Six years ago Dilkush’s family moved in Mumbai from one of India’s poorest states – Bihar. Like thousands of other impoverished migrants in Mumbai, they too settled in a slum community in one of Mumbai’s poorest Wards, hoping to find some means to keep themselves alive.
Today, they are a family of seven, and they live in a one-room hutment made of tin sheets in their slum. They sleep on the floor, draw electricity from an illegal source like most of their neighbours and are at the mercy of the local goons for their daily supply of water, but at least they own the roof above their head.
Dilkush’s father never had the opportunity for education, but he’s determined to change the narrative for his next generation. He works hard as a daily-wage tempo driver but his income is wiped clean just covering the bare necessities for his wife and five children. They could only afford to educate their older two children at the local municipality school.
For six-year-old Dilkush, and his brothers Raj and Rajiv, it is your gifts that stepped in to fulfill their father’s dreams. They are first-generation learners today only because your support welcomed them into our Beacon Learning Centre inside their slum community a year and a half ago. For the first time in their lives, the children got the chance to read and write!
Your donations also gifted the children a hearty, nutritious meal every single weekday, backpacks, shoes, rain gear, all their education materials, dental workups, health assessments and timely vaccinations. Dilkush is gearing up to join formal school in the new academic year, and his brothers will graduate into our junior kindergarten next year.
Dilkush dreams of becoming a policeman when he grows up, and he’s determined to stick with his schooling come what may!
His father thanks you for reaching out with love into their loves, and making his dreams for his children’s education come true!
