By Priyanka Khanna. Delhi, India, 02:31 PM IST

Children's faces, voices and visions for change came to the centre-stage with the India Social Forum (ISF) getting underway here Friday with all the expected fanfare and slogan-shouting.

'Do Not Exclude Children', 'Children Can Build Another World', 'Another World Is Possible When Every Child Has Every Right,' 'We All Are One' were some of the vehement calls of hundreds of children from across the country and determined tiny fists could be seen going up in the air across the sprawling grounds outside the Jawaharlal Nehru stadium.

Hundreds of children have congregated at the five-day-long event that is an open meeting place for reflective thinking, democratic debate of ideas and formulation of proposals.

The meet also encourages free exchange of experiences and inter-linking for effective action by groups and movements of civil society that are opposed to neo-liberalism and domination of the world by capitalism and any form of imperialism, and are committed to building a society centred on the human person.

ISF 2006 aims to further advance the movement against neo-liberal globalisation, sectarian politics, casteism, patriarchy and militarisation.

In kick-starting the planning for ISF a year ago, the organisers identified a forward-looking slogan for the mobilisation effort: 'Building Another World: Visions for the Future'. It made sense to enlist the interest and involvement of children and youth to contribute to a country forum that would pose the issue in terms of India.

As Prabir Purkayastha of World Social Forum (WSF)-India points out: 'Who else but today's children will live in the India we want, or the world we are striving to build?'

For the first time ever, the worldwide forum gives the issue of children a central place on the agenda. Of the 40 plenary conferences scheduled to be held at the forum, one of the five keynote sessions is on 'The Faces and Vision of Children.'

According to observers, this is a 'first' for the worldwide process, relating rights of children to the overall quest for another world.

The keynote plenary conference slated for Nov 11 will highlight the challenges of survival, protection, development and inclusion, recognising that any vision of 'another world' and another India based on equity and the people's own voice cannot afford to ignore their right to a fair deal today.

It also cannot ignore their right to a future in which their dignity and well-being are secure.

The key speakers are well-known social reformer Swami Agnivesh, Prabir Purkayastha of WSF, parliamentarian Jabir Husain. The panellists will be four children from different states and activists like Jaya Srivastava, Mira Shiva and Enakshi Ganguly Thukral.

Similarly, children's rights and entitlements are prominently profiled in panel conferences, seminars and workshops scheduled throughout the five days. Themes and topics stress on the impact of policies of market-oriented reforms and social sector cut-backs, and the fallout of globalisation on the economic and social security of the communities where most of the world's children struggle to live, including most of India.

Child activists have welcomed the active participation by children, NGOs, networks and child rights campaigners from across India who have come to ISF to grasp the opportunity.

According to UNICEF, like any disadvantaged group, children do need affirmative attention. Where adults somehow manage to withstand dire situations of want and denial for some time, children cannot. They die waiting for the severity of scarcities and deprivations to abate. Activists say that the telecast records of famines and disasters provide enough evidence of this.

To illustrate the less-reported stories of malnutrition, anaemia, chronic hunger, avoidable illnesses, and deaths in apparently non-crisis situations offer even more proof. Children cannot find their way around the everyday deprivation of basic care, basic health services, learning, development, shelter and protection. They succumb.

The WSF-India decision to recognise children's entitlements among its priority concerns for ISF 2006 is thus a clear-sighted move to question a particularly serious gap in the way many governments perceive their obligation to secure basic development standards for all their people.

If the five days in New Delhi do bring about this consciousness, it could be that the ISF would convey a message to the nation's planners and decision-makers as they set the seal on another Five Year Plan. It would be a good outcome to an assembly that is itself a manifestation of hope in positive possibility.

By Priyanka Khanna (Staff Writer, © IANS)