Shas­tri Boodan

Free­lance Con­trib­u­tor

Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar says the break­down of fam­i­ly life has led to moral de­cay and un­prece­dent­ed lev­els of crime and vi­o­lence. As such, she is call­ing on par­ents/guardians to en­sure fam­i­lies be­come safe spaces and havens for the coun­try’s chil­dren.

She made the point as she de­liv­ered the fea­ture ad­dress at Di­vali Na­gar cel­e­bra­tions in Ch­agua­nas on Sat­ur­day night.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said par­ents must con­front the chal­lenges cre­at­ed by the en­vi­ron­ment in which their chil­dren live.

Cit­ing an ex­am­ple, she said dig­i­tal tech­nol­o­gy has con­sid­er­ably re­duced the time par­ents spend with chil­dren, thus giv­ing par­ents less time to im­part val­ues.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said, “The temp­ta­tion of drug abuse, cou­pled with peer pres­sure and bul­ly­ing, re­quires us to be vig­i­lant and present in the lives of our chil­dren. As par­ents and guardians, we must all make a con­scious ef­fort to be more in­volved in our chil­dren’s lives. To­day, the world is a cru­el and harsh place and there­fore the fam­i­ly must be our chil­dren’s safe space and haven.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said homes must be­come cen­tres for learn­ing and ar­eas where moral and spir­i­tu­al val­ues can be nur­tured.

“Places where we can com­fort­ably ex­press our­selves, our thoughts and our feel­ings to all of us. The most im­por­tant things in our lives are our chil­dren and their wel­fare.”

She said dai­ly, more and more chil­dren are be­com­ing vic­tims of heinous crimes.

“The break­down in so­ci­ety has seen blood­shed be­com­ing more and more per­va­sive in cir­cum­stances sur­round­ing the home. How­ev­er, we must find the courage and de­ter­mi­na­tion to pick up the pieces and awake from the slum­ber which seems to have be­fall­en our na­tion on crit­i­cal is­sues af­fect­ing the most valu­able in our so­ci­ety.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar paid trib­ute to De­ok­ien­anan Shar­ma, the for­mer head of the Na­tion­al Coun­cil for In­di­an Cul­ture, who died ear­li­er this year. She said Shar­ma spent decades work­ing to­wards the up­lift­ment of the cul­tur­al and so­cial ta­pes­try of T&T.