Nobel Peace Prize winner Satyarthi celebrates Children's Day with slum kids

Nobel peace prize winner and child rights activist Kailash Satyarthi celebrated Children's Day with slum children in New Delhi.

The 60-year-old children's rights campaigner is recognised for his battle against child trafficking with Bachpan Bachao Andolan - or Save the Childhood Movement - a group he founded in 1980 after quitting his job as an electrical engineer.

Over many years, Satyarthi has taken his campaign to the streets of the country. In one operation this May, police rescued 63 children and arrested 23 suspected child traffickers at Old Delhi railway station, acting on a tipoff from Satyarthi.

On Children's Day, Satyarthi spent time with slum children and held long interaction with them. He also shared his experiences of rescuing children with them.

"We should learn to love and respect our children, learn to befriend and believe them. Loving children does not mean showing mercy on them, rather, loving them means to trust them and try to be friends with them. This is not the case for the poor children only but in certain well-off middle-class families also there are parents who do not have time for their own children. They don't have time to be friends with their child, sit with them and have long chat for hours," said Satyarthi.

"The first condition of being a friend with children is that we must feel the child hidden inside us. We must feel that there is a child still alive within us. Whenever we say the truth, one must discern that there is still a child inside us. Whenever we follow an honest path, one must understand that there is still a child in us. When we lead our life with simplicity, when we talk straight-forwardly in a candid manner then it is due to the same child which is still alive in us. What we tend to do with our gradual growing age is we keep on wiping out that innocence from us and start accepting mendacity, cleverness, exterior knowledge and get layered by these fake things from outside," he added.

Earlier in October this year, Satyarthi, and Pakistani activist Malala Yousafzai were jointly awarded the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize for "their struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education".

This is the first time that an Indian and Pakistani have shared the Nobel Peace Prize.