Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
Abuse
Child Labour
Gender Discrimination
Health
Homelessness
Poverty
Abuse:
Many of the street children who have run away from home have done so because they were beaten or sexually abused. Tragically, their homelessness can lead to further abuse through exploitative child labour and prostitution.
Not only does abuse rob runaway children of their material security, it also leaves them emotionally scarred. Many of the abused children I-India encounters are traumatised and some refuse to speak for months. To aggravate matters, children often feel guilty and blame themselves for their mistreatment. Such damage can take years to recover from in even the most loving of environments; on the streets it may never heal.
A large proportion of the boys and girls in I-Indias homes have suffered abuse. In addition to fulfilling their material needs, we seek to provide a warm and caring atmosphere. Our vocational centres are also a safe, fun places where children gain confidence and self-esteem. We run a help line for children in need, and our staff are trained by professional counselors as well as have years of experience on how to foster the children's emotional development.
Child Labour:
Most Indian street children work. In Jaipur, a common job is rag-picking, in which boys and girls as young as 6 years old sift through garbage in order to collect recyclable material. The children usually rise before dawn and carry their heavy load in a large bag over their shoulder. Rag-pickers can be seen alongside pigs and dogs searching through trash heaps on their hands and knees.
Other common jobs are collecting firewood, tending to animals, street vending, dyeing cloth, begging, prostitution and domestic labour.
Children that work are not only subject to the strains and hazards of their labour, they are also denied the education or training that could enable them to escape the poverty trap.
I-India provides non-formal street schools to ensure that working children get at least a basic education. We nurture community support for our schools and seek to mainstream suitable children into the
private education system. We also provide popular and practical vocational training where older children can learn skills while also earning some money.
Gender Discrimination:
In Indian Society females are often discriminated against. Their health, education, prosperity and freedom are all impacted. The problem is worse in conservative Rajasthan than almost anywhere else in India.
For example, because girls carry the liability of dowry and leave the family home after marriage, parents may prefer to have male offspring. Many female babies are aborted, abandoned or deliberately neglected and underfed simply because they are girls. This can be seen in the fact that the female mortality rate amongst 0-4 year olds in India is 106% of the male mortality rate, whereas the comparable number in Western Europe is 74%. The rate is 119% in Rajasthan. Further evidence of the imbalance is that the female/male ratio within the general population of India is unnaturally low at 927/1000, and even lower in Rajasthan at 909/1000.
Gender discrimination is particularly evident in education where boys are more likely to attend school and to do so for more years. The traditional place of the woman is in the home and many parents and children consider education for girls to be a waste of time, especially when the child can instead be working or performing domestic chores. The gender parity of adult literacy between men and women is 29%.
Child Marriage is another way in which girls are disadvantaged. In addition to limiting educational possibilities and stunting personal development, early marriage carries health risks. A girl under 15 is five times more likely to die during pregnancy than a woman in her twenties; her child is also more likely to die.
I-India emphasizes care and opportunity for girls. There are more girls than boys in our street schools, vocational centres and homes. We also employ many women and do so at all levels up to the founder, Abha Goswami, herself.
Health:
Poor health is a chronic problem for street children. Half of all children in India are malnourished, but for street children the proportion is much higher. These children are not only underweight, but their growth has often been stunted; for example, it is very common to mistake a 12 year old for an 8 year old.
Street children live and work amidst trash, animals and open sewers. Not only are they exposed and susceptible to disease, they are also unlikely to be vaccinated or receive medical treatment. Only two in three Indian children have been vaccinated against TB, Diphtheria, Tetanus, Polio and Measles; only one in ten against Hepatitis B. Most street children have not been vaccinated at all. They usually cannot afford, and do not trust, doctors or medicines. If they receive any treatment at all it will often be harmful, as with kids whose parents place scalding metal on their bellies as a remedy for persistent stomach pain.
Child labourers suffer from exhaustion, injury, exposure to dangerous chemicals, plus muscle and bone afflictions.
