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Asha Internal Report - No. 6 Society Undertaking Poor People's Onus for Rehabilitation (SUPPORT), Mumbai Report prepared by Shanmuga Gist: About SUPPORT - Visit to Dadar Center - Asha's involvement - Suggestions for future - Contact Information - A poem dedicated to street children. About SUPPORT : SUPPORT, Society for Undertaking Poor People's Onus for Rehabilitation, is a young go-getting, no-nonsense voluntary organization fighting on the streets to prevent Drug Abuse and AIDS. It began its work in 1985, creating awareness on drug abuse and AIDS with children of the higher strata of society. In 1989, SUPPORT moved its focus to the most vulnerable of our children, those who live on the streets, and a project was initiated at Victoria Terminus Station covering 300 street addicts. From 1993, SUPPORT has expanded its activities to Grant Road, Kamathipura, Dadar, Matunga and Mahim areas covering a wider range of street population including sex workers and eunuchs. A rehabilitation center has been opened for child addicts below 16. Its strategy is to work the most vulnerable among the street populace, the addicts, the runaway kids, the women, the youth and the pavement families. It works to organize them and give them a sense of identity and social belonging, provide them with medical help, detoxification, counselling, healthy recreation, education and vocational training in order to rehabilitate them and make them able to rely on themselves. Its Vision is 'We working towards a drug free society where all children have access to education, recreation and a healthy environment.' Its Mission is 'To reduce the amount of
drug abuse and HIV incidence among streetchildren, homeless
youth, commercial sex workers and pavement families.' My visit to SUPPORT on Jan 6th 2000 was accidental. This section records my impressions without apriori knowledge of SUPPORT or Asha's involvement. Rajashri Bansiwar of VOICE (Voluntary Organization in Community Enterprise) had advised me to visit their Dadar vocational training center. By the time I arrived at the center, around 5pm, it was already closed (I was returning from my visit to Abacus). But I entered unknowingly the center of SUPPORT. One of the volunteer at the center requested me to look around a bit before leaving. The center itself ws one open concrete room, resembling a small garage, under the Dadar flyover. Some kids were sitting around chatting and few more were just coming in. I started talking to the kids and just then a lady entered the room; She introduced herself as Nilima, center-in-charge and after going over some chores with other volunteers joined me for a discussion, paraphrased below. A couple of boys about 15 years old sat near us quitely observing our discussion. Shanmuga : Is the address Gala
No.14, under Kavi Kusum Das flyover, Dadar(west) for VOICE
or SUPPORT center ? Nilima couldn't give me much details about number of children and finances.She requested me to contact Sujatha Ganega, Director of SUPPORT or Tejasri, coordinator of the center. At this time one of two boys who was sitting with us left to join the other kids. Many more boys had come into the center by now and were getting busy with their notebooks. Nilima suggested that I talk to the other boy and introduced me to him. He introduced himself and we talked for a while. Below is a summary. Narayan : My name is
Narayan. I am 19 years old and work with SUPPORT in this center.
I was living in the streets before. Narayan quickly picked up his notebook and with great concentration wrote down his name. He took almost a minute to write it. I appreciated his neat handwriting and also showed him how using the same alphabets he can write other words like Nana, Yaar,etc. He was pleasantly surprised and noted these down. We continued our discussion. Shanmuga: Do you think your leaving home
was a right decision ? Do you regret it ? We heard some loud laughs from a gathering further inside. I joined in to see what was going on. The screen printing class had started. About 25 boys were standing in a queue to get their chance. They were making visiting cards. Each boy made about 5 cards and then joined at the back of the line to get the next chance. The instructor was very encouraging and corrected the boys gently if they made a mistake. One of the prints they were making was visiting cards for Sujatha. I picked one for myself. I wished Narayan good luck and started to leave . Nilima thanked me for the visit and reminded me to talk to Sujatha and try to help out. Closer to the entrance some younger children were still at work with the notebooks. It was a haphazardly seated bunch on the floor talking, laughing, helping and being helped. A few minutes later these children would walk out of this room, into their home, the streets of Bombay. The market outside was in full swing; bright lights flashing from the shops; people buying fruits, flowers, T-Shirts,etc.from roadside sellers. I noticed there were many other galas like that of VOICE and SUPPORT under the flyover. Two others that struck me were Shelter Don Bosco - An Open house for street children(Gala No.7) and Upang Maitri. I tried calling Sujatha without luck and couldnt meet her as I left Mumbai early next morning. Asha's involvement : Asha-Seattle and People for Progress in India(PPI),Seattle
are both involved in a pilot project for vocational training with
SUPPORT, each contributing $4000. Suggestions for future: Long term involvement with SUPPORT following the completion of current pilot project can be explored. For this we need to know more details about their current outreach, long term strategies and overall financial position. Future volunteer visits to SUPPORT can focus on a discussion with Sujatha Ganega about SUPPORT's future plans and also visit to rehabilitation center, visits on the streets with field workers. SUPPORT has started relatively early(1985) in its work against drug abuse. Their accrued experience will be valuable to learn from - in dealing with the drug menace. Dialogue in this direction should be initiated with the longtime workers of SUPPORT. A detailed survey of the galas under the Dadar flyover would be very informative. Deserving groups amongst these can be chosen for involvement. |
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