December 2002

From the Editor's Desk

Hello readers!
One more year has gone by. Another one ahead. Let us hope that our dream of achieving quality education for all children may come to fruition in the coming years. It is a tall order, but if all people start working for this in their own little ways contributing whatever they are able to – the goal is not impossible to reach. Wishing all of you a very Happy & Prosperous New Year!
- Basundhara (Editor)

A time to thank

In the last issue of our newsletter, we talked about Ariel Rubanenko, our good Samaritan from Israel. In fact, we have had a steady flow of volunteers round the year from different places - of all ages and background. From this, a thought crossed my mind – at the end of the year, let us remember all those people who have shared their time and resources to help our cause.

Some young people from Belgium – Sophie, Stephanie and Patricia – came to India after completing their studies, before embarking on a career, with the intention of giving back something to society – 'for the education of their souls’ as they put it, so as to round off their education. They spent quality time with the children of various Nabadisha centres by singing, organising events for them, teaching them art and craft, and in the process bringing a great deal of joy. They went back to their homeland and spoke about their fulfilling experiences here, as a result few more of their friends arrived to spend time with underprivileged children. One of them, Fredrick, stayed here for more than two months and taught the children English conversation, rhymes and origami. Seeing the bonding that developed between all of them and the children, we once again got proof of what we always believed in: language is not a barrier when the heart speaks.

Back to our own country, Parvati, Tilottama, Pooja and Priyanka, all students of premiere colleges of Kolkata, spent time with the children of our Nabadisha centres. They taught different types of cultural activities .Two of them even spent time with the children during the Durga Puja celebrations and brought sweets for them. Undoubtedly, this is one puja which these children will never forget.

School-girls too were not far behind in volunteering. Instead of partying on the night of 31stDecember, a small group of class eleven students of Mahadevi Birla Girls’High School gave the children of one of the Nabadisha centres a time to remember. They sang and danced together, and as a touching gesture brought home made sandwiches, sweets and orange squash for them.

Neelanjana Nundy, a teacher in an elite school of Kolkata spends her off days with these under privileged children, teaching them art & craft and other enjoyable activities.

Abhijit, Basudeb, Sheikh Mumtaz, Sheikh Moidul, and Ramesh are young adolescent boys brought up in a residential home for street children run by Future Hope. These boys decided to organise a day long fun-programme for Naba Disha children - magic shows, cultural programme, party games : a touching gesture considering their own background. They had gone around collecting money for organising this event – hence the prizes and chocolates given by them had a special value.

Kumar Ghosh is in his early forties. A banker by profession who has recently taken voluntary retirement wanted to do something meaningful for society. He now wants to do a film with and for children. For this he is spending time with the children studying in Lake Naba Disha Centre telling them stories, acting out plays, teaching them songs in order "to understand them better" as he puts it.

Two sisters – Mitra Mukherjee and Sutapa Roy Chowdhury –are volunteers with a difference. Seeing their energy and enthusiasm one can hardly believe that they are in their early sixties. They frequently drop in at our office and willingly do whatever work comes their way – writing articles for our magazine, putting addresses on envelops, translating reports, typing, preparing teaching-learning materials with our training team – all with equal dedication.

Ronita Littler, who freelances for BBC in London had come for a social visit to India and went to see some of the Naba Disha centres. She was so inspired with what she saw that she donated 50 pounds (Rs.4000/-) which was used by us for making uniforms for children studying in the Park Street Naba Disha Centre.

Prof. Mohan Bhagat of Maryland, USA donated $200 and urged us to start building a corpus fund with ‘little drops of water’ – as he called it. Undoubtedly, all these little drops of water add up to something big which can never be measured or evaluated. Our gratitude for all these friends and well wishers really cannot be expressed in words.

Of White Rhododendrons

In the last week of December, we had a group of interesting visitors from our neighbouring contry - Nepal. This beautiful Himalayan kingdom is a great attraction for tourists from all over the world. But this time, a group of seventeen highly motivated and experienced social workers from an NGO called ‘Seto Gurans National Child Development Services’ had come touring our country for getting a different kind of exposure – for seeing the work of different educational NGOs in India. And Kolkata was their first halt. They came to Vikramshila to receive a one-day orientation on "Early Childhood Development". The head of their delegation, Ms. Agatha Thapa explained the meaning of the name of their organisation. ‘Gurans’ means ‘rhododendrons’. Red rhododendron is the national flower and hence widely recognised in their country. The white ones are as beautiful but very little known to the public. So the name Seto (white) Gurans (Rhododendrons) symbolises the deprived and neglected children of society for whom they work. When the group left for Chennai, their next destination, as part of their all-India exposure visit, they expressed their wish to continue their association with us in future. They have gifted us beautiful dolls dressed in traditional Nepalese costumes, which will always remind us of the great time we had at the end of the year.

This month’s diary

Twenty-three Project Holders and Project Managers (of CRY Projects) came all the way from Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh to Kolkata for an exposure visit. They visited our rural and urban projects and were delighted to interact with the children. They were specially impressed by the teaching methodology practiced in our centres and the discipline of the children specially in view of their social backgrounds.

Our Director Mrs. Shubhra Chatterji was invited by the Ministry of Human Resource Development to attend the National Consultative Meet organised by the Ministry to prepare a National plan of Action for achieving the goal of Education For All (EFA) based on the Dakar Framework for Action. The agenda of the meet was Group Consultation on Selected Items – early childhood care and education, education of girls and women empowerment, universal education and quality concerns, , education of out-of-school youths and adolescents, literacy and life skill education for adults, financing of education, organisational arrangements for planning and management.