ANNUAL REPORT (2007-2008)
SRI RAM GOBURDHUN CHARITABLE TRUST
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Director's Message
For a year that began placidly, 2007 turned out to be a very eventful and exciting one. April 2007 saw us well ensconced in our new centre, basking in what we felt was a comfortable pattern and not expecting any upheaval of sorts. How wrong we were. This year turned out to be one of the most eventful years of Project Why!
In May 2007 a crises, an encounter and a series of unpredictable events led us to seriously think about the need of setting up a women residential centre. On October 15th our women and children centre was set up in Madanpur Khader and within the span of few weeks it was throbbing with life: A precursor of Planet Why our distant dream.
Not so distant as we were soon to learn.
In January 2008 another set of unforeseeable events made the impossible, possible. A promise made then recanted left us with the indomitable task of raising a whopping figure to purchase a piece of land for which we had paid an advance. This was to seed Planet Why that would one day make our work self sustaining and autonomous.
March 2008 saw us very close to seeing the dawn of this project.
But this is only the beginning of a long journey if we truly want to see Project Why live beyond individual efforts. The dream will only become realit y when Planet Why – a guesthouse and residential care centre – will be built and operational.
For me personally it is a rite of passage, as it sees what began as a simple effort to repay a debt I owed, become a structured and somewhat impersonal entity. But all things must change and grow if they are to live.
Once you find your feet, you need to find your wings!
Project Why is all set to learn to fly!
Anouradha Goburdhun Bakshi
New Delhi, May 2008
OVERVIEW
The Sri Ram Goburdhun Charitable Trust using the name Project Why? is a non-governmental not-for-profit organisation engaged in education support and life-skills enhancement. The projects current focus is primarily on the slum and basti children of South Delhi. ProjectWhy began as a spontaneous reaction to help an unfortunate few, and has grown organically over eight years to become an extraordinary life-line that offers many children hope instead of despondency.
The initial few were kids born into the slums of South Delhi, but they were the unluckiest of the unlucky; born with special needs into a place where even able children stand little chance. ProjectWhy created both classes and teachers from resources in the slums and they quickly became full. So more had to be done, more money found, more teachers trained, more class-rooms formed from the rubble. Today ProjectWhy teaches 600 kids, provides employment to more than 30 local staff.
More than this, Project Why comes to the aid of the communities desperate cases, those that have nowhere to go, and those who are in despair. This is Project Why's spirit: to do what it can where it's most wanted no matter what the circumstance.
Project Why's reach is limited by expenditure, which of course is limited by income. It reactively spends what it receives and there has never been the possibility of a period of consolidation and saving – there are always desperate cases here. Hence this year saw the setting up of two new centres: a women and child centre in Manadpur Khader and foster care centre.
Project Why is a hand to mouth type of organisation; desperation connects the income received from donors with the investment in its resources.
RATIONALE AND OBJECTIVES
The year saw our education programme continue in what has by now become a well-set model. Our children once again performed extremely well, and our programme remained dynamic and flexible, something that we feel is in great part the reason of the success of our work and has become a well-established and tested model to replicate. Project Why's reach is limited by expenditure, which of course is limited by income. It reactively spends what it receives and there has never been the possibility of a period of consolidation and saving – there are always desperate cases here.
Our sustainability efforts had however to be reviewed and though the first half of the year saw us once again groping for ideas, we slowly but surely veered towards the idea of setting up Planet Why: it is Project Why's long-term investment in itself: a guest house dovetailed with a residential children centre. The income of the former would generate income to sustain project Why activities.
THE APPROACH
For our entire education programme our approach remained the same: a judicious combination of education and life skill activities. Required course corrections were made as and when needed without disturbing the on-going work.
