|
|
|
October 12, 2006
For the love of mankind
When the Austrians set up the first SOS village in Lahore in the mid `70s, Souriya Anwar had prophesied with conviction that very soon a stage would come when “we will commit to our own local sponsorship in every way.” And even though Europe is where SOS International has their major fundraising and promotion organisations, Pakistan is the only country in the world that totally self finances its SOS villages, writes Nyla Daud
“The SOS … What does it mean to me…Why, it’s my life! From day one, I have known that it would be a life long commitment. And no, there has never been any question of a back-track. You just cannot go into something like this and leave it in the lurch.” The sudden turn in the conversation from the days when, as a young bride with her doctor husband she had set up house in the Canadian colony of Warsak, to the commitment that is her life, makes Souriya Anwar sit up.
Sitting back is not for Souriya Anwar –– literally or figuratively –– who, at 70 plus has more reason than one to stand tall; the résumé on the table being but one brief, modest glimpse into a life spent in the service of others. And how! A committed social worker for over 40 years, Anwar was providentially placed in a landscape where education ––– she’s a Ruchi Ram Gold Medalist (1948) for a first position in Intermediate, with a Bachelors degree from Kinnaird ––– marriage and social life completed her circle of life.
“Social interaction is very essential and Anwar and I have had a very busy social life, having made some very good friends along the way. At the same time I made time for others as well.” There’s a long drawn pause and then, she adds almost thoughtfully, “Coffee parties never really interested me.” So, barring the occasional mahjong session in the early years, she steered clear of the coffee party circuit as “the crime of sheer indulgence in talking about nothing,” was not her cup of tea.
Thus, having in the very beginning of her adult life given up the proprietary rights to what most females would call the luxury of ‘their own time’, Anwar, even as the typical young bride of the day with so much to do, devoted herself to productive causes. The self-confessed Good Samaritanism of a young girl, growing up in Mayo Gardens residential enclave of railway officials was in due course of time, to become a fruit of the loom branded insignia. So, although it would be a good number of years before SOS came into her life Souriya Anwar started off with the UCH Women’s Auxiliary, an organisation recruiting volunteers to improve hospital conditions.
Two years later it became her due as President of the International Women’s Club, to turn the socialising club into a service oriented group, which it steadfastly remains, to date. Along the road there have been other projects, each bringing its own brand of responsibility like office bearing for the Muscular Dystrophy Welfare Association, the Fatima Memorial Hospital, the Committee for Crimes Against Women, the Prison Reforms Commission, the Divisional Social Welfare Council, to a five-year tenure as a Justice of the Peace! The list is a never ending one.
“The will to do social work comes from within you.” True to form, Anwar, who quotes maternal aunt Saeeda Waheed as a role model, channelised that inherent will to productive perfection; a synergy that was to reach an acme in the international circuit of the SOS – the seed for an association with which the organisation was surreptitiously being planted in far off Katmandu sometimes in the `70s, courtesy sister Attiya Inayatullah who had suggested that the Austrian Representative of the SOS in Nepal visit Pakistan for a possible extension of the service to orphans here.
’I keep saying that it’s the whole team that the award should go to. SOS Pakistan and its phenomenal success is a multi-credit project. Which is one reason that I had initially committed myself to SOS International. I had the confidence that as Muslims with a duty towards orphans, people would be ready to go overboard in helping establish and sustain the project. Pakistanis have an unbelievable capacity for giving’
Edith Pohl went back home only to promptly write back to Anwar that if she were to take on the responsibility, SOS International would only be too willing to finance the venture! Pohl had, with obvious intention, touched the raw chord. What evolved therein was the celebrated will. “Even at that point in time I had known the magnitude of the project. I had also realised that once it got off ground, come what may, the project would have to be sustained. What I did not know then, was the speed at which we would be able to take the project forward.”
