Our responsibilities to our parents cannot be fulfilled by any old age homes!

“I just want to die peacefully” she said with her trembling voice. I quickly tried to cheer her up, like the way I always do, but she only repeated “I just want to die peacefully…!

I now intuited that there was something really disturbing her. I looked at her wrinkled face, and her eyes were moist. I slowly held her hands and asked what was wrong. She said “he abused me and is asking me to get out of here...” I soon realized that it’s the act of the bloody convener. This was not the first time that he has abused her and asked her to get out of that place. For heaven’s sake, he doesn't own that place! As you are reading this, the first thought that must have come to your mind was that a man is trying to send a lady out of his house. You are right to some extent, but he is not trying to kick her out of his house but out of an old aged home. This is the real story of an 88 year old aged granny and that man is only a bloody secretary of that place. Neither did he build that old age home, nor does he own that place.

In the modern world, old age homes have emerged as an unavoidable necessity. We Indians, who boast about our respect for elders, now consider these old aged homes as a boon in disguise. Most of the professionals have discovered old age homes as a practical solution to their biggest problem, i.e. the problem of taking care of their parents! Most of them forget the numerous sacrifices made by their parents to realize their dreams. The irony is that the grown up children consider their parents as a big burden. This is a sad and a very shameful trend. Elderly parents have to listen to all the abuse from their children at home, but what about someone does not have any children to look after. . They take these old age homes as their asylums only to go through the elder abuse from a local convener of the ashram??!!

The solace the parents get from their children cannot be provided by the luxurious facilities in old age homes. Old age homes are a lame excuse to the atrocities done by the children to their aged parents. The old age homes are not the way they present their rosy picture in front of us. It’s now not only a mere money making business but also a place where exploitation and elder abuse is jsomething which the elderly people of the old age homes needs to go through almost every single day!. Loads and loads of money is usually given as a donation to these old age homes (Sometimes just to try to make up their flaws) and where does all the money go... Simply into the pockets of the cold secretary who claims to be a gem of a person! (Bullshhiiittt!!)

On one of my visit to this particular old age home, I was taken aback when i saw an old age home inmate, who should be in his early seventy’s washing the car of that rogue secretary.. He abuses the old people there because they voiced their opinion regarding the stale food they provided there!( mind you, they do not stay there for free, rather they pay 5.5K every month, where a small glass of milk is charged fifteen rupees whereas the entire packet of milk comes for 14.50 rupees!!) and to add to this, there is no receipt provided! The list doesn't end here. They are either forced to vacate the place forever and get on the roads or are forced to shift to the 2nd floor all by themselves just because he wants to mint more money by getting new inmates to the floor below for a higher monthly fee. He expects the 76, 88, 74, 82 year old grannies to climb up the stairs and get down the stairs for four times a day and when they request him to send their food to the second floor, all he says is "if you want food then have to you come to the floor below otherwise you are free to die for the good!"  

I was shaken on hearing this! May be because I had this naive expectation that humanity still exists. I got shocked by the violation. I mean where is our culture heading to? Why are we forgetting that our responsibilities to our parents cannot be fulfilled by any old age homes!