Improving the lives of Abandoned Children

OUR CORRESPONDENT

Ranchi, Feb. 19:

As many as 30 orphans from Jamshedpur, Ranchi, Gumla, Simdega and Patna had assembled here today to share their experiences on how an organisation is helping them change and improve their lives.

The children, studying in schools across Jharkhand and Bihar, owe it to the Navjeevan Foundation, which has been providing financial support to the orphans and educating them for three years.

Today, the foundation had organised a Children's Meet, at Kokar, so as to make the common man aware of the issues of the orphans.The students receive Rs 1,500 every month from the foundation to take care of their lodging and school fees. The organisation is able to afford the expense by contributions it gets from people associated with the foundation.

Secretary and founder of the organisation, Gladson Dung Dung (28), said he wants to rehabilitate such orphans and give them a education to ensure that they are incorporated into mainstream society.Dung Dung, an orphan himself, has taken the single-minded vision in life as a challenge and is supported by 15 to 20 of his close friends.

Dung Dung said he became an orphan after his parents were murdered. He said: My life took a dramatic turn after this event. I had to leave school and discontinue my education because of financial constraints. But I somehow managed to complete Matriculation. To get admission into a college, I needed Rs 250. But I could not come up with the amount.?

That was when he decided to go to Patna, where his sister was residing. Here, he added, his sister supported and encouraged him.I managed to complete my graduation from Patna. I wanted to pursue further studies. But meeting finances were a big problem. Hence I decided to work with a single mission in life; to work for the betterment of orphans like me.

He also managed to complete a postgraduate in human rights from Indian Institute of Human Rights, New Delhi. His friends extended monetary help for this endeavour.

I can get a job and draw a comfortable salary. But I have a different mission in life, I want to rehabilitate orphans and provide them all the financial help required so that they do not suffer like I do. Hence, instead of putting them in an orphanage, I want them to live and study with normal children, he added.Boris Joseph, a sponsor of the organisation, said: We'd like to help more orphans.

Source: The Telegraph with a few updated information.

The crime of being born a girl

SANTOSH K KIRO
Ranchi, January 17

FOR FIVE-year-old Pinky Kumari, being born as a girl child proved a crime. Soon after her birth, her father started to persecute her mother. Driven out of the family, the mother-child duo took to begging. Later, the mother lost her mental balance totally and tried to kill her when a non-governmental organisation rescued her. The mother then left for an undisclosed location, who remains traceless till date.

Pinky, who was then only three-years-old when the incident took place, recalled her past while talking to this correspondent of the HT. She was in Ranchi on Monday on a visit to the NGO that adopted her and placed her in a residential school in Patna.

According to Pinky, who does not know where her parents are now, she originally belonged to Naumundi of West Singbhum. She could not recall the name of her biological father but said he worked as a cook in a canteen of Jojo camp in Naumundi. Pinkey said, “My father used to pull my mother’s hair and beat her. He always blamed my mother for giving birth to girl child.” She however failed to recall her mother’s name. “One day my father was overdrunk and beat up my mother severely. He kicked both of us out of the house. We took to begging to earn our livelihood,” she added.

One day they boarded a train to come to Ranchi but they landed up in Naubatpur, 30 kilometres from Patna. They begged there for a couple of months till Manju Dungdung, project director of Gramin Vikas Samiti took them to her house in Patna.
But the mother’s psychological health showed no signs of recovery. “Though we got better food and shelter, my mother continued to blame herself for giving birth to a girl child,”said Pinky. One day, the mother took Pinky out of the house and began thrashing her blaming Pinky for her state.

Dungdung rushed out of her house to rescue Pinky but the mother disappeared. Dungdung then handed over Pinky to Gladson Dungdung, her brother in Ranchi who runs Navjeevan Foundation, an NGO that sponsors education of orphan and poor children. “Later, we admitted Pinky in Oshan Residential School, Patna,” said Gladson Dungdung. “She is bright and wants to become a doctor,” he added.

Source: The Hindustan Times 18 January, 2006