During this financial year we had the following education programmes:
1 early education at Govindpuri (80 children)
1 prep class (20)
1 early education at Manav Kalyan camp (20 children)
4 primary extensions at Sanjay Colony, Govindpuri, Okhla and Madanpur Khader (150 children)
1 day care for children with special needs (20 children)
1 secondary programme (150 children)
1 computer centre
1 community outreach and awareness programme
1 women centre (110)
Our other activities included:
2 open-heart surgeries
2 other surgerieW
Nutrition for people with special needs (pregnant and lactating mothers, post operative cases)
Several awareness workshops
DETAILED ACTIVITIES
EDUCATIONAL ACTIVITIES
Overall Situation – infrastructure
The Special Section and the creche are now located in our own premises.Our Manav Kalyan creche remained unchanged (rented premise)
Our Prep Class that is just about a year off functions from a room across our main centre (rented)
One Tilak Khand centre was closed and moved to Sanjay Colony (rented premise)
Our Okhla (no rent as in reclaimed garbage dump) and Nehru Nagar primary (rented premise) centres remained unchanged<
A new primary centre was opened at the women centre in Madanpur Khader (rented premise)
The Senior Secondary section remained in Giri Nagar, as did the computer centre (rented premise)
The Junior Secondary is in a small rented room opposite our centre (rented premise)
The Women Centre is located in Madanpur Khader (rented premise)
Overall situation -staff
Our staff strength is around 40 as we had to get some new staff for the women centre.
Overall situation - content
As usual most of the time was spent on finishing curriculum and preparing for the far too numerous examinations that exist in the present education system.We however felt the need to add on environment programmes as well as introduce the children to civic responsibilities.
Mainstreaming children
This year we were successful in getting over 25 children admitted to regular schools. This is in keeping with the main objective of our organisation. In spite of existing Government policies claiming easy access to primary schools, the reality is often very different. Parents often become weary of the attitude and administrative demands and give up. It has been our constant effort to convince parents on the necessity of educating their children and thought its is a difficult battle we believe that even one family convinced is a step in the right direction.
Curriculum Support
Driven by the dual objective of containing and arresting school drop out rates and enhancing performance, our main stress was once more on our curriculum support programme. As in the past, the programme was flexible and adapted to the specific needs of the students.
Primary school intervention
This year our primary programmes ran well, and once again all our children passed their school examinations.We ran extensions in the following places:
Sanjay Colony, Nehru Nagar, Okhla and Madanpur Khader
Secondary school intervention
Our consistent results increased the number of students and we decided to separate the secondary into two sections (class VI to VIII and class IX to XII). Our teachers took extra classes enabling us to take students of the science and commerce streams.
Once again we had a 100% result.
Early intervention programme
Our early intervention programme has been a great success with new children replacing the 25 who got promoted to primary school.This section is particularly important as toddlers are still not part of the free education programme and do not get pre-school learning.Our decision to add a small prep class with a desk and chair format was taken to ensure that children will not feel lost when they enter class I.A small curriculum was evolved keeping in mind the requirements of class I.
Intervention for children with special needs
Here again we have achieved great success. Our programme aimed at making these children as independent as possible is showing promising results. This year also saw a more organized approach to our vocational activities.
We laid emphasis on vocational activities such as cooking, beauty skills and stitching.
One of our hearing impaired students completed her beauty training and is now gainfully employed in local beauty parlour.
Our teachers attended several workshops.
A physiotherapist visited the centre regularly.
Children went on an outing to Delhi Hath
OTHER ACTIVITIES
Women related activities:
Our women and children centre opened its gates on October 15th 2007. This centre has a dual purpose.
Its residential programme is based on a simple idea: find your feet and their your wings. It is open to women who have suffered major problems that has marginalised them (substance abuse, domestic violence, social abuse ) and offers them a refuge where they can heal and acquire skills to make them economically autonomous. The centre offers temporary and permanent shelter options.
Activities were also launched for local women: beauty skills, tailoring, adult literacy and English conversation.
Weekly women meetings are held and address a wide range of issues: gender equality, girl child, saving, insurance, health, hygiene etc
Life skills and problem solving
Like skills is according to us an intrinsic part of any self respecting education intervention programme.
We also began civics as a subject, where the emphasis was on defining duties and the role of the citizen.
Issues like water, environment and right to information were touched upon at all levels as it is felt that without such awareness education is incomplete.
