Jai Ho!

NGO helps Gurgaon slum kids realise dreams

From a ragpicker to the Slumdog Millionaire, Jamal Malik, played by Dev Patel, is on an Oscar high. One thousand miles away from Kodak Theatre, a little over 100 ragpickers, living in shanties behind the DLF Phase V, are trying to live the same dream.
An NGO, Edwell, is making their dreams possible. The NGO has launched Chauraha, an adult education programme, for these slum kids. “We started these classes last week and children have already learnt alphabets of both English and Hindi. We wish to bring these kids more innovative ways of teaching and better infrastructure,” says Vivek Tyagi, CEO of Edwell.
“This is a 40-day capsule programme and after this we will arm the children and women of the slums with vocational training. Children can learn candle-making and instead of ragpicking can do much constructive work,” says RC Vidyarthi, Head Project Development & Planning, Edwell. “Ragpicking in Gurgaon is a huge business and these children are its mainstay. They set out in the morning to collect garbage from different parts of town and then they sort it out here. The waste is then exported for recycling,” he adds.
“Chauraha owes its success to its unique pedagogy and production design that has an interesting mix of fiction, animation, puppetry and narratives,” says Tyagi. Edwell plans to involve the women and children of the slums in the production of smokeless fuel (briquetted fuel) to be used in an improved version of Chullha (twin stove) for cooking, water boiling and room heating.