SEEDS OF PEACE

Planting Seeds of Peace
A New York-based nonprofit works to help youth from conflict zones promote coexistence and reconciliation.

By Anjum Naim

“Tensions and conflicts generated by wrong historiography have burnt us. Our mission is to find the truth in multiple truths.” This statement by Mahak Mansoor, a third-year student at King Edward Medical University in Lahore, Pakistan, might sound quite grand. But this is what Seeds of Peace, a New York-based nonprofit, has been doing since it was formed in 1993—helping young people from regions of conflict broaden their perspectives and learn how to coexist.
Mahak, 21, was one of the five participants from Pakistan who came to New Delhi in July to interact with six Indian “Seeds” in a workshop based on the theme, “How history is taught in India and Pakistan; history of South Asia and feminist version of history.”
Seeds of Peace is an autonomous, apolitical organization started by American journalist John Wallach to help young people from conflict zones learn the skills of making peace. From 46 Israeli, Palestinian and Egyptian teenagers in 1993, the network now encompasses nearly 4,000 young people from the Middle East, South Asia, Cyprus and the Balkans. The organization now focuses on the Middle East and South Asia.
The South Asia program with Indian and Pakistani youth was launched in 2001 with support from the U.S. State Department. Participants from diverse economic and religious backgrounds meet at the annual Seeds of Peace International Camp in the northeastern U.S. state of Maine. Interactions continue over the Internet, through speaker series in both countries, cross-border visits, conferences and workshops that teach the Seeds how to engage their communities and spread the message of reconciliation.
“India and Pakistan have fought several wars and generally the people of the two countries are hostile towards each other, and one of the major reasons for this is the history taught on either side of the border, which creates division and mutual hatred. Therefore, it is essential to correct where they are wrong and where we are wrong,” says Huzaifa Furniturewala, a student at Mumbai’s D.Y. Patil College of Engineering. He felt that the New Delhi camp “bore encouraging results.”
Krishna Kumar, director of the National Council of Education Research and Training; Anil Sethi, who writes books on education; and Urvashi Butalia, who teaches at Delhi University and is the author of The Other Side of Silence: Voices from the Partition of India discussed history books taught in India and Pakistan with the Seeds. They also talked about the possibility of finding similarity between multiple truths with a view to presenting a history free from biases and distortions.
Besides trying to understand the history of India and Pakistan objectively, the Seeds visited New Delhi’s famous historical places. “It was not strange for me to visit the tomb of Hazrat Nizamuddin Aulia; the strange thing was that Faryana Pardiwala was with us and a sense of…respect for the place was radiant on her face,” says Sana Zulfikar from Lahore.
Seeds of Peace works with the U.S. Consulates in India, representatives of city councils, community leaders, teachers and school administrators to choose participants. They are selected on the basis of an essay competition and interview. In some countries the participants are chosen by the ministries of education.
Each year, the three-week international camp on the shores of Pleasant Lake in Otisfield, Maine welcomes nearly 350 Afghan, American, Egyptian, Indian, Israeli, Jordanian, Pakistani and Palestinian participants. The youngsters live and play sports together and share meals. The daily coexistence sessions led by professional facilitators form the core of the summer program where the Seeds discuss contentious issues, share painful memories and confront their differences. The goal is to help the Seeds communicate effectively and understand perspectives that, for many, were once beyond comprehension.
