Background

Child Aid was first established in 1999 by Abc Xyz, a social worker involved with rehabilitation of street children. On a cold evening in May, he discovered a child of no more than eight years smoking on the road. Probing his background led Mr. Xyz to the largest red light area of the city. Once he realized the lack of attention this section of the society received, it became his life’s mission to bring a change in the lives of the children dwelling there.

Growth

Mr. Xyz started Child Aid as a one-man organization running the show from his home. After involving others interested, he worked towards understanding the needs of these children. After grueling work of 17 months, Child Aid was officially registered in 1999. Since then, this one-man show has turned into an organization working with twenty eight permanent employees and scores of volunteers.

Mission

Child Aid was established with the mission of improving the quality of life of children of sex workers. It aims towards providing a safe and decent childhood with the hope that one day they will be a part of the mainstream of society.

Child Aid strongly believes in motivating children and providing them with decent living conditions of protection, medical facilities and education. At Child Aid, we hope to prevent the children of sex workers from following in their parent’s footsteps of prostitution and a life of degradation.

Main objectives

Child Aid has realized its mission by chalking objectives that we hope to achieve with the support of the public and government. Our main objectives include:

• Rescuing children who may be pushed into prostitution
• Provide decent living conditions to all children and adolescents who require rehabilitation
• Provide medical facilities and psychosocial rehabilitation of children of sex workers
• Obtain education for children of sex workers from schools run by other NGOs and the government
• Provide vocational training for young girls rescued from red light areas
• Spread awareness in order to change the attitudes of all involved – sex workers, children of sex workers, general public and the government.

Financial aid

Child Aid is not a self-sufficient organization and relies mainly on government funds and donations for its functioning. Backing from other NGOs and international child relief organizations have also been a great help to Child Aid.

In addition, we also run newspaper drives, greeting card creations etc. every now and then. These funds are utilized for basic needs of the children. More importantly, these projects are run to spread awareness and motivate children.

Our networks

Child Aid believes that without the support of other non-governmental organization, no social cause can be entirely successful. We rely largely on other NGOs working with children for monetary and social support.

RST Child Help is an NGO working with street children. They have a shelter facility along with their own school. Most of the children we support are sent to this school for basic education.

JKL Makkala is a non-profit organization working with children from slums and those hired as domestic workers. They work towards rescuing these children from abysmal living conditions and provide rehabilitation. They form a part of our rescue network.

LMN Women’s Right is a non-profit organization working towards improving the social and legal status of sex workers. Their fantastic work has helped in improving the outlook of the government towards sex workers. Their rescue efforts have also been very successful. Child Aid connects with LMN Women’s Right in order to garner actual support for parents (sex workers) of children we work with.

Volunteers

Child Aid has successfully run public awareness programmes in schools, colleges and public forums. This has encouraged many individuals to volunteer with Child Aid. Although most work with us part-time, their support and help is highly valued by the Child Aid team.

Some volunteers are actively involved with our rescue missions. Others work towards teaching basics to our children, providing training to our young girls, devoting their time to make our awareness programmes successful etc.

Training for our employees and volunteers

Child Aid recognizes the importance of training our employees and volunteers who work with the children of sex workers. Most of us live with doubts and are unsure of how to conduct ourselves with such children. To encourage, motivate and instill confidence among them, we have an informal training session once a month.

This session is a light-hearted approach to a serious matter. We educate our employees and volunteers on the situation of these children. Based on this we also help them hone their skills of interaction in order to receive positive results on their jobs.