All the President's Children has been a CNN-IBN property for a long time. We first did it with President APJ Abdul Kalam in 2007. When the idea was proposed to President Pratibha Patil this year, there was a lot of excitement at the Rashtrapati Bhawan. One thing that President Patil insisted upon was we invite children from across India, from all the strata of society and that we put a particular emphasis on the female children.
So in a show that lasted for more than two hours, the children had a great time with the President. Of course, the girls outshone the boys as far as the questions to the President were concerned! Since a few children were also connected via satellite, questions came in from all kinds of places. From Bijnor, Manipur, down South to Kashmir. Children were curious about President Patil's experiences inside a battle tank, a naval warship or while flying a Sukhoi.
Many of the children were from the weaker sections of the society and had their own tells to share with the President and other children. The intermixing was excellent as we saw students from better-off schools mingling with the kids from the less privileged backgrounds. There were at least two to three occasions when there were standing ovations. One that I remember was of a girl who was from a manual scavenger family and how proud she was to be there with the President. She told us how her schoolmates, who weren't very nice to her, were now envious of the fact that she was going to spend a great day with India's President at the Rashtrapati Bhawan.
Once the show was over, children gave gifts, cards, flags etc that they had brought for the President. I think everyone went back with a big smile on their faces. Many of the children even referred to President Patil as the grandmother-like figure.
Of course we would have loved if the show would have allowed to take a few political questions too - since they were many - but we kept that for another occasion since the show was all about the President's children.
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