It is at this point that the word we becomes a part of the conversation! The change of pronoun only too suggestive of a signature Anwar conscience that refuses to accept laudatory compliments first person, for all that the world may say and believe about President SOS Pakistan. The signature we carries down to the recent nomination for a national Sitara-i-Imtiaz to be awarded to Anwar for outstanding service to social welfare.“I keep saying that it’s the whole team that the award should go to. Even SOS Pakistan and its phenomenal success is a multi-credit project. Which is one reason that I had initially committed myself to SOS International. I had the confidence that as Muslims with a duty towards orphans, people would be ready to go overboard in helping establish and sustain the project. Pakistanis have an unbelievable capacity for giving.” The courage of convictions paid off famously even as Anwar told the Austrian representative some 30 years back in time that this was a project “We would ultimately finance ourselves.”
Setting up the SOS project was like treading virgin ground in that its inception brought a fair degree of skepticism locally, in the initial stages, because people knew the state of affairs in orphanages. However, events proved all dissidents wrong just as surely and as strongly as Anwar had earlier declared, “I will show you we can do it.” Today she can sit back and laugh over the many years SOS kept on offering a salary, just in case their chosen local representative lost interest along the way! “In a project like this, motivation is strengthened by the involvement and when you get to see the difference you are making.”
So when the Austrians set up the first SOS village in Lahore in the mid `70s, Souriya Anwar had prophesied with conviction that very soon a stage would come when “we will commit to our own local sponsorship in every way.” And even though Europe is where SOS International has their major fund raising and promotion organisations, Pakistan is the only country in the world that totally self finances its SOS villages. “Pakistan is the diamond in our family,” said Secretary General SOS International in a recent statement. Of course, true to form, Anwar passes on the credit to the people of Pakistan, the public and the state, who have all, in their own ways, been instrumental in writing this success story.
However, even today, with its phenomenal track record in a country which faces so much negative publicity, neither the organisation nor SOS President Souriya Anwar can afford to put up their feet as there are two vital issues involved: the constant effort to engage in private and public support for the project and two, the sheer perseverance of living with the gruesome stories that some of the children carry in. Almost on a daily basis Anwar has listened to chronicles of human endurance in the face of hard heartedness and animal instinct.
“Yes,” she admits it is hard to take in all this misery and I have very often been disturbed and carried home a backlog of the depths human nature can descend to and the unfairness of children being exposed to sheer animal instincts. But I am a very positive person. I am saddened, very saddened but what keeps one going is that a difference can be made to these little lives. I don’t internalise the deals. I immediately look for solutions. It’s almost a reflex action.”
Yet she listens, simultaneously advising her team to listen as well. “I miss those initial years when I was able to be in more direct contact with the children. You were surrounded by children of all ages talking at the same time. Listening to them was the most enjoyable part because they are always looking for people to talk to. Then so much comes out when children get talking. Sometimes very important things come out…problems that have to be handled on an official basis.” Anwar’s daily routine those years could comprise anything from giving a patient ear to a child whose father had murdered his mother, to a child being slapped by a class mate, to dreams of owning colour pencils, to a quartet of siblings left in the lurch with no place to go to.
Currently constrained to remove herself slightly from the children, because of the spread of administrative activity by virtue of being sitting President SOS Pakistan, Anwar has watched SOS grow from one village to forty projects. Building the future of Pakistan in her own right, Souriya Anwar today, has little time to rue the constraints of the day when, as a young girl she had been discouraged from reading for a degree in architecture. “Or perhaps I had not been too serious about it!” she comments nonchalantly.
Whatever the case, there is definitely a sterling sanguinity of personality that makes her take heart from the perseverance of an optimistic will that is re-born almost on a daily basis, when the emotionally and physically fulfilling nature of the job asserts itself. Having stood steadfastly by the side of her doctor husband with his myriad professional and social involvements and also having raised two children, along with caring for an extended adopted family, it is this very sense of fulfillment that makes her state time and again, “With the kind of lifestyle people like me have, we can easily organise ourselves and give time for others.”
|
|
|
|
