Giving is good but not without a snese of responsibilty

Most of the times when you were passing through a crowded road, you might have seen beggars sitting at the road side or on a hand-pulled wooden cart, wearing dirty clothes, having scars and ulcers of various scales of severity, often covered by clothes and sometimes by a medical bandage, on their bodies. What instantly comes in your mind when you watch such people, most of the times they are leprosy affected people, begging at public places?

1. remorse/pity
2. aversion/hate
3. negative ideas about our society/government  
4. feel need to act something  

If you feel sorry about them and their suffering then most probably you put a coin (or a currency) in their bowl with sympathy. According to one of the Surveys (conducted by Development Insights for Sustainable Action), majority of common people express their sympathy towards them and donate without giving a heed to what would eventually happen to their donations? This is the reason why most of the beggars and leprosy affected people can be seen at religious places, especially, in the countries like India. However such feelings and donations can not bring a change in their lives, on sustainable basis, as they encourage their being vulnerable, poor and  worthy of showing mercy.

                                        However, if you feel aversion then it would be reflected in your zesters. You might hate begging, or their being dirty or sometimes your may respond in a mixed way-half aversion and half fear (of infection of leprosy). You would, most probably, try to keep distance from them and even would avoid looking towards such people. A sizable portion of population in our society reacts in this way. Again, many people feel sorry about the conditions of such people however they do not prefer to donate or take action to bring betterment in lives of affected people. Instead they feel and often express anger on society or on government for the poor condition of beggars or leprosy affected people. Such people also form a sizable portion of our population.

                                       There is a forth category of people, however few in number, who bother to go beyond the current misery of beggars and affected people. They often feel the emotional trauma, the pain of exclusion, through which an affected people might have gone through. They don’t feel leprosy affected people as ‘different people’, instead, they accept them as some one from ‘ourselves’. Such people, often think about changing the fate of leprosy affected people and sometimes take actions either individually or in a group to bring betterment in the lives of later.