Cyber WHY
Our computer programme ran smoothly. Internet and hardware classes continued with success.The inverter installed last year ensured that classes could go on uninterrupted.
Cyber Why is opened to all at a small fee to ensure maintenance cost. Our hope of making it an income generating activity did not however meet with the success we had hoped for.
Nutrition
This year the nutrition programme once again extended only to special cases on a need basis. This is because of shortage of funds.Some of the children in the special section and the creche are given regular lunches as their families do not give it to them
Recreational activities
Slum children are rarely taken out. However outings are expensive and they are only possible with the help of friends.
Thanks to Enfances Indiennes the following outings were organised:
- Okhla centre to the zoo
- Nehru camp to India gate and the Children'ss Park
- Special section to Delhi Haat
- Staff for a viewing of Taare Zameen Par as we felt it would sensitise them to the needs of children with learning difficulties.
CRISIS INTERVENTION
This past year a few the emergency situations were dealt with.
Open-heart surgeries
Shubham (11) and Mehajabi (1)
Anil who had been operated on and required more surgeries passed away.
Other medical intervention:
We sponsored the hip replacement surgery of N, an HIV+ person in need of help. She later joined our women centre.
Jhunnu was diagnosed with bipolar syndrome and had to be hospitalised for 4 weeks.
WHISTLE BLOWING
Last year Project Why had donned the new mantle of whistle blowers.
Our most rewarding moment had been the release of the orphan girls abused by their caretaker in the Ghaziabad Swami case. However we were all left with a sense of hopelessness, as we could get no news about the girls who were shifted to other orphanages and heard that the Swami was out on bail.
This made us review the wisdom of undertaking such efforts.
NETWORKING
This year again it was our endeavour to try and extend our interaction with other organisations.
SUSTAINABILITY
Sustainability has been a major concern of Project Why since its very inception as we are all aware of the extreme fragility of the project which is based on donations obtained almost on a day to day basis and requiring extensive efforts.
Our past sustainability efforts did not meet with any result. Hopes had been pitched on our rupee a day idea, but it failed to take off. This was because of the attitude of donors and the plethora of organisations some having doubtful antecedents. Moreover the success of a rupee a day depended on the motivation, commitment and initiative of the donor something we failed to raise.For a long time we have been trying to find the one idea that would meet all requirements of a sound sustainability programme.
PLANET WHY
The idea of Planet Why was seeded when one came across the Ninos Hotel in Cusco: a guest house for travellers the profits of which help sustain development activities in the area.The paucity of safe and low budget accommodation in Delhi and our need for a residential centre for the children we know have no future made us veer towards this idea. Much brainstorming convinced us of its viability and the idea was shared extensively.
Moreover the new trend worldwide of Tourism with a Heart or Volontourism made us confident of our ability to fill a small 10 room guest hosue.The main problem was to find land that would be suitable for a guesthouse. We located an area close to the airport but were well aware of the prohibitive costs of land in Delhi.
In January 2008 a potential donor came our way and promised us an interest free loan for the required 80 lacs to purchase the land. He let us believe that he would also be able to help us raise the building funds.This infused us with the much needed hope and will to take on the project. Though the donor later retracted, we had paid an advance and were in a do or die situation.
We managed to get some time from the seller and are in the process of garnering the missing amounts. We are confident that we will be able to meet our April 20th deadline
WEB PRESENCE
The greatest achievement of the year was once again our increased web presence both as a well visited website and a blog that now has a group of supporters. The blog enables one to share the everyday realities of our work and thus became a great diary of the trials and tribulations of working in an urban slum. It now has many regular readers.
Our blog and site are updated as regularly as possible and have been linked by many other sites.
A photo gallery is also present so that people can get a feel of the project.
LEGAL AID
Monica Anand a young and dynamic High Court lawyer is our legal consultant. She advises us pro-bono.
FUNDING
As Project Why is above all a project from the heart, it grows organically as and when a new challenge has to be met or a new why's answered. This of course leads to an ever increasing budget that needs to be met on a crisis footing.We are extremely lucky and blessed to have supporters who understand us and come to our rescue each and every time. Over and above the need for regular funds to sustain or day-to-day activities we had in February 2007 to find ways of saving our piece of land and raising over 70 lacs of rupees.Many came to the rescue.