“We exist in order to roll up our sleeves and get our hands dirty and make real peace in the real world. That is not an easy thing. We do not plant a tree and call it ‘Peace.’ We do not sing a song and join hands and call it ‘Peace’…,” Wallach said while accepting the International Advocate for Peace Award on behalf of Seeds of Peace in New York in 2002. “No, we believe that making peace is very hard and that making peace requires co-existence. Not necessarily liking one another, but agreeing to co-exist.”
The Seeds later visit each other’s countries for a week under a home-stay program. This gives them a chance to interact with the families and friends of their hosts. “When I first went to Pakistan in 2005 to participate in a week-long camp, I had an utterly misinformed opinion about girls in Pakistan,” says Teju Jhaveri, a student at the department of fine arts, University of Mumbai. She expected Pakistani girls to be very conservative, clad in hijabs, with no voice of their own. But “they were very much like me, I shared both their pain and ecstasy,” she says. “Seeds of Peace really showed us the power of friendship to change the conflict of thinking.”
The idea for Seeds of Peace came to Wallach after the 1993 terrorist bombing of the World Trade Center in New York City. “I was still a journalist and it was February 1993, and I asked myself a very simple question: What are the terrorists trying to do? The answer was very simple. They were trying to instill fear,” Wallach said in his peace award speech. “Was there something that could be done to counter this? It seemed to me that what we had to do was to come up with something that would inspire hope. If terrorists are trying to instill fear, if we inspire hope by mobilizing the majority, we could make a dent in achieving greater justice in the world.”
At a dinner party in Washington, D.C., attended by Israeli, Egyptian and Palestinian leaders, Wallach stood up and asked whether they were willing to send 15 youngsters each to a summer camp in Maine. The aim was to dispel fear, mistrust and prejudice through dialogue. The next day, Wallach announced at a news conference that all three countries had agreed.
The first Seeds were guests of President Bill Clinton at the signing of the 1993 Oslo Accords between Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization Yasser Arafat on the White House lawn.
Initially launched with financial assistance from Wallach’s friends, Seeds of Peace attracted support from various quarters as it expanded its reach. The U.S. State Department supports the South Asia program while USAID funds a significant portion of the Middle East program. Other funding partners include Carlson Wagonlit Travel, oil and gas company Exxon Mobil Corporation, and luxury home builder Toll Brothers.
Wallach died in 2002 and the organization is currently headed by Executive Director Leslie Lewin. It has regional offices in Amman, Cairo, Gaza, Jerusalem, Kabul, Lahore, Mumbai, Ramallah, Tel Aviv and Washington.
Besides its international programs, Seeds of Peace runs a domestic program called Maine Seeds to address ethnic and racial tensions between communities settled in Maine and a cultural exchange program between American and Arab youths. But the focus remains on bridging differences in traditional regions of conflict.
When Sana Zulfikar was passing by the well at the tomb of Hazrat Nizamuddin Aulia with Faryana Pardiwala in New Delhi, she remembered what an Israeli Seed had said at the international camp: “Teachers at my school asked us to say the first word that crosses our mind when we hear the word ‘Palestinian.’ Some said terrorists. Some said neighbours. I said ‘friends.”

