Umeed Home, Delhi.
Photo © Mohit Gupta, All Rights Reserved

My sincere thanks to Aman Biradari for giving me a chance to live with these children. I hope this essay will help them in whatever little way its possible. The essay was recently published by Photo Philanthropy

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. It was sheer coincidence that 98.3 was playing “Jai Ho” (from the movie Slumdog Millionaire) which tuned Vijay’s vocal chords. An innocent assertion followed ” Bhaiyya, Do you know this movie is based on children like me. I too have been part of similar incidents while I was living in 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’s a similar story for many homeless children in India who’ve made streets their home. They roam about, fall prey to petty and organized crime. What follows is even worse, they spend long, lonely and brutal years in detention centers established under the Juvenile Justice Act (JJ Act), sometimes succumbing to depression, drugs or ailments like TB, and HIV. A few lucky ones like Vijay find non custodial shelters like 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.

The Dil Se Campaign was launched in June 2005, with the objective of developing a scaleable intervention model that upholds the dignity and inclusive rights of the urban poor, specifically for children who live and work on the streets. “Dil Se Campaign” is about building capacity in all sectors of society to help ensure that the most vulnerable urban street children have nutritious food, protection, health care, and proper education.

Believing that the state is primarily responsible for our most vulnerable citizens, the campaign has tried to avoid major reliance on short-term projects. Advocacy at policy level towards ensuring state budget allocations, and active involvement of concerned government departments like education, health, welfare etc. and grassroots mobilization among the local communities amidst whom these children live, and among themselves as well, have been the two pronged strategy of this team towards making long-term sustainable model of care, affection, rights and well being for these children. Under this initiative five homes impacting over 500 children directly and another 1000 children indirectly are being currently run in buildings allocated by the Government of Delhi and Hyderabad. 10 more such homes would come into existence by the end of this year.

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.