- Abhigyan Jha of Unercoverpro Publications launched a book sale campaign for us.
- Enfances Indiennes and other friends have promised support.
- Asha Seattle has now Ädopted us and meets over 50% of our ever increasing budget.
- Asha Canada adopted our prep class
- Medi Plus reisen a travel agency based in K??ln became a regular donor
- Enfances Indiennes is of course ever present as usual.
- Akshay Kumar sponsored two more heart surgeries.
- NDTV gave us our yearly grant of rs 3 lacs
We again received a grant from the Foreign Service Spouse Association!
Sabrina and Chris two friends from Germany raised funds for us with a concert in Germany
Isabelle and friends one again organised a music show in France for Project Why
Organisations
Omprakash Foundation, 3rd eye solutions, Asia Bike Yours , Asha Seattle, Chemical Construction Company, Enfances Indiennes, Leila Fodil, Chopra Foundation, Asha Canada, Mediplus Reisen, Delhi Network,
Individual donors
Loreta Penna, Ines Barozzi, Elena Parenti, Umberto Nannini, Roberto Giorgi, Rosella Massimi, Daniela Di Mario ,Andreea Moniica Briciu, Ana Terenzi, Federico Valente Silvana Bruno, suma sivan, damyanti ghosh, manisah bajpai, eliazbeth grigg, meera and vikram seth, amanda jellin,damyanti, dev bhojwani, avni santani, heinrich wegenstein, savit tewari, libu balki, rajshree vasanthiamma, damyanti, dev bhojwani,andy jellin, abhigyan jha, anu agarwal, effi jono, rahul batra, shankar narayan, avantika malhotra,Vijay Kiran Kaliravapu, ak, andy jellin, abhigyan ha, anu agarwal, effi jono, rahul batra, shankar narayan, avantika malhotra, Vijay Kiran Kaliravapu,jean ellis, ian jones, phil and wendy young, bev hart, velayutham subbia, vel dhingaravel, swarup biswas,velayutham Subbia, malavika srivastava, lopamudra, vijay kiran, rakshanda malik,balaji muralikrishnan, sreeja raj, libu balakrishnan, subhash nanda, arpitha mahareddy, ganesh padiyar, chatal khoueiry, suresh sangaiah, deepak mittal, rajashree vasantiamma, harcharan rajagopal, avni snatani, naveen kashyap, gaurav shah, navjet singh, sarmishta parida, kasushik parthasarthy, rekha das, ravi srinivas, heirich wegentsein
GUEST and VISITORS
We had a number of visitors this year and many became friends of project WHY and great supporters:
Stonefeld (Stephane malleret)
Group from Bull Europe
Japanese Women's Association
Rita Chopra
Hand Emde (Medi Plus Reisen)
Satish Gupta
Mallika Chopra
Sophie Lottefer (Delhi Accueil)
Dorothea Ruesch (Delhi network)
Special Kids from France
Kim Wong Hoh and Hui Fen
Mrs Poddar
Catherine Young
GMR group
Dominique Lasserre
Shankar Narayan (Gaia energy)
VOLUNTEERS
Many volunteers came to help project WHY this year:
Lucy, Xiong, Firdaush, Cyril, Elise, Barbara, Timma, Lucy, Shawn, Mathilde, Adrian, Andy, Mira, Brian, Sophie, Laetitia
PRESS
Lokh Sabha Channel (hoslon ki udan)
NDTV India for a ive and interactive programme
Pragya TV (ek aur eklavya)
Indian express (real page 3)
To all who helped, and stood by us we would like to say: "Thank You "
If you want to know more about project why visit
http://projectwhy.org
http://projectwhy.blogspot.com
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Contact us at: C 15 Chiragh Enclave, New delhi 110048
(Field office) 251A/3 Govindpuri, Kalkaji, New delhi 110019
Phone: 91 9811424877 and 91 9999079705
Email: anouradha.bakshi@gmail.com