| Publication |
2013.
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| Summary/Abstract |
A Child is born. Its birth represents the duplication of human species.
It becomes a festive occasion of excitement and joy for the parents,
family members and people in the neighborhood. They pray for the
health, happiness and well-being of the new born in the words of
Shuklayajurveda:
'May you live for one hundred years
May you see one hundred autumns in their resplendent glory
May you listen to the whisper of the falling leaves of one hundred
autumns
May you minstrel to humanity
In the language of one hundred autumns'
But the fervour and joy are short-lived. No sooner the baby is out
of the protective warmth of the womb of the mother, it is subjected to a
series of vicissitudes. To start with, there is the incidence of low birth
weight (42.5 PC of children below 5 years in India are underweight
while 69 PC of such children are anaemic) compounded by vulnerability
to series of infections (diarrhoea, dysentery, whooping cough, tetanus,
measles, diphtheria, TB, pleurisy, bronchitis, bronchial asthma and so
on). As the child learns to begin with the first step in the long journey
of life, it falters and falls. Every moment of its evolution and growth
also becomes a moment of accidents which cause injury and, therefore,
anxiety and concern. The pangs of death invade the scene as
unpredictably as the joy of birth.
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