Does a child have the right to have a father?

Mrutyuanjai Mishra
05 May 2014, 06:20 PM IST

Let me get straight to the point. I have just returned after having met Daniel Dencik, a Swedish film producer living and working in Copenhagen, who has written a very touching book. No one who is a father and who loves his children will be able to read the novel "Anden Person Ental" (Second person singular) without shedding a few tears.

It is a novel, a supposedly fictional work, but based totally on his own true story. Simply put, it is a Swedish father's story of being grinded and caught in a system whereby he is denied the right to see his two daughters for two consecutive years. He had to write this book to tell his children that he still loves them, even though he did not get to see them. The false charges of violence and incest against him are dropped. But even though they were dropped, he was not able to get access to his children. One wonders, where do some men gather courage and survive without getting a nervous breakdown. There are thousands if not hundreds of thousands of men in a similar situation in Western countries.

A few years ago, The Telegraph reported that tens of thousands of children lose contact with their fathers in the prevailing court system in UK. Every third child whose parents divorced or separated lost contact permanently with their fathers. So Sweden is not alone in this business. But Sweden is one of the worst in these matters, explains Dencik to his audience.

In India, lots of things are wrong, but there are fewer divorces and fewer break-ups where the result is endless war for custody over the children. I earnestly hope that for God´s sake we do not copy this inhuman way of ending a love life. There are subtler, gentler and more spiritual ways to part if that is what is best for the children.

Let me make my point more clear here. Life in the West is often glorified and made to glitter in India. But one forgets that there is a gap between what is projected in the media and what actually happens when immigrants eventually confront those societies where they have to spend a sizeable amount of time. It is better to state facts as they are rather than base things on fiction or romantic beliefs.

Daniel Dencik sits very quietly and presents his novel in a small lecture hall attached to a bookshop in Copenhagen. Thiemers Magazin, a literary venue, had arranged the lecture and I end up luckily getting the last place remaining in the hall.

He is not the only father, but thousands of fathers like him get falsely accused here in this part of the world, especially when mothers want to win the custody battle over children. Denmark is bad, but Sweden is worse, says Dencik. It is simply inhuman, one would conclude, when one realizes that he has been denied any right to see his daughters for two years. His book has been published by the largest publishing house of Denmark, Gyldendal. And he gently informs us that a film is now being made based on his novel.

"Not Without my Daughter" was the title of a book written by Betty Mahmoody nearly 25 years ago. It was a mother's story of her battle to get reunited with her daughter. Now we live in a topsy-turvy world where times have changed and it is fathers who are losing contact with their children.

Why is it that this book catches so much attention? It was mentioned to me first by a Danish journalist based in Tel Aviv, who on a visit to Copenhagen a few months ago invited me for a coffee. During our conversation she asked me if I had read this book. I had not read or even heard of it at that time.

This afternoon, I heard Daniel Dencik say: "I am going to change my nationality. I do not want to be a Swedish citizen. I will change it into Danish. It is an emotional decision"

I guess everyone who goes through a trauma needs some therapeutic action.

Fortunately, his book is well received and while he makes his point about how easily one gets caught up in a very inhuman system, he nevertheless makes sure that his audience and readers do not misunderstand his point. This is not a work against feminism. Many of the lawyers who fight against these fathers are men. Most of Dencik's listeners and sympathizers were Danish women. And a Danish female politician, Zenia Stampe, who is a Member of Parliament for one of the ruling parties in Denmark, wrote an article in Politiken, one of the leading Danish newspapers, recently, stating that fathers are almost always the losers in custody battles.

Similarly, another female lawyer and journalist, Mette Larsen, is writing a book on this subject. So there are as many women out here who are equally shocked when they witness the way men are discriminated and unfairly treated in a bureaucratic social system. One may criticize the Danes, but they nevertheless take the debate, says Dencik, and he is right. It is in Sweden that the actual debate is required, he emphasizes.

The book has not yet been translated into Swedish, even though this is a story which has unfolded in Sweden. Swedish people take huge pride when someone from their country sits on very high posts in the United Nations and lectures to the whole world to follow human rights standards. Would someone tell them for once in those big halls of the United Nations that a child has a right to have a father as well?