MOBILE THEATRE

A Mobile Theatre
Anjum Naim

The scorching sun is still overhead, but evening hullabaloos and hustle bustle at capacious Gandhi Maidan, situated in the heart of Patna, the capital of Bihar (India) have already started. Worn and played outs, political activists, entertainment lovers, jugglers and hawkers have settled in their choicest places. In a corner, there is a group comprising 15-20 children. It is a corner-play troupe, which is performing a play on the theme “Girls are not burden.” Two senior members of the troupe are supplementing the overall effect with their musical instruments like tom-tom and harmonium. The banner hanging behind is identifying them as: “MOBILE THEATRE – Children with their own voice.” The presentation gets completed within 45 minutes. The spectators applauded giving them a big hand and in a few moments, the crowd vanished. The troupe is busy rolling up their goods and chattels. “There is a programme in Rajendra Nagar, too. Sometimes we perform many a times throughout a single day”, says Ashok Aditya, general secretary of an NGO, “Mobile Theatre” which was established in 1993 with the objectives to ensure that backwards, lesser privileged and victims of sexual abuse get respected places in the society. He says, “Corner-play is the most efficacious medium to bring a change in the society.” Perhaps it is his life-long real experience.

How far these corner-plays have been successful in bringing a positive change in the society, is altogether a different subject of study. But in a country like India, where almost one third of the total population comprises teenagers, a greater chunk of them belong to families below the poverty line. They are compelled by none other than their parents themselves to earn two square meals a day for them and their family. And they, under the compulsions of time and circumstances, become a rotten part of the society. Those who earn less or spend their earnings are beaten mercilessly. That is why; they often return to their homes and stay back at pavements or platforms. Ashok Aditya says, “Passing their nights at pavements and platforms, these children, both boys and girls – often become the victims of sexual violence.” Such street children can be seen in slum clusters in every city and metropolitans. A recent survey by Mobile Theatre shows that more than 5000 slum-dweller street children are residing in Patna alone. Sheer poverty pushed them to road-side motels, dhabas and tea-stalls or they are working as child labours. There is a lot of rag picker children who work hard even in extreme temperatures and earn hardly 40-50 rupees per day. Since they have money,they often become drug addicts.
First of all, the Mobile Theatre focused on rag picker children. According to a full-time worker of the Mobile Theatre, “Hundred such rag picker children were brought together. They were brought round to assemble at Mobile Theatre Centre in the evening after getting their rubbish sold in the noon. At the centre, they will not only be given music, dance and drama training, they will also learn reading and writing. The experiment stood successful and the number of participant children augmented.” But the work was not easy and smooth. Many parents used to raise a hue and cry at the centre that their bread-earners were being exploited. But when they realized that their children are being trained to earn their livelihood in a better way, the ice melted and they started cooperating. Bridge-course were arranged to send the drop-outs and those interested in getting education, to schools. A few intelligent children were admitted to Bimla Vidyalaya, a missionary residential school situated at Bakhtiarpur, 40 km away from Patna. Ashok Aditya says, “Father Sibistein, the school Principal helped very much. He promised that only 50% of the expenses will be charged from the children sent up by the centre, with free accommodation facilities.” Many children have returned back after completing their school-level education and still a group of five children is studying there.” Pointing out to a Dalit girl, Reena who was working earlier as a maid help, he says very confidently, “Today when I see this girl, who used to earn her livelihood as a domestic help, working on computers, it seems the prevalent conditions will change for sure.” In 1995, Ashok Aditya alongwith three Mus’har children Anjana Prakash, Mamta and Pramod, the toppers of first batch at Missionary School, participated in an international conference held at Lux de fank in Switzerland, on the invitation of Terre des hommes, an organisation working for abandoned and abused children. The traveling expenses were borne by the organization itself. The 4-member troupe presented a number of shows in different cities and received training, working with other NGOs, on child issues. One of the participants, Pramod, who is, presently, working in a screen-printing press and provides training in screen printing to children at the Mobile Theatre Centre, in his spare time, says, “ This global exposure not only instill in me a sense of severity of children’s issues but also gave me a goal of life which I consider my identity.”

Switzerland’s visit was beneficial both in terms of experience and facilities to work smoothly. Mobile Theatre, hitherto survived with the local support and cooperation. Now, for the first time, Terre des hommes granted a fund for the project, “Education through cultural and recreational activity among street and slum children”. Thereafter, UNICEF in 2000 and Literacy Centre of the Rotary Club of Arizona, Pioria, in 2002, approved a grant of $15000 for ‘Back to School’ project. In the beginning of 2002, Anjana Bhanti, President of Mobile Theatre had been to America where she presented her project before the authorities of Rotary Club. President of Pioria Rotary Club, Martha Herm along with her 3-member delegation visited India the same year. Appreciating the functions and modus-operandi of Mobile Theatre, she approved the aforesaid grant for the project. According to Ashok Aditya, the vocational training and educational activities currently in vogue at the centre receive grant from the Public Relations Section of the American Embassy and this support has promoted the Center’s activities considerably.

According to a recent study conducted by the Ministry for Women and Child Development, every two of three children are physically abused. These children include girls too in a large proportion. Ashok Aditya says, “A large number of sexually abused children live on platforms and pavements. Their sexual exploitation created a dreadful problem – “An all-embracing situation for AIDS.” The children, both boys and girls, who earn their livelihood by sweeping rail –compartments or singing and playing musical instruments, have neither any place to keep their earnings nor do they have any purpose to save for. Thus, they concentrate on delicious foods, drugs and mutual cohabitation. Sooner or later they fall prey to traffickers in women and children. They are transferred from one place to another. Many of them develop AIDS and start transferring HIV infections to others continuously. Ashok Aditya says, “Keeping in view the dreadful situation, we ought to infuse our entire energy to look after such children who are not only destroying themselves but aiding AIDS to spread.”

Fifteen children out of these 100, who were picked up, initially from platforms of different railway stations of Patna, were provided with formal vocational training at the centre and now many of them are engaged in screen-printing and fabric painting. Most encouraging aspect is, these rootless siplings want nothing but a bit of love, affection, sympathy and your generous attitude,” says Aditya.