Iqbal's father used to beat his family, his mother left with his sister and he and his brothers were soon abandoned in the street by their abusive father. Iqbal was 5 years old and spent the next 12 months fending for himself on the harsh Delhi streets. Before he was 6 he had been subjected to enforced back-street factory work, sleeping rough, had a hospitalising accident and had suffered innumerable health and welfare injustices. On Friday 16th December I had the pleasure of taking a walking tour through the New Delhi Station and the backstreets of Parharganj with Iqbal who is now 19, speaks superb English, hopes to be a software developer (with lofty Microsoft ideals!) and who was one of the most engaging young men of his age I have ever met anywhere in the world.
Iqbal's charm, new lease of life and his private education were thanks to two charitable organisations, one of which is the Salaam Baalek Trust. Salaam Baalek losely means Saluting The Children, which captures beautifully how this organisation works based upon respect for the true needs of these vulnerable little people. Boys on Delhi's streets endure a violet and risk littered life, however, they do typically earn an average of 200 rupees per day through recycling litter, pick pocketing or washing chai cups. Because they will be robbed if they keep hold of teh money and becasue the life is so relentless, they spend the moeny every day, more often than not on solvents and video games. I was especially appaulled by the oblivious arrogance on the faces of the men who sit at huge weighing scales in the shops which buy the recycled materials from the boys. I was fairly convinced too that they had a stake in the video game booths opposite or beside these shops ...what is given with one hand is taken away by the other.
Salaam Baalek Trust has numerous contact points around the city, one of which is in the heart of the railway station where possibly hundreds of boys sleep. These centres offer health and hygiene support as well as a safe environment for the children to report and deal with any harm they have suffered at the hands of police or others. Another role they play is to trace parents and re-home runaways, often with financial support to help parents to keep them and educate them if that is why they ended up on the street. For the boys who are already established on the street, these centres are there to encourage a CHOICE to leave the street and go into a residental centre. "Encouragement" in mind, one afternoon a week the contact centres play back-to-back films as a taster of the fact that when education is over, the kids in the homes get to watch TV and films together! I visited the station contact centre at one of these times and sat with the boys practicing my Hindi - although Iqbal had given us a crash course in how to ask someone's name before we went in!! I was struck by the smell, boys to me smell of fresh air or maybe damp earth but these boys smelt like the Delhi streets which hung in dank film on their skin. My heart went out to each of them as they sat on a blanket, reasssuringly boyish with their eyes fixed on the TV screen!
The enduring image of the day for me, however, was of the beautiful wide and scared eyes of a little girl in the contact centre office which locked on to mine as Iqbal casually explained that the two girls were "new-in today ...just found". You will have noticed that in my account so far I have not mentioned girls and that is because, as is always the case in India, girls are different. Workers for various charities scour the streets for lone girls because so too do darker forces. Within 48 hours of hitting the streets, a girl (unless her parents also live on the streets) will have been taken and put to work in a brothel of sorts where they would typically have to cope with 10-15 "customers" a day.
...now Iqbal had already informed us of this gut wrenching fact when I stepped into that office so the paralysis I sustained during those moments of eye-contact was overwhelming. I almost found myself speaking out loud to myself, telling myself "its OK Adele, these two are safe" but I couldn't take my mind away from the fact that the line is so fine and that every day, some will be saved from that hiddeous fate, and some will not, nor from the fact that Delhi is one city, in one country and this is happening all over this world we are supposed to share and take care of.
Salaam Baalek run two large homes for girls in the leafy suburbs of Delhi where they are given total safety, an education, and are encouraged to have ambition against all the odds. Like the boys home that I later visited, the girls receive counselling and have a busy schedule which I was delighted to read includes a session of meditation or yoga every morning after the "freshen" session! The key difference between the boys and the girls was that for the girls there really was no choice to stay on the streets once found, however, any child can still chose to leave the homes if they like, this way Saalam Baalek maintains the children's trust and continutes to Salute them.
Iqbal's charm, new lease of life and his private education were thanks to two charitable organisations, one of which is the Salaam Baalek Trust. Salaam Baalek losely means Saluting The Children, which captures beautifully how this organisation works based upon respect for the true needs of these vulnerable little people. Boys on Delhi's streets endure a violet and risk littered life, however, they do typically earn an average of 200 rupees per day through recycling litter, pick pocketing or washing chai cups. Because they will be robbed if they keep hold of teh money and becasue the life is so relentless, they spend the moeny every day, more often than not on solvents and video games. I was especially appaulled by the oblivious arrogance on the faces of the men who sit at huge weighing scales in the shops which buy the recycled materials from the boys. I was fairly convinced too that they had a stake in the video game booths opposite or beside these shops ...what is given with one hand is taken away by the other.
Salaam Baalek Trust has numerous contact points around the city, one of which is in the heart of the railway station where possibly hundreds of boys sleep. These centres offer health and hygiene support as well as a safe environment for the children to report and deal with any harm they have suffered at the hands of police or others. Another role they play is to trace parents and re-home runaways, often with financial support to help parents to keep them and educate them if that is why they ended up on the street. For the boys who are already established on the street, these centres are there to encourage a CHOICE to leave the street and go into a residental centre. "Encouragement" in mind, one afternoon a week the contact centres play back-to-back films as a taster of the fact that when education is over, the kids in the homes get to watch TV and films together! I visited the station contact centre at one of these times and sat with the boys practicing my Hindi - although Iqbal had given us a crash course in how to ask someone's name before we went in!! I was struck by the smell, boys to me smell of fresh air or maybe damp earth but these boys smelt like the Delhi streets which hung in dank film on their skin. My heart went out to each of them as they sat on a blanket, reasssuringly boyish with their eyes fixed on the TV screen!
The enduring image of the day for me, however, was of the beautiful wide and scared eyes of a little girl in the contact centre office which locked on to mine as Iqbal casually explained that the two girls were "new-in today ...just found". You will have noticed that in my account so far I have not mentioned girls and that is because, as is always the case in India, girls are different. Workers for various charities scour the streets for lone girls because so too do darker forces. Within 48 hours of hitting the streets, a girl (unless her parents also live on the streets) will have been taken and put to work in a brothel of sorts where they would typically have to cope with 10-15 "customers" a day.
...now Iqbal had already informed us of this gut wrenching fact when I stepped into that office so the paralysis I sustained during those moments of eye-contact was overwhelming. I almost found myself speaking out loud to myself, telling myself "its OK Adele, these two are safe" but I couldn't take my mind away from the fact that the line is so fine and that every day, some will be saved from that hiddeous fate, and some will not, nor from the fact that Delhi is one city, in one country and this is happening all over this world we are supposed to share and take care of.
Salaam Baalek run two large homes for girls in the leafy suburbs of Delhi where they are given total safety, an education, and are encouraged to have ambition against all the odds. Like the boys home that I later visited, the girls receive counselling and have a busy schedule which I was delighted to read includes a session of meditation or yoga every morning after the "freshen" session! The key difference between the boys and the girls was that for the girls there really was no choice to stay on the streets once found, however, any child can still chose to leave the homes if they like, this way Saalam Baalek maintains the children's trust and continutes to Salute them.
Adele
ReplyDeleteThat sounds like a good charity to support when you get back - it must have been very emotional . You have let us understand some of the problems the poor have there - we should really help more 101