About the Story
I was driving down back home, accompanied by these 3 kids. I could clearly sense their excitement about sitting in a car. One among them shouted with a thumping voice “FM please”. I smiled gently and turned on the radio. As luck would have it, “Jai Ho” from Slumdog Millionaire, fell in their ears and tuned Vijay’s vocal chords. Innocent he was, said “Do you know this movie is based on children like me? I too have been part of similar incidents when I was at the railway station, as a rag picker.” My heart leapt out to him…
I was returning after spending a weekend with many such children at Umeed (aka Hope). It is a similar story for many homeless children in India who’ve made the streets their home. They roam about, fall prey to petty and organized crime, and thus spend long, lonely and brutal years in detention centers established under the Juvenile Justice Act, sometimes succumbing to depression, drugs or ailments like TB, and HIV. A few lucky ones like Vijay have found non custodial shelters like Umeed.
Background to Umeed
Post Godhra riots, a group of men and women came together to form a collective, Aman Biradari, that was deeply committed to constructing a collective and a series of initiatives that reflected their respect for equity and diversity and values of justice, egalitarian compassion and peace. One of its early initiatives was Dil Se (from the heart) campaign. Launched in 2005, it is a campaign of caring, to develop a scalable intervention model to uphold the dignity and inclusive rights of urban poor. Its early focus was specifically on children who were forced to make the streets their home, and who earned by picking rags, begging or other street based work. It aimed at extending comprehensive care to these children in voluntary open residential homes, including mainstream education, in close integration with children who have families.
Umeed is one such non-custodial residential home under the Dil Se Campaign aimed at providing unconditional shelter to the boys in their teens or beyond. The photo essay is on the lives of children at Umeed.
If you are interested in knowing more about Dil Se or Umeed, please write to me or you can visit the site. The site is a bit old and is in the process of being updated.
