India
Growing up in Western Rajasthan, Govind Singh Rathore, founder of Sambhali Trust observed countless instances of inequality between men and women and injustice in his home community. Women are often powerless in the male-dominated Rajasthani society. Although they play a key role in establishing and raising a family, they are denied basic rights such as decision-making, education, health-care and family planning options. They lack confidence and basic socialising skills and are often subjected to physical and emotional abuse that they are powerless to prevent or even object to happening.
In January 2007, Sambhali Trust was founded with the intent helping to empower those women from the underprivileged communities in order to promote a sense of independence and self-worth and to lessen the gap between genders and castes. There are now many projects that Sambhali Trust is running, but the two main projects that volunteers can get involved with are: Jodhpur Empowerment of Women and Girls Project, Setrawa village project, Literacy project and Sheerni Micro-Credit Project.
Located on 5 acres of land in Errampatti Village, 20km northwest of Madurai, SHALOM HOME will provide facilities for the care of up to 50 orphaned or at risk children from nearby slum and village areas. Construction of Stage One, to accommodate the current group of 12 boys, commenced in January 2009. Stage One consists of a multi-purpose building for sleeping, dining and after school studies plus kitchen and bathroom buildings. Other project activities include planting crops and establishing dairy farming activities to generate income to help cover the home’s running costs. SHALOM HOME will also provide a venue for health education and training programs to assist people from the surrounding village areas.
Australia Project Partners – Geoff and Karen Hales
Indian Project Partners - World Kingdom Fresh Fire Ministries
SJCM Centre is located in Cuddalore, a coastal city in Southern India which was devastated by 2004 Asian Tsunami. The Centre operates as an orphanage, housing 115 children and a school of approximately 400 children which caters for preschool through to matriculation. The project involves the purchase of land to expand the orphanage and to provide an area for crops, hens and cows for food production.
Home of Hope In Bangalore was started by a former Tuk Tuk driver T Raja. He began by picking up sick & dying people from the streets of Bangalore & taking them to his home to care for them. Presently the Home of Hope provides emergency relief and care for 280 patients in a small building they have purchased. These people are the poorest of the poor. Many people are healed physically and emotionally during their time at the HOH. The home has a policy of not turning anyone away who needs their help. 300 people are feed three meals per day with minimal facilities The Local Council has sold them some land. This is to build a new facility to house around 1,000 people.
They now do not need to scour the streets to find the homeless and vulnerable. The Police from 52 stations deliver destitute people off the streets to the Home of Hope for care. The needs here are immense. The HOH is truly providing physical and holistic care for these people who are unable to afford or find alternative care.
Leper Care Program
There are so many lepers in the streets in the coastal city of Kakinada begging. This project provides emergency care & relief for around 300 lepers and their families who are in need of food and medical attention. They have been ostracised from their community with little food, little health care, no education and very poor homes. They are given two meals a week and help to change their bandages. The vision is to continue to feed these people & care for them. The strategy is to send a team of helpers with some wound dressers each week to feed and dress the wounds of the lepers. Once a month a special "banquet" meal is prepared for them which is nicer than the standard one.
Micro Enterprise Sewing Program
The same people who run the leper care program give regular sewing training programmes to very poor Hindu women. The course runs for nine months and women who graduate get a treadle sewing machine. This programme sets women up to earn a small income and care for their families. The stories of hardship told by these women who enter the program are tragic and this is their only hope for a better life. These courses reach the poorest of the poor – women who have one set of clothes and only some basic cooking utensils that they call their own. This is a very cost effective project that is relatively easily established and managed.
There are Centres in Kerala, Goa, Tamil Nadu and the projects include J315.J316, J324 and others. Essentialy each project is for the Dalits and Other Backwards Castes.
Dalits are systematically abused. Dalits and Other Backward Castes (OBC) are poor, deprived and socially backward. Their most basic needs of food, shelter, and safety are not fulfilled. They also cannot access decent education and employment. The systematic denial of their basic human rights results in a lack of education, food, healthcare, and economic opportunity, thereby keeping Dalits in perpetual bondage to the upper castes.
Gospel for Asia (GFA) has long recognised the need to reach these people groups with love and compassion, and assist them in seeing the fulfilment of their desires for freedom of religious choice, social justice, and upliftment from their oppression be realised. Gospel for Asia plans to carry out this work by using skilled national workers who have undertaken a three year training course at one of the 54 training facilities GFA has throughout India and neighbouring countries. They will focus on the disadvantaged or hard-to-reach groups such as those residing in the rural areas, slums and leper colonies.
