Like Daughter, Like Mother
When it was just time for Amara to start going to school, three years ago, the Pandemic struck and the world was at a stand still. “Now what?” her parents wondered, thinking that their dreams for a good education for their daughter had been sabotaged right at the start.
It was in that turbulent time that our Community Case Counsellor identified Amara’s family in the slum, and asked her mother about their plans for Amara’s schooling. Our CCC and Amara’s mother got talking about the importance of age appropriate education and she quickly agreed to enrol Amara in our classes. Unlike many other parents in their slum community, Amara’s parents didn’t refuse the idea of early childhood education, because that’s exactly what they had hoped for for their daughter too.
Amara’s father works in catering and is the sole breadwinner of their family. However, his work is erratic. If there are orders, he gets paid for the day. If not, the family must live off their meagre savings from his earlier work days. This leads to high instability in their home.
Amara’s mother Naina is a homemaker. The family of four lives in a slum community north of Mumbai. The only way to enter their community is over a pile of garbage heaped high enough for pigs to make their home in. Through their slum, runs a creek choked with garbage, overflowing at its seams. As this is an unauthorised slum community, municipal services such as garbage clearance, sanitation, electricity and water don’t exist here. The community must fend entirely for themselves. For this community of 5000+ homes, there are only two sets of public toilets. Most resort to open defecation.
Amara’s family is more stable than most others in this slum though. While their neighbours live in tin-sheet homes, Amara’s home is built pukka. It’s their only security though, as the pandemic had wiped them clean of any financial stability. It was in the pandemic days of deep lack that Amara’s baby sister Adira was born. Their finances were stretched further thin, and worry was their constant companion. Without work available for Amara’s father during the pandemic, they had very little to live on.
Vision Rescue’s provision of groceries for the family, every single month of the pandemic for two whole years, made their burden lighter. This was possible only because of the generous donations from Vision Rescue supporters like you.
During the pandemic, Amara joined our online Beacon Learning Centre (BLC) nursery, and today she’s in our Junior KG, enjoyed face-to-face classes. Her sister Adira is now almost 3 years old and in another year will join us for some learning and preparation before she hops into formal school too. Amara’s journey in education has taken flight and there is no stopping this little girl!
While Amara learnt the basics of reading, writing, songs and poems in our BLC, her mother Naina too got actively involved in the programs we conducted in their slum community. There she learnt about health, hygiene, dental care and savings. Even though her second child was still so small she made it a point to attend our Focus Group Meetings once in a month and continues to do so with the support and cooperation of her husband.
Attending these meetings over the last year has empowered Naina to do something for herself and her family by contributing financially. She has now taken up a course in tailoring conducted by Vision Rescue’s Skill Development & Livelihood team in the same vicinity. So, while Amara is in our classes, her mother sets off for our tailoring lessons.
We are so impressed at how Naina took ownership for her decision to do the vocational course and crossed all the obstacles that came her way. It doesn’t even stop her that she has to take her second daughter along with her for the class. How wonderful to see the intergenerational transformation taking place in this family already!
Amara is enjoying school and has many friends, who she loves to help. She is regular, studies well and on her way back home takes a nutrient-filled tiffin, provided every single weekday by Vision Rescue, which she shares with her sister. What a joy it is to see Amara come to school every morning in a neat and tidy uniform, with her personal hygiene taken care of! Changes in cleanliness and hygiene in the home has also been observed during the Case Counsellors visits. For a slum community with no external sanitation aid, these baby steps of progress in personal and family hygiene are monumental. It is through your donations and support that we are able to continually conduct awareness programs on health and hygiene to empower our families.
Little Arama says she wants to grow up and be a soldier someday. As our founder Biju Thampy always says, “We can’t take the children out of the slums, but we can take the slum out of their minds.” Watching Amara and her mother dream big dreams, is witness to us that this mother and daughter duo are heading towards better days.
We hope that while we enrol Amara in formal school next year, her mother Naina too can move a step ahead and start using the tailoring skills she has learnt and contribute to the family’s income. Our teams will follow-up with the family regularly so that both their daughters may continue to be engaged and sustained in education. Because of your interventions, this family can live with dignity and think progressively for the future of their children.
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Vision Rescue exists to rescue children from all forms of exploitation by engaging and sustaining them in education. We are a registered NGO for child education under the Bombay Public Trust Act 1950.
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