Child labourers suffer from exhaustion, injury, exposure to dangerous chemicals, plus muscle and bone afflictions.
I-India provides nutrition, medical treatment, hygiene and reproductive health education to 5000 children yearly in our street schools and homes. We also operate a Shower Bus that regularly visits street points and offers on-the-spot showers and cleansing products. We employ several full-time nurses and have relationships with hospitals that are willing to treat our children for free.
Homelessness:
Street children in India may be homeless because their family is homeless through poverty or migration, or because they have been abandoned, orphaned or have run away. It is not unusual to see whole families living on the sidewalks of Jaipur, or rows of individual children sleeping around the railway station.
Homeless children have the odds stacked against them. They are exposed to the elements, have an uncertain supply of food, are likely to miss out on education and medical treatment, and are at high risk of suffering addiction, abuse and illness. A single child alone on the streets is especially vulnerable.
I-India prioritizes homeless street children. For them we provide: repatriation to their families, temporary and permanent shelter, street schools, vocational training, nutrition, medical treatment, shower facilities, and a help line.
Poverty:
Poverty is the primary cause of the street children crisis. Poverty dumps a crowd of problems onto a child. Not only do these problems cause immediate suffering, they also conspire to keep the child poor throughout his/her life. In order to survive, a poor child in India will probably be forced to sacrifice education and training; without skills the child will, as an adult, remain at the bottom of the economic heap.
The root causes of poverty are beyond a single NGOs power to change, but I-India believes in helping where it can. Street schools provide some education, as does mainstreaming of children into government schools and offering scholarships to private schools. Vocational training centres are a pragmatic, but powerful, tool to assist children in escaping the poverty trap. Children at these centres learn skills such as jewellery-making and tailoring which can prove more valuable to them than additional formal schooling. The money children earn at the centres alleviates some of their poverty, and encourages the child and his/her parents to choose vocational training over child labour. I-India has also been active in promoting Child Rights.
1.1 INTRODUCTION Education is a basic right and more importantly a catalyst for economic growth and human development. It is a crucial tool for breaking the barrier of poverty. Specifically, primary education is the critical enabler required to improve the economic and social scenario in many pockets of the nation. We also need to ensure equal status for the girl children as citizens in their own right. For any country to progress, one half of its population cannot be denied the right to education. This denial is also a gross violation of many rights enshrined in the Indian Constitution, primary among them being the right to education and the right to equality. Global statistics reveal that 75% of the 130 million children who are out of school are girls. Illiterate girls grow up to be illiterate women. This results in lopsided development as it denies equal opportunities to equal citizens. Of the 960 million adults in the world who cannot read, two thirds are women.1 South Asia has the widest
gender gaps compared to other countries of the world. 2There are many disparities between women and men across the world and they remain persistent in the areas of access to resources, opportunities and in matters of human rights. India is a signatory to many international commitments on wom ens and girls development and has its own national commitments for development and education of girls. The first reference to equal opportunities for education of both girls and boys is made in Indias National Policy on Education, 1968. One of the principles of the development of education in the country listed in the 1968 policy was: Equalisation of Educational Opportunity: (c) The Education of girls should receive emphasis, not only grounds of social justice, but also because it accelerates social transformation. The National Policy on Education, 1986 went beyond just specifying the need for emphasis on girls education and laid down some specific strategies for education to achieve womens equality: Foster the development of new values through Redesigned curricula, textbooks, Training and orientation of teachers, decision-makers and administrators, Active involvement of educational institutions
1 UNESCO, 2 UNESCO,
Draft Medium Term Strategy paper (2008 2013), 34/ C - 4 Education for All, www.unesco.org/education/efa
