers and sisters dragged out of the houses, hog-tied, raped, maimed and murdered. Uniformed, armed men would appear out of no-where in the middle of the night. Barge through feeble doors. Kick at each and every thing, dead or alive and drag the male member(s) of the house to the clearing amidst the humble huts. Allegations would be slapped, death warrants signed. Arms and head chopped off. The remains further mutilated to teach the survivors a lesson. Having done whatever they are worth, the killers would vanish into the darkness.

Sapna, Vineeta, Mamta, Nisha, Nagmani, Durgi, Raju, Joga, Manshila, Kittu, Suraj, Kuldeep, Rakesh, Santosh, Mukesh, Munna, Desha and many others are forced to live with such memories, etched deeply in their mind. When indoors, they divide into two groups and enact their horror. One of the groups would pretend to be villagers, engaged in their daily chore whereas the other would all of a sudden march in armed with clay pistols and AK 47s. They would command the villagers to arrange into a circle and pull one of them in the centre. He would be thrashed and killed. The caretaker watches this mock drill in horror.
Shail didi, a social worker for these children brings out some paintings all red. The soil, the sky and carcasses all seem to be blood soaked. She points towards toys made out of damp soil. These resemble AK47s, INSAS and pistols. She stressess upon the need to wipe these memories from their memory. She has arranged for schooling of these children. The primary and middle school children have joined hindi medium schools. Whereas Durga Soyam, Santosh Soyam, Rakesh Soyam, Kuldeep Soyam and Sapna Katam have been shown into the Khalsa Public School nearby. These students have been adopted by members of Lions Club Pinnacle. Principal of the School, Sardar Sardul Singh says, Charter President Vibha bhutani,  President
Manju Surana, treasurer Sandhya Agrawal, Suchitra Chalsani, Madhuri Ratnani, Amita Saraswat, Sonal Mehta, Arti Taunk, Sarita Rathore, Simran Bedi, Anjali Jain, Anita Agrawal, Namrata Chane and others have made it a point to not only arrange for their tution fees, books, stationery and uniform but also spend time with them, celebrating something or the other.
Moved by the plight of these kids Akhauri Atul Shrivastava, Kanchan Shukla, Prachi, Aditi, Srishti, Mithun, Rishi Singh, Nishant Thakur, Abhishek and others spent a day with them on the eve of Independence day. They also presented them with sports materials.