By Rahul Thomas | Coordinator - Donors
Sahaara believes that every person has a dream, and our work centers around ensuring that marginalized persons are able to articulate and work towards achieving their dream. Children in observation homes are one of the most marginalized populations in Mumbai.
The children who live in these Homes come from different states of India and are educated in a Marathi medium school run by the Home. The language difference makes it difficult for them to learn. Remedial education helps in coaching the children in the Marathi language as well as their school subjects thereby helping them understand what they are learning and maintaining their interest to continue education once discharged from the Home.
Sahaara staff procures addresses of discharged children from the home authorities. The social workers then traverse through labyrinthine gullies of Mumbai slums searching for the children’s residences. Through such home visits, networking with local schools, facilitating assistance in books and materials, the child is facilitated entry into formal education paving the way to a bright future.
Bharali found the meaning of being Good.
Bharali was born in the year 2007 in Pune.
She has a sibling sister who is elder to her. The family faced various problems primarily due to the fact that her father got married to another woman and abandoned the family.In order to overcome the economic crisis that hit in the family, Bharali’s mother began to work in a beauty parlour in order to support the family.
Since her working hours were erratic and long, Bharali’s mother felt that it was safer for the children to be admitted to a home. As the result, Bharali and her sister were admitted to the BKN Home in the year 2013, under the provision of Child Welfare Committee for care protection.
Sahaara conducts coaching classes for the girls in this Home in order to help them to develop strong academic foundations. Bharali enrolled in the coaching classes when she was studying in the second grade, while her sister was in the fifth grade.
The Sahaara staff found Bharali to have a very short attention span and as a consequence, she was easily distracted and found it very difficult to sit in one place and hence distracted others too. She frequently lied and used abusive language as she communicated with the other girls in the home.These struggles led her down the pathway of neglecting her studies and she also began to neglect her personal hygiene.
The staff took an initiative of counselling Bharali and enquired about her deviant behavior, wherein Bharali replied to the staff that she did those things just to protect herself from others. In anger she uses abusive words to other children when they abuse her, after which she used to lie to the house mother in order that she may escape punishment. The staff understood the problem and encouraged Bharali not to use abusive words anymore and practice to be clean and tidy, even if the other person is using abusive words and showed her other ways to deal with bad language.
Bharali took the advices and started practicing it. The teacher noticed her improving gradually and showing more interest in her studies. They found she got rid of the deviant behavior which she used to be and now she is clean and tidy to the regular classes. Bharali is in 3rd std and doing well in her studies.
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