Cost of education Access to education Lack of adequate number of schools at stages of education within proximity Lack of institutions for girls Lack of transport facilities Inadequate hostel facilities School environment (infrastructure) Paucity of women teachers Curricula Insecurity Lack of child-care centres or balwadis
Source: Educational Development of Women in India, New Delhi, 1982 Ministry of Education and Culture
used as a way of simultaneously preparing boys to accept girls as equals. Education for girl child has long term economic implications for the nation. It is important to understand that increasing the number of girls in schools, and thereby increasing the number of literate adult women, has a positive effect on both economic growth and social well being. Discriminating against women by restricting access to schools, hospitals and jobs is costing Asia- Pacific countries nearly $ 80 billion a year. (United Nations Report, UN
5 http://wcd.nic.in/CEDAW4.htm
Assurance of equality of status for girl child as an individual and a citizen in her own right through promotion of special opportunities for her growth and development. To ensure survival, development and protection of the girl child and to create an environment wherein she lives a life of dignity with full opportunity for choice and development. To stop sex selection, female foeticide and infanticide. To eliminate child marriages. To ensure the girl childs security and protect her from abuse, exploitation, victimization and other forms of violence. To protect the girl child from deprivation and neglect and to ensure the girl child equal share of care and resources in the home and the community and equal access to services. To take measures to protect girl children from any treatment, which undermines self-esteem and causes their exclusion from the social mainstream and also to break down persistent gender stereotype. To eliminate all obstacles that prevents girls from full enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedom including equal rights in succession and inheritance.
To ensure equal opportunity for free and compulsory elementary education to all girls.
Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Convention on the Rights of the Child The Government of India ratified the convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) on 2nd December 1992 and is obligated to fulfill this pledge. Article 28 of the CRC deals with education as a Right of the child. It states: The child shall have the right to education and with a view to achieving this right; measures shall be taken to encourage regular attendance in schools and the reduction of dropout rates. Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) Article 10 of the convention states that the state parties shall take all appropriate measures to eliminate discrimination against women in order to ensure to them equal rights with men in the field of education and in particular to ensure, on basis of equality of men and women: (a) The same conditions for career and vocational guidance, for access to studies and for the achievement of diplomas in educational establishments of all categories in rural as well as in urban areas; this equality shall be ensured in pre-school, general, technical, professional and higher technical education as well as in all types of vocational training; 10 (f) the reduction of female student dropout rates and the organization of programmes for girls and women who have left school prematurely.
Group Report, Girl Child in the Eleventh Five Year Plan, WCD Ministry, GOI
Population (0-6 Years) 81,911.041 75,952.104 157,863.145 Sex Ratio (0-6 Years) - - 927/1000 IMR (April 2006) - - 58 MMR - 407 Child Mortality Rate (0-4 Years) (2000) 18.6% 20.6% 19.5%Anemia (15-19 Years) - 56% Literacy Rate 75.26 53.67 64.84 Gross Drop Out Rate - - Class I-V 35.85 33.72 34.89 Class I-VIII 52.28 53.45 52.79 Class I-X 60.72 64.97 62.58 CHAPTER 3: STATUS OF GIRLS EDUCATION IN INDIA
7 http://www.indianngos.com/issue/housing&slums/overview-delhi.html 8 Indian 9 U.
Express, February 5, 2007, Indian Express, Let Male Teachers at Girls Schools Stay Sarkar. Combating Child Labour through Education. 2004. ILO, p. 12.
Attitudinal, Economic & Socio-cultural blocks Gaps in systemic issues and process of education CAMPAIGN OBJECTIVES The campaign aims to get girls to school by creating an enabling environment and advocating with key decision makers to give impetus to girl childs education. The four objectives of the campaign are: 1. Coalition formation: forming a network to focus on and promote the right to education for the Girl Child 2. Enrollment/Retention: Increasing enrollment of girls in schools and ensuring that they do not drop out. 3. Advocacy Awareness generation amongst the families in the community, to send their daughters to school, Lobbying with government agencies, policy planners and other relevant departments to bring about positive changes through sharing of campaign findings 4.Capacity Building of all partners involved in the process, ranging from teachers, NGOs and the girl children themselves.