(When I walk in the village, your shadow walks with me mother)

People at Dilli Haat stop in their way to listen as 12-year-old Jasbeer Kaur sings the song. Jasbeer has come to Delhi from Kalbanjara village in Punjab with her two younger brothers. Their father committed suicide in 2002 because he was unable to pay back the local moneylender’s loan.

Their mother left home soon afterwards never to return. Now they are barely surviving with their grandmother. This is just one example out of thousands in the Sangrur district of Punjab, where parents, one or both, have committed suicide owing to failed crop and humiliation of ever-increasing debts. The children were left behind to fend for themselves with no means of earning and a huge debt.

Navdanya, an NGO that runs a bio-diversity conservation programme, has brought 12 such kids from six different villages of Sangrur to Delhi to highlight their plight. They visited the Dilli Haat on Wednesday and will take out a march from Mandi House to Krishi Bhawan on Thursday.

Though Jasbeer, being the eldest among the three, understands the magnitude of the tragedy that has struck them, a smile never leaves her face. Her younger brothers, Gurpreet and Jagtaar, do not remember much about their parents. “We like playing cricket. We play at school whenever we get time,” says an excited Gurpreet while Jagtaar is busy teasing other children. It is their first trip out of Punjab and they are happy thinking about that only.

With almost no means of survival and an acutely depressed 80-year-old grandmother in the name of family, these children have learnt to live in the present. When asked about her future plans, Jasbeer says, “I would like to have a job when I grow up. But that’s far. Right now, I just want to study as much as I can.”

These 12 children can easily be an inspiration for others. Despite all odds, none of them left school. Take for instance, Naresh Khan, who went to take an examination two days after his mother died. “I do not want to become a farmer. It is risky. I would rather study and have a steady job,” he says. And then there is Tharminder. His father killed himself in December 2007. “We have a debt of around Rs 2.5 lakh. My father could not even pay back the interest. Strangers used to come to our house and abuse us. They even threatened us many times. Then my father killed himself,”says Tharminder. Here he is now, just a few weeks later, hoping to turn the tables around.

Thousands of such children in Sangrur now live on the mercy of neighbours or contribution from various NGOs. When asked about their hobbies, none of them could come up with an answer. The struggle for survival takes up all their time.

But 13-year-old Salma, who has lost both her parents and lives with her brother and aunt, says, “I liked watching TV earlier. I used to watch serials. Then we had to sell it to return the loan. It was followed by our house. Now sometimes, we don’t even have enough to eat.” Ironically, Woh rehne waali mehlon kii was her favourite serial.