I hate the word 'kids', Amole Gupte says

Amole Gupte, who was in Hyderabad recently, talks about working with children, his actor son Partho and more
You have worked with a lot of children in your previous films. How did you get interested in working with children in the first place?
I grew up in a society in Mumbai which had 188 flats and on the whole, there were nearly 700 children in our locality.Those were not the days of ���hum do hamare do���. Almost every house had at least five to six kids and I remember that when I was really young, my neighbours would leave their new born baby with me. And then, my parents were working. So I had the responsibility to look after my younger brother. It���s a tragedy that children today have no space to play. More than the interest of working or observing children, I���m more concerned about the injustice meted out to them. I���m just a chronicler of all that.
So are you trying to recreate that magic of your childhood days, now that you are the father of a 13-year-old son?
You cannot dictate terms to your children. That���s like living in a fool���s paradise. You always have to learn from your child. You must also understand that your kids don���t want you as their friend. I would rather build a healthy relationship. I am intrigued with the idea that a child can remember 400 names of characters in Pokemon, but ask him how many states there are in India and he wouldn���t be able to answer. There���s something wrong with the education system, because kids are not really allowed to ask questions in schools.
Your son, Partho, has already won a National Award. Apart from his acting, what else surprises you about him?
Partho tags along with me every weekend when I go to municipal schools to organise workshops on cinema and theatre. As a result, he has already been exposed to a lot of world cinema and the great masters from all over the world. To my surprise, I see him interpret all these films not just as an actor, but also as a filmmaker. He makes a lot of short films and he���s also a photographer, guitarist, and a vocalist. Surprisingly, he���s learning all this by himself through the Internet and I can���t even figure out some of that stuff (laughs).
Does working with children give you a lot of creative freedom? Why do most people have wrong notions about working with them?
I hate the word ���kids���. People don���t really respect children and you lose so much by not giving them that respect. You need to have some patience to work with them and you will get whatever you want when you are selfish enough to enjoy every bit of it. I am not doing them a favour by working with them. Children just imitate what the directors tell them and most often, the fault lies with the adults.
Your upcoming film Hawaa Hawaai is based on skating. Any particular reason you chose that topic?
Partho was four years old when he started skating and I used to go along with him for these practice sessions. So, the idea had been brewing in my mind for a long time and I felt the time was right to make the film now. If I had delayed it by another year, he would have grown a moustache (smiles).
Were there any interesting incidents while making the film?
Of course! When you have nearly 500 children, full of spunk, it���s bound to be exciting.We got a lot of national and state-level skating champions to act in the film and then, another group was from the municipal schools. Some of these kids have been with me for almost seven years and I treat them like my sons. They are from a disadvantaged section and I���m not Dhirubhai Ambani���s son to change their lives, but I can share cinema with them and help them find themselves as artistes. Cinema cannot be made sitting inside four walls. You have to go out.