Victor Bansiwar and Rajashri Bansiwar - Voluntary Organisation In Community Enterprise (VOICE).

On inception of the organisation

During my MSW course, I was placed as a trainee in a remand home in Matunga. During my tenure as trainee, I learnt that children in the remand home are not looked after properly and were treated very badly.

And it was very sad to see dehumanising condition of children. So I decided at that point of time that if at all I will do something in life, it would be for these kids who are still roaming on streets of Mumbai.

When we finished our course and thought of doing something, our attention went to kids on railway platform - shoe-shiners, beggars, run-away children etc.

So we have intentionally started this kind of work keeping in mind needs of these children who need love and care.

Tell us about your programmes…

We believe that education is the most important aspect of development and upliftment of these children. So we concentrated on education and weave our programmes around that. In brief, our programmes are

Prayas.
It is a program that teaches children to save and manage their money.

Akshar - ank Anubhav
This forms the core of our activities.

Initially, all children are part of the non-formal education process that VOICE provides at the railway stations at Andheri, Vile Parle & Dadar. VOICE representatives are in constant touch with the children, earning their trust & at the same time, urging upon them the imperative of education

Swadhar
is a unique five-year experimental program for children who have committed to giving up the street to become self-reliant.

Asha Kiran
programme is for Character building and Value Education of children.

Saheli initiative
reaches out to the women that the children live with.

We also hold various sessions in Yoga, Music etc to give expression to latent creativity in children. We also teach them Japanese art of self-defense and conduct recreational tours and camps.

You educate these children non-formally, how do they adjust in main
stream ?

It's not just non-formally. Many students go to municipal schools.

There are children who could never go to school due to circumstances, so such children receive non-formal education at our centres.

We try and see that they pick up literacy skills during these programmes. If they become interested in the process then we send them to main stream schools.

We start as non-formal system and enter slowly in to main stream schooling.

How many children till now have benefited through VOICE programmes ?

In last 13 years over 5000 children received education in various form through VOICE programmes.

Are you doing anything on advocacy front ?

We have not put any emphasis on advocacy aspect.
Work required at ground level is so much that we have not been able to join forces doing advocacy work.
But there is definitely a need to do it.

Why have you selected certain stations like Bandra, Andheri and Vileparle as your work area ? Why not all stations ?

Initially when we began in 1991 till '96, we were working at Churchgate, Dadar, Vile parle, Andheri, Jogeshwari, Goregaon, Borivali, Bhayendar and Virar.

So we were at many stations. But unfortunately due to lack of personnel and railway authorities objecting to our being there, we could not continue at all stations.

We would like to be at all stations, but we cannot possibly do that.

What kind of teaching material VOICE has developed ?

Our teaching material, designed by us, is relevant to the lifestyle, thought process, and requirements of a Mumbai street child - since our focus is not just on book-learning, but chiefly on the all-round development of the child.

We have developed teaching material keeping in mind children working on railway platforms who cannot go to school.

This teaching material is prepared in such a way that these children can learn to read and write. It is based on their day-to-day life and surroundings.

They need not mug up and are required to use their intellectual skills and understand concepts.

What are your Future plans ?

We have many plans. We want to reach out to more children by starting a mobile education unit.

For this we are approaching manufacturers of bus like TATA's, Leyland etc. At present we cannot reach out to more children because we don't have the means.

So if we have buses, we can reach many more places where these children live. We plan to build a shelter for homeless girls, who are particularly vulnerable to rape and molestation. We feel that in these years we have not been able to save girl children. Majority of these girls were not in safe hands. They were exploited and were forced in to undesirable things. We are thinking if we can save these girls and keep them in safe homes.

In this regard we have made tremendous success by obtaining a place in Virar over one acre plot and we are constructing a home for such girls there where 100 girls can stay day and night. We are also planning to reach out in and around Virar targeting Adivasi community.

What role do you expect media to play ?

We would like media to bring out facts about girls and other such situations. We have been seeing abuses and exploitation of girl child at home.

Girls are not looked after well, not given opportunities. If media can pay attention to these concerns and bring out such issues, it will make our work easier.

What are your key Achievements ?

The fact that we have been here for last thirteen years proves that there is greater need for our kind of work.

We have been successful for reaching out to those who are need and there is no one to look after them.

The other area where we found lot of success is that our work is visible since it is in the open and many more people want to join our work.

As I said we are thinking of mobile education unit and Virar project. So these things are really encouraging us to go ahead in life.

What role you expect corporates to play ?

We would welcome corporate's involvement. They can help us in either way- financial or non-financial. We are open to their participation.

How many children have benefited from Srajan programme ?

Srajan is an income generation programme. In addition to making education available to street children working at railway stations, we at VOICE consider it essential to teach them skills that will generate employment & income for them in the long run, thereby enabling them to become self-reliant.

The Srajan program, therefore, teaches the children relevant income-generating vocational skills, including tailoring, screen-printing, diya-making, & creating paper products like greeting cards.

This year we have also introduced computer education. These children also learn leadership, & how to manage a small, independent unit. Children make diyas, paper products, torans, and items that can be consumed by people.

We supply to customers in India as well as abroad. There are at least 10 children who have learnt screen printing, many more children are participating. These activities have helped these children to come up in life.

I can vouch that many children are interested because it is purely vocational training. They learn it because they like it.

What about funding ?

Being a trust we always look out for public support. We do receive lot of support from individuals because of high visibility of our programmes.

People have seen our work and always wish to support us. It's not that we have big money but whenever we have needed money, people have willingly supported us.

So we do rely on individual support, corporate support, trusts and NRI. And support is something we'll always need.

But we also have lot of thinking in-house in terms of having our own programmes that can help us generate income.

Would you like to say anything to the audience of IndiaNGOs.com ?

We are very thankful to Indianngos.com because since its inception, we have been getting very encouraging support

We expect this kind of support to be continued for long time.

We would like to request IndianNGOs.com that if they have volunteers, who can be of help to us to direct them to VOICE.

Thank you for your partnership.