Extending a helping hand to street children………Nithin Belle
Jun. 18–MUMBAI — When Sujata Ganega first saw him about 11 years ago on a Mumbai street, he had a ‘beedi’ between his lips. He was barely six, had no hands, but was ‘smart’ enough to light up and smoke a ‘beedi’ with his toes.
“If he can hold a cigarette with his toes and smoke, he might as well hold a pencil,” thought Sujata, executive director, Society Undertaking Poor People’s Onus for Rehabilitation (SUPPORT), an NGO that encourages street children and homeless youth to give up the drug habit and reduce risk behaviour through a process of detoxification, rehabilitation and mainstreaming.
Sujata took him to the group’s rehabilitation centre at Vakola, a north-western suburb of Mumbai, and over the following weeks got him to give up the smoking habit.
He was then admitted to a near-by municipal school, where he joined other normal children and began attending classes.
On Thursday, Rajesh Laxman Pillay, a strapping, 17-year-old now, was the hero at the SUPPORT rehabilitation centre, home for the 100-odd runaways, orphans and street-children. The youth without arms had scored 71 per cent marks in the secondary school certificate (SSC) examinations of the Maharashtra State Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education.
Rajesh had sat for the SSC exams (in Marathi medium) along with other students of the municipal school; but unlike them, he had written the exams with his toes. The only concession that the authorities had given him was an additional hour for him to complete his papers.
The orphan, who does not even know how he lost his arms, is thrilled and wants to pursue higher education. Hoshang Irani, a SUPPORT trustee, told Khaleej Times that despite his severe handicap, Rajesh does most of the things that a normal teenager does. Besides concentrating on his studies, he does his normal work, and also plays cricket.
“In fact, he had the option of getting a ‘writer’ to sit along with him during the exams,” says Irani. “But he opted to write with his toes, and performed brilliantly.”
Rajesh originally belonged to Beed in Maharashtra’s backward region of Marathawada, but does not know how he landed in Mumbai.
Of course, there are thousands of such street-children in the metropolis, many of who can be seen begging, hawking stuff, taking drugs, or even selling their bodies.
Exploited by gangsters, pimps, employers, unscrupulous cops and other rowdies, very few of them can aspire for a better life. NGOs such as SUPPORT are few and have their limitations.
Irani points out that another teenaged girl, Mani, also sat for her SSC exams along with Rajesh. Fortunately, after her exams, the NGO managed to trace her parents to a village in Andhra Pradesh. After checking their credentials, the girl was sent back home last month.
“We called her up on Thursday and informed her that she had passed the SSC exam,” says Irani. “She was happy and said she wants to study further.”