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www.newsguardian.co.uk
News Guardian, Thursday, October 28, 2010
How your money makes a difference to youngsters living rough in India
Forum helps keep children off the streets
Tegan Chapman, left, at the Forum for Street Children.
Our reporter TEGAN CHAPMAN has been in India to see how money sent there by the Rotary Club of Monkseaton Centenary to support good causes is spent. Here is the second of her reports. THERE are 20,000 street children living in and around Hyderabad and Secunderabad. Most earn a living picking rags to sell for recycling while on the verge of starvation – and they are the lucky ones. There are others who are caught and exploited by thieves and beggars. As a policeman, Pratap Singh would round up street children and take them to the district magistrate to be beaten and put in the company of older, hardened criminals, who would teach them to steal and cheat better. By law, that was what he had to do. On his retirement, he took up their cause and founded the Forum for Street Children to offer a safe haven where these children could be nourished back to health and given food, clothing, edu-
cation and healthcare. Each boy has faced trauma – from ill treatment, to years of abuse at the hands of alcoholic parents. The children run away and end up on the streets and become rag-pickers in the hope that the occupation will earn them their next meal. These children have escaped poverty and broken homes in search of a better life, ending up on the streets of Hyderabad and Secunderabad. Touched by the appalling condition of these street boys, homeless and devoid of parental care and affection, Pratap got together with Madhava Reddy and started the shelter in 1988. Based in Secunderabad, the forum gives 45 young boys aged eight to 14 a chance to escape the dangers of the streets.
The boys are taught to be orderly, honest and disciplined, but are also given love and affection, something they are desperately in need of. Mangalagiri Gautam, who now runs the centre, said: “The mentality of street children is not like that of ordinary kids. They need to be given the freedom to roam the streets and spend their money as they like. “Some boys run away from the shelter, but it is not healthy to put them under lock and key. “We give them what they need, and mostly they choose to stay. “The main aim of the forum is to educate these children. All our boys go
to school, and we have a computer lab with computers that have been donated to us. “We receive no financial assistance from the central or state governments, and we have no regular income, grants or foreign aid. We rely solely on donations. “Our dream is to be able to restore these children to their parents, ensure they are well looked after and to make sure they are trained so they can be useful citizens. “The goal is to increase our intake and help even more young boys. “I find it remarkable that people in the UK support our work and send us
money to help these young boys. Without it, we wouldn’t exist, so I would say thank you to them.” The Rotary Club of Monkseaton Centenary has been involved with the Forum for Street Children for just over five years, dedicating two weeks each year to fundraising for the charity. That money has paid for clothing and healthcare for 45 boys each year. For the last two years, the club has also been able to help towards the costs of educating the boys. In the future, it plans to send two volunteer teachers to Hyderabad each year for a month to teach English and economics to the former street children.