The aim of the project is to build the capacity of the poor in the local community to sustain, determine and fund their own future. It will therefore address their immediate needs of:
- access to business start up capital
- business training,
- skills development and mentorship;
- life skills training;
- community development;
- advocacy for the poor; and
- anti-corruption education to business, government and community.
As at August 2009 there were 1,400 women in the program.
Jacob's Well hopes to break the poverty cycle by sinking fresh water wells in villages, establishing health and resource centres and providing life changing education for children from tribal villages and the slums.
www.jacobswell.org.au
This project seeks to provide support for children and families at risk aiming to assist them in acquiring the necessary skills to become self reliant and productive members of the community.
A small project to relieve poverty by providing education to promising young adults.
Heart for India works in several Provinces and is involved in a number of activities including:
- Rescue of at risk children
- Schools and children’s homes,
- Relief from natural disasters,
- Assisting people to attain a better lifestyle e.g. purchasing a micro business such as cycle rickshaw.
- Other ventures include purchasing sewing machines for tailoring.
Project Manager: Heather Sell/Graham Hill
Current projects are:
- Street children program – providing them with food, shelter and education
- Widows pension – providing food, clothes and financial assistance
- Relief work – providing food packets to people living in slums. Also providing skill training for the unemployed
- Education – the William Carey International School has enrolled the pupils without any boundaries of religion, caste, creed or sex.
- Micro enterprise – providing skill trainings to those who had no hope of providing for their family and teaching them job skills which fit their circumstances.
Project Manager: Thomas Vataparambil
This project takes care of ‘The Promised Land’, a complex of living units and school on 90 acres. It has a primary school and 3 hostels which started with 12 kids and has grown to house 2,000 children. Its objectives are to:
- Provide education, basic food, clothing, social developments and accommodation improvements. This will seek to give them life skills to assist with lifting them out of extreme poverty
- Provide sustenance funding for 700 boys in the Australian Turner Boys Hostel
- Provide additional teachers at the Graham Staines Memorial School which is a school with 1,300 students and an average class size of 60 students per teacher. The aim here is to reduce the class size and improve the education of the students.
This project of hostel and school in India is currently in the process of building a 500 bed girls hostel with fully integrated classrooms starting from grade 1 through to grade 12. The girls come from an ethnic tribal group that view girls as a curse on the family, particularly if the girl happens to be the first-born. They have no future in their social system, and many are still being killed at birth. The next option for the girls is to be sold into slavery. There is an excellent team of dedicated teachers who train the girls in all facets of life.
Project Manager: New Life Christian Church-Craig Tomkinson
The centre is located on the outskirts of a small village called Sevattur, a few kilometres outside the larger town of Tirupattur. Disadvantaged people such as the elderly, widows and orphans struggle to survive on a day to day basis. Its objectives are:
- To enable the children to receive education and have a purpose for life
- To help orphans and widows become socially and economically self reliant
Project Manager: Lincoln Haynes
The objective of Jaysingpur Project is to establish a Community-Education Centre in the city of Jaysingpur to provide much needed community and education services to the people of the region.
The community services that will be provided by the centre will include:
- English Literacy and language courses
- Counselling
- Financial services and planning
- Parenting programs
- Early childhood education
- Employment preparation.
Project Manager: Bron Dickson - Global Outreach
ICD provide integrated development projects to India including:
- Self help groups
- Hostels for disadvantaged adolescent males
- Worker training
- Women’s empowerment
- Legal aid
- Health education
- Rehabilitation
The New Life India project is an amazing project which seeks to be fully self sustainable. The project will provide jobs for the underprivileged in the community and obtain an income to fund care and education for disadvantaged and orphan children.
The aim of this community development project will be: To provide a home for up to 20 orphan/semi orphan children or children whose parents are invalid or have a terminal sickness. This could be long or short term care and will depend on the family circumstances. These children will be educated in practical trades and skills to influence and contribute to the development of their own communities.
- Home for aged care up to 10 men and women.
- Medical centres with qualified nursing sisters to service and educate the whole village,
- To provide water to the village people through our bore as they have limited supply.
- Vegetation and farming education and provide resources to help it become self sustainable.
SIEM have established ‘MERCI Children's Home’ in Dec '06 and currently have 22 children being cared for with another 40 children waiting to be taken into a second Merci Home. We are rescuing orphans from the abuse of child labour.
Most of these children are orphans from surrounding rural remote villages. These orphans may only be around 4-12yrs old but have known huge responsibility never meant to be given to children. They go to work to support themselves and their siblings. They are considered a nuisance and have no hope of ever gaining an education.
