NGOs in Delhi are helping street kids develop their creative faculties by publishing their stories and articles in newspapers and books. By Arjita Mishra
We have always seen street children selling flowers, stationery, toys, dusting cars on roads, rag-picking or begging. By looking at them we always feel the incapabiluty to do something substabtial for them. But, the NGO’s in Delhi are actually going oen step ahead to help those in need.
Tara Boys and Chetna are the NGOs which are working to save the future of street children by encouraging them in literary work. “We want these children (street children) to live a respectful life as we do and therefore I started this initiative where these children can get education and start writing,” said Sanjay Gupta who runs Chetna NGO. This NGO used to publish a tabloid newspaper called Balaknama since 2003 in every two months where street children used to bring their stories which got published in it.
“There are two kinds of reporters where there is a group who reports as well as writes the stories and then there are also Batuni reporters who just used to bring the stories and narrate it to the writer who writes it,” said Gupta.
The most interesting part of it is that this newspaper is not only criculated in Delhi but also in Agra, Mathura and Gwalior and the newspaper has also got an international fame. Gupta also told us that right now, the newspaper is being published in Hindi but, they have organised five volunteers who are teaching English to the children and soon they will encourage them to write in English as well.
To encourage children for this work, the NGO ensures each and every child that they will bear all the expense of their education. They just not stop here but, they also give rewards of Rs200 to Rs250 to the new children who join the NGO for their encouragement.
An author from the UK, Katie Waldegrave helped and encouraged the street children to learn English and then write their thoughts.
Recently, Waldegrave launched a book titled, Chocolate Biscuit Stories by Tara Boys where the articles written by these children got published. She encouraged children, living in an NGO, to write their thoughts and imagination. As part of their training, Waldegrave engaged the children in different exercises, before they started writing the book. The aim of the project was to keep the things simple so they just structured their work and let their imaginations flow. It took eight to nine months for the author to train the kids.
Kailash Satyarthi, founder of Bachpan Bachao Andolan told us, “We are working towards the empowermnet of street children. But, I strongly oppose anything that restricts a child from recieving a good quality education.