Nobel Peace prize: A victory for children

While awarding Kailash Satyarthi and Malala Yousafzai the Nobel Peace Prize for 2014,  the committee chairman Thorbjoern Jagland said that the committee regards it as an “important point for a Hindu and a Muslim, an Indian and a Pakistani, to join in a common struggle for education and extremism.”

But this statement humbly belies the real achievement of this year’s Nobel: It is a victory for children.

Children are never represented in politics or the 'actual' world. They are spoken for but their thoughts are never considered worth reporting. Their lack of experience makes it easy to dismiss their thoughts and opinions.

As children, because they have no franchise and aren’t an electoral category that can be wooed, they are not considered active agents of democracy. They are tiny humans being prepared for the ‘actual’ world, with the legitimacy of citizenship conferred on them once they turn 18.  As children they are vulnerable and marginalised.

Which is why Kailash Satyarthi’s and Malala Yousafzai’s recognition is a victory for children and child rights.

While Malala and Satyarthi both work towards better childhood and education for all, both belong to two different generations of activism and were moulded by very different circumstances. It is fitting that 60-year-old Satyarthi, as a leader of grass-root level movements and a representative of children and child rights, is honoured alongside 17-year-old Malala, a new-age activist who catapulted to fame in two years, aided by cyber-activism and the media. Most young people know Malala. To many Satyarthi’s name doesn’t ring a bell, and this is not surprising. Malala’s activism, though in its nascent stages, has been well-popularised and has attained celebrity status. But Satyarthi – follower of Gandhian ideals and founder of Bachpan Bachao Andalon, an organisation that rescues child labourers, rehabilitates them and fights for a better childhood  – has remarkable achievements to his credit, and has shaped laws and attitudes towards child labour.

Honouring Satyarthi and Malala together raises one’s expectations of what Malala should and can do in the future, and reminds us that there are icons like Satyarthi, whom young people need to look up to and learn from.

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