‘Back Pack Heroes’: Bal Mitra Mandal’s child heroes become teachers for street children
It is generally said that extraordinary problems require extraordinary solutions. Bal Mitra Mandal (BMM), the flagship program of Kailash Satyarthi Children Foundation (KSCF) for urban slum children, has taken one such extraordinary initiative to educate street children begging in the slums of Pune. During this innovative initiative, the children of BMM will organize ‘Street Classes’ at red lights for the children of these slums and motivate them to enroll in the school.
The campaign titled ‘Back Pack Heroes’ started as a holiday initiative by BMM’s Bal Parishad during the summer vacations. These child leaders themselves are from the slums of Pune and they want to see the same change in the lives of these children as they have brought about in their lives and the hopes they are filled with today.
These child leaders will use their vacation time to spend time with slum children at red lights. During this, he will inform those children about the right to education and motivate them to go to school. These children have also arranged the necessary funds for the implementation of this unique idea of street classes and they plan to form a ‘Karuna Chakra’ to connect all the people on the street with this campaign.
Rakesh Sengar, Executive Director (Programs), KSCF, said that this innovative initiative will act as a catalyst towards helping and educating street child beggars, while also making these child leaders empathetic towards others. would be an important step. He said that this initiative will definitely lead to major changes and will help in creating an empathetic society that we are striving for. This will help these children develop sensitivity to the needs and problems of red light traffickers apart from learning the art of teaching in a unique way.
Under this initiative ten children accompanied by senior workers will visit ten places. There one child will teach while two children will help in explaining his words to other children. During this, they will also collect other information like the name, age and whether the children go to school or not.
Apart from teaching children maths, science and English through art, music and drama, these child leaders of BMM will also distribute pens, pencils, books and drawing sheets to the children.
BMM aims to secure the safety and development of urban slum children through sustainable, holistic and preventive measures. Bal Mitra Mandal, which as the name itself suggests is a child friendly community, is based on the concept of Bal Mitra Gram, KSCF’s flagship program in rural India.
BMM strives to empower children and their communities by protecting them from child labor and child sexual abuse, protecting their rights through democratic actions and collective efforts, and creating awareness about issues such as education, drinking water, sanitation, and livelihoods Is.
