Kailash Satyarthi: How to make peace? Get angry
2014 Nobel Peace Prize winner Kailash Satyarthi is a tireless activist fighting to protect the rights of voiceless children everywhere. Full bio
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leaving the school
could not afford textbooks
of a desperate slave father
about to be sold to a brothel
in a pool of blood,
we were taught anger is bad.
and suppress our anger.
for the larger good of society?
the evils of the world?
came to my mind out of anger.
in a locked-up, tiny prison.
of how I got a name for myself.
of Mahatma Gandhi since my childhood.
India's freedom movement.
the most vulnerable sections,
with dignity and respect.
birth centenary in 1969 --
many of you might know,
are born in the lowest segment of caste.
to go to the temples,
and shops of high-caste people.
the leaders of my town
the caste system and untouchability
let us set an example
cooked and served
so-called untouchable, people,
but it was unthinkable for them.
It never happened."
they are against untouchability.
we can set an example."
and invited political leaders.
agreed to come.
We can set an example.
three women and two men,
the best of their clothes.
hundreds of times
for them to do.
that the leaders become late,
and went to these leaders' homes,
perhaps he cannot come."
"Okay, you go, he will definitely join."
will take place,
a newly built Mahatma Gandhi Park.
Mahatma Gandhi's statue.
rather exhausted.
the food was lying.
of an untouchable woman.
"Kailash, why are you crying?
cooked by untouchables,
high-caste elderly people
elderly women were crying
to these elderly people
to outcaste my whole family.
is the biggest social punishment
and the punishment was purification.
away from my hometown
for priests, 101 priests,
kitchen and my own dining room,
they wanted to outcaste me.
the entire caste system.
the beginning would have been
family names are caste names.
a new name to myself: Satyarthi,
of my transformative anger.
a children's rights activist?
and lives of millions.
uncontrollable form of energy
and making society better.
when I was caught in the prison:
a dozen children from slavery,
when I free a child.
to come back to my hometown, Delhi,
were arriving;
tiny shell, like an animal.
and biggest ideas was born.
children, and 50 more will join,
was the first time
or anywhere in the world,
for child-labor-free rugs.
we have been successful.
in a fall in child labor
consumer's power, or consumer's campaign
and other industries,
maybe shoes -- it has gone beyond.
education is for every child,
and help the poorest children.
campaign for education
the whole thinking towards education
to the human rights mode,
the reduction of out-of-school children
to be sold to a brothel,
of raid and rescue,
that it is not one or 10 or 20,
to physically liberate 83,000 child slaves
back to their families and mothers.
against child labor
a new international convention
who are in the worst forms.
the number of child laborers globally
in the last 15 years.
Which I tried to do.
be vanished, can never be destroyed.
be translated and harnessed
a more just and equitable world?
for a few seconds:
the narrow shells of egos,
hatred, violence, revenge, destruction.
into a great power.
by using our inherent compassion
compassion to make this world better.
transformed into it.
again, as a Nobel Laureate,
into idea and action.
you've been an inspiration to others.
and that is the truth,
that he will ever come back to his mother,
can ever come back and sit in her lap,
rolls down on her cheek,
this is my biggest inspiration.
as I said before, but thousands of times,
in the faces of those children
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Kailash Satyarthi - Children’s rights activist2014 Nobel Peace Prize winner Kailash Satyarthi is a tireless activist fighting to protect the rights of voiceless children everywhere.
Why you should listen
Kailash’s work has involved organizing almost weekly raid, rescue and recovery missions on workplaces that employ and enslave children. Since 2001, Satyarthi’s has risked his own life to rescue these children and has convinced families in more than 300 Indian villages to avoid sending their children to work, and instead putting them in school.
Satyarthi’s has also managed to grab and retain the world’s attention on the problem. He organized the Global March Against Child Labor in the 1990s to raise awareness and free millions of children shackled in various forms of modern slavery. His activism was also instrumental in the adoption of Convention No. 182 by the International Labour Organization, a statue that's become a guideline for many governments on child labor.
In 2014, he and Malala Yousafzai were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for “their struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education.”
Kailash Satyarthi | Speaker | TED.com