Lost Spring (Anee Jung) — NCERT Solutions

Saheb is scrounging in the garbage dumps for things of value—sometimes even a rupee or a ten-rupee note. He is in Seemapuri on the outskirts of Delhi, and he has come from Dhaka in Bangladesh, where storms destroyed his family’s fields and homes.

The author says that children go barefoot because of poverty and also because of custom/tradition. Some have never owned a pair of shoes, some mothers do not bring them down from the shelf, and some children throw them off even when they get them. The author also feels that the excuse of tradition may hide a perpetual state of poverty.

Saheb is not happy working at the tea stall. Earlier he carried his own plastic bag, but now he carries a steel canister that belongs to the tea-shop owner. The narrator says his carefree look has gone, and the canister seems heavier because he is no longer free: “Saheb is no longer his own master.”

The text says that Firozabad is famous for its bangles. It is described as the centre of India’s glass-blowing industry, where families have spent generations making bangles.

The chapter says children work in glass furnaces with high temperatures, in dingy cells without air and light. It also says the dust from polishing glass can make workers go blind, and many lose their eyesight before adulthood. These are the main hazards mentioned.

Mukesh is restless and hopeful. He says, “I will be a motor mechanic,” and wants to learn to drive a car and go to a garage. Unlike his family, who believe it is their karam or destiny to make bangles, Mukesh wants to break away from the family’s inherited occupation and be his own master.

The chapter shows that people leave villages when fields are destroyed by storms, when there is no grain, and when they need food and survival. Cities attract them because they hope to find some means of living, even if life there is hard.

Yes, the promises are rarely kept. The narrator promises Saheb a school, but later feels embarrassed because building a school takes time and the promise was not serious. Such promises happen because poor children are often given easy assurances by adults who do not act on them; the children then live in a world where promises are hollow and cannot change their condition.

The workers are trapped by a vicious circle: poverty, the stigma of caste, and the control of sahukars, middlemen, policemen, bureaucrats and politicians. They are exploited, fear the police, and have no leader or cooperation to help them break free. The system keeps them tied to bangle-making and poverty.

Mukesh can realise his dream if he gets education, skill training, and a chance to work in a garage as he plans. He must be allowed to escape the pressure of inherited occupation, and society should support him so that he can become a motor mechanic and remain his own master.

The chapter mentions that workers in the glass bangle industry labour in high temperatures, in dingy cells without air and light, and are exposed to glass dust that damages their eyes. Many lose their eyesight before adulthood.

Child labour should be eliminated because it deprives children of schooling, health and a normal childhood and keeps them trapped in exploitation. It can be stopped by sending children to school, enforcing laws strictly, and creating social awareness so that families and society do not accept exploitation as normal.