================================ Ashis Roy, Tomorrow's Foundation ================================= Ashis: In 1991 Arup and Swarup used to work with Mother Teresa in Kalighat, Kolkata. They found that the children used to come to the center run by the Mother where they used to get milk and biscuits. They thought why not give them some basic education. They started with 17 children in 1991 - very informal effort with no idea that they wanted to form a formal group called Tomorrow's Foundation. These children came from 5 wards - street children, children of sex workers belonging to a high risk group. After 1 year, Arupda thought that NFE is not sufficient and started looking for a school. In Kalighat there is Dharamdas Model Trust school and thats where the children are admitted. A joint project was started with Kolkata Municipal Corporation. Parallel in france a group started which in english translates into Street to School. They started working in tandem with them. They found that there were a lot of dropouts. Children used to come in the morning and drop out of the afternoon sessions. For this they started the mid-day meal scheme. After the noon-mean scheme started the dropouts decreased significantly. After that there were many girls who were high risk and started placing them in hostels. Some boys were also placed. After they return from school, there was nobody at home [to do homework]. So they started a tutorial class that looks like a formal school in the evening. It has classes from PP [Pre-primary] to 12th. Kolkata Municipal School has classes upto 5th standard. For those classes, we work with KMC. But for higher classes upto 12th class, we provide a formal school. After midday meals, we provide various pre-vocational classes. The choice of the vocation is selected by the children themselves. On saturday, we have a quality cultural program. Since 1991, there were many children who dropped out of school and simply not interested in school. For them we started adoloscent drop outs and skill development program. Under this they have an option of giving Open School exams and they also have vocational training. Some of the children go to Tomorrow's Foundation Card Project [TFCP] where greeting card making and screen printing are taught. Rest of them are gicven regular vocational training. ..partnership with the community. We also started a small adult education program for the mothers. Essentially you tell the mothers that if you learn, not only you but your child also benefits. They have cross cultural programs. Schools in France, Africa and India write what their image of an elephant is, and through this share their views. We have published books on such cultural exchanges, and sell these books to raise funds. There are lots of students who come from various universities - Jay Prakash University, Vidyasagar University , Aide University etc. - doing MSW and Social Science. There are exposure visits to and from various groups across the country to share our experiences and learn from them. As pointed out earlier, we can work with Saathi, Mumbai. We are working on a life-cycle approach for the development of the child. They feel that the child requires a role model, and that is critical for development. The role model should come from within the community with the help of the community. The focus of Tomorrow's Foundation is what it is, and it [the focus] is not there to please any funding agency. Right now funding is obtained from Asha and Calcutta Del la Rua. For example recently one child got through the Joint Entrance Exam - a competitive exam for medical - and the child did not have funds. So Tomorrow's Foundation made an appeal on behalf of Child and Asha helped. Just working with a funding agency, such a thing might not have been possible. It would have taken a long time. If possible we have no problem with helping but we will not divert our attention from the focus area. We have placed 6-7 children in jobs. These children were with the Tomorrow's Foundation right from the beginning. Future Work: Computer literacy program: we want to work with the Kolkata Municipal Corporation on this project. Half Way Home project: We started just now. They are participating in various NGO groups. CLPOA (City Level Program for Action) , NICP and also groups like Asha for Education. UN Group on Contemporary Forms of Slavery had invited Tomorrow's Foundation to make a presentation on how TF is working with the government - about 1 year ago. There are four types of abuse. The exact definitions may not match others but this is our view. I circulated a paper on this. Physical Abuse - physical harass or torture Neglect - don't care, no supervision Sexual Abuse - Emotional Abuse - rejection I gave short case studies for each. These are types of abuse we see around and we try to work with them. We rehabilitate [some of the] children in hostels. If they are abused in any one of these forms, they fail emotionally and educationally. Permanent physical or mental damage. They themselves can become an abuser. We also noticed maladjustment in case of sexual abuse. We gave some suggestions based on our experience [included in the paper]. First we should be aware of what the problem is, what the laws are and what the system is. We also be ready to act. West Bengal has declared that nobody can employ child labor. They do notice lots of houses where there is child labor. We are working with various groups, and finding out good practices. If we come across any case of abuse, we try to work with the abuser to sensitize him/her to ensure that the problem does not arise again. We do not rush to the police. [When they do] we want to make sure that the reporting and documentation is accurate. World Week for Children - A convention of UNO. The children have two demands (1) An end to abuse and violence - laws that protect children from exploitation and abuse be implemented and respected by all. (2) [create] centers and programs that help victimized children. This was drafted by the children at the UN. Hansa: In case of abuse, when you say that you don't go to the police, do you work with the children or the perpetrator. Ashis: Our responsibility towards the children is rehabilitation. Until now we have not come across severe cases. But when we talk to the child, we come to know that some sort of abuse has happened. Once we realize that, we talk to the abuser. We educate them on what is harmful to the child. Even children are educated. Chandravel: You mentioned four types of abuse. How do you measure the type of abuse? How do you find out which type of abuse has happened? Ashis: There is a risk here, but there are case histories. For example, there is a 7 year old child and because he has three brothers, he has to do all the work in his house. Instead of working if he comes to school or does not do what he is told correctly, his grandmother and mother often beat him up. The case history helps here. Chandravel: How do they measure the abuse? Ashis: We respond to situation as needed. This is an informal categorization only based on what we have seen. We have a professional counselor deals with the situation but the teacher and other community acts a bridge between the counselor and the child. They many write down/tell the counselor what happened according to their points of view. Preeti: In Bombay when we had a lot of discussion on terms. When we say abuse it is in the context of use and abuse. We can use drugs and when you overuse drugs, you abuse. When it comes to sexual exploitation, there is no use and abuse. We could try and avoid it. It is not because we want to get into the terminology issue. But many times when you have the right terminology, your strategies and understanding of the issue changes. In the context of best interest of the child, when you are dealing with a child sexual exploitation situation, we do not want to go and report. We do not want to get into prosecution because we find that the child is not prepared for something like this. In the best interest of the child, we do not report the crime. In this case the best interest of the child becomes the best interest of the perpetrator. In this process if we are concentrating on the issue of sexual exploitation, we need to think about two things: (1) what is the message that we are giving to the child (2) what is the message that we are giving to the perpetrator - "I do a crime and somebody is trying to counsel me before booking me for my crime. So I can continue doing this and nothing happens to me except a sympathetic counselor coming and talking to me" Dr. Subbaramaih: Are you taking any measure to restore the children to the parents? Ashis: Except for the few orphans, children do have relationship with their